Help Required Recording in OBS Via Reaper

Gear & Tools Talk šŸ’» Hardware, Software & Recording
1

Gā€™Day All,

So, I know there are plenty of posts here on similar topics and also quite a few peeps that probably do this so this is a fairly specific question.

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For an Audio/Visual recording I record in OBS with the audio via Reaper as per the photo, using ReaRoute. If I either ā€˜Muteā€™ a track (circle on the right) or disable the ā€˜Record Monitoringā€™ (circle on the left) it stops the transfer through to OBS.

What I want to do is, for example. Only listen to the Trio track in the headphones and not hear the Gtr and Voc track that I am in the process of recording.

OBS and Reaper has worked well for me up to now. This has only come about due to starting to record multiple parts to songs.

Does anyone know how to overcome this or have a better setup to achieve this?

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Iā€™m afraid I canā€™t help personally on this one, Craig.

@TheMadman_tobyjenner Toby, I canā€™t recall exactly how you got the Reaper->OBS thing working well. Maybe you have some ideas on this issue.

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3

David I send the Reaper audio to OBS using ReaRoute per the OPs outline above. But donā€™t understand why you would not want to hear your guitar when recording, so had nothing to add bar muting or not monitoring in Reaper, which has been done.

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4

Hi Toby,
I prefer to hear my guitar and voice direct rather than into Reaper and back out again through headphones, I find this off putting. So I have one headphone off my ear but the other on to hear the backing.

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Thanks Toby. I couldnā€™t recall if it was Route or Stream . . . I think there was a Stream option. And thought maybe youā€™d resolved some possible gotchas.

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Are you putting FX on the Reaper tracks before the audio get to OBS ? Just wondering if there was a way to feed the Trio and Backing Vocals into your AI if you are not. Also if I was trying to emulate what you are attempting I would use my UMC 1920 AI, as it has a wet and dry monitoring facility. The Dry side is what goes into the AI the Wet is the combined sound from source ie Reaper for example running on my PC. So if I want to limit how much PC ā€œnoiseā€ I get I set it more to the Dry side. Naturally the PC/Reaper sound would be low across all the tracks but the Dry input would be more prominent.

If you favour the DI sound of the Guitar why not record that in Reaper in parallel to OBS. Add FX to the recording and the mix the OBS video and Reaper Audio in Reaper when you are done.

For vocals, I can only say try and get used to how other folks hear you. Its pretty scary to discover you are the only one who hears you as you do !!! Took me a long time to adjust to that when I started video presentations decades ago. Who the heck is talking ? Oh is that me ! ! !

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Thanks for the suggestions Toby.

In this instance there are effects applied to the vocal tracks. What you canā€™t see in the picture is a Track 5 which is a Slapback Delay and the Vocal tracks route via this to add the effect.

:+1: My AI is a UMC202. I do have a ā€˜Directā€™ button that is supposed to allow me to hear back directly from the AI rather than feeding into a DAW and back but to be honest I donā€™t find it particularly useful.

:+1: Worth playing with, cheers. My guitar in general is plugged into my Katana which is then plugged into one of the AI inputs with the Mic on the other input.

:rofl: :rofl: Yes, I think when this part of the journey started I certainly got a shock, I have also sung live with someone in a bar and initially it was horrifying :laughing: I am used to it now but still find that I am more comfortable playing and singing if I am hearing me and the guitar directly :man_shrugging: Wierd maybe. :face_with_spiral_eyes:

Thanks for your input again, thereā€™s a couple of ideas here I can try. I havenā€™t really used Reaper as a video editor although I have looked at it, Iā€™ve recently started using Resolve so I could do it there Iā€™m sure.

:+1:

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8

Thanks for clarifying, as that gives me some more thoughts. What I would suggest as you have the desired FX set up on each track in Reaper :

  • Record both Vocals and Guitar in Reaper but with each FX disabled, while reccording both Audio and Video in OBS, This way you will only hear the DI signal for gtr n vox.
  • Import the OBS Video into Reaper as a new track but muted.
  • Use the waveform from the OBS audio and tracks recorded in Reaper to sync.
  • Then enable the FX you want on the Reaper tracks and mix the overall package, This will give you the option of maybe doubling the guitar for example with a delay to exploit the Haas effect and thicken the gtr. Or changing the panning or EQ for balance post recording,
  • Once happy with the audio mix and levels for your desired platform, add a Loudness meter :wink: Render the Reaper project as video output for what ever file type you prefer.

You can then do whatever you want with video editing with the rendered file, Might sound like a lot of faffing but you get to hear gtr and vox as you were seeking here and fine to the mixing and mastering of the track, as you can ā€œplayā€ with the recorded audio in Reaper.

I would do something similar for muti track projects, the only difference being I would be happy to listen the the full Reaper output while recording (and recording in OBS) and the spend time mix and mastering as I would if it was just audio,

Just a thought. :smiling_face_with_sunglasses:

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:thinking: Mr Jenner :grin: you are a cunning soul :+1:. I appreciate your help with this mate, and this does sound like something that I could run some experiments with. Reading through it I do believe you may have opened up a whole new :rabbit: hole for me, and Iā€™ll let you know later if it drives me to :tumbler_glass: :grinning_face_with_smiling_eyes: When you mentioned the doubling up on the guitar a whole new light bulb came on :persevering_face:

What you describe does sound like Iā€™m adding a lot of steps but I guess thatā€™s the penalty Iā€™ll pay if I want to achieve this. I also like you description of your process in your last paragraph but of course I need to then deal with how I am hearing the parts.

Thanks again for the suggestion, Iā€™ll have a look at this and see how it feels. :+1:

I enjoy trialing new techniques with Reaper, OBS and DaVinci but at the same time the sensible side of me hears other forum members saying ā€˜keep it simpleā€™ :joy: I probably should be spending more time on the basics and not faffing with so much tech, but I canā€™t help myself.

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