pro tools op

Ease of Use
8

% of Projects I use it on
90 to 100

Sound Quality
NA

What it is
A DAW Controller with a single fader, a pan knob, transport functions and a few editing functions.

Problems it solves
- Unmusical mixing / mixing with a mouse
- Quick volume rides
- Easy to reach for transport

What you like about it
- writing volume automation is the most musical way to make mixes come alive. Doing it in real time as opposed to drawing it in with a mouse feels so much better and lets your mixes breathe
- Using your hand in real time on a fader brings out your personality as a mix artist. Feels better than using the mouse
- small size makes it easy to reach for and leave next to the mouse, therefore I use this every day.
- I track in the same room as the artists I work with, often I need to adjust the monitor volume of a vocal and need to do this without the clicking noises made by a mouse or keyboard. FaderPort solves that problem reasonably well
- This feels like a fader on an SSL. It is very stable and responsive to touching it.
- Twisting a knob for pan allows more precise incremental control
- Speeds up work flow
- Makes it easy to play keyboards and engineer, and the undo button allows me to get rid of bad takes easily
- Makes mixing more fun. Doesn’t feel like programming any more. I feel like I’m working on Music.
- Feels very solid and well constructed.
- Tech support got back to me promptly via email
- Made in Louisiana and those folks need our business after Hurricane Katrina… and they make a mighty nice product here.

What you don’t like about it
- the buttons click, making it less useful when tracking in the same room as the artist
- can’t automate aux send levels
- HUI protocol is somewhat limiting (Not PreSonus fault)
- Power supply is a wall wart and doesn’t reach that far.
- Using the Marker Navigation crashed my computer

Tricks you can do with it / examples of use
- Ducking offending noise
o I was working on a reggae tune where the guitarist kept making these clicky noises on the downbeat where he shouldn’t have been playing. I didn’t want to take them out and make it sound robotic, so I put the fader in touch-write, hit play and pulled the fader down only on the downbeats. I let go of it when it was supposed to be loud, and the speed of the touch write return was perfect. It sounded very natural. The rhythm of the song really came together and made the drummer sound so much more solid.
- Riding a level
o So far my preferred method of working is to set the mix levels on the screen with the mouse to get things in a state where they sound pretty good before automation. Once I have everything compressed and eq’d, muted and so forth, I write automation. The easiest way to do this is to put the track in touch write. I select the automation mode from the FaderPort so that I can verify on screen which track I’m actually editing. Then I hit play, let it go and when I need to make a change I just grab the fader and do it, let go when I’m finished. Great for small fixes on the fly.
- Working as engineer and artist
o I got a USB extender and put the wall wart on a cheap extension cable and was able to drag it on top of the piano beside the computer. I’m not a very good keyboard player, but the transport and the undo button were incredibly helpful in preventing me from having to roll the chair back and forth between the piano and the computer keyboard.
- tracking with an artist in the room on a live mic
o I like to track vocals in the room with the artist. When I reach for the mouse, it makes clicking noises in the track while they are singing. This makes those rides to improve monitoring SO much easier.
- Staying away from the computer screen
o You can select channels using the faderport as well as rewind and fastforward. I like to turn off the monitor and just listen while riding the fader.