11.5 Working with FX in the Mixer
If you wish, you can do much of your FX management working in Mixer view.
Kind: concept (user-guide-section) Chapter: 11 The Mixer and The Master Source: REAPER User Guide v7.70
If you wish, you can do much of your FX management working in Mixer view. You can add FX to tracks, move or copy them from one track to another, open the FX window for any plug-in, or open the track's FX chain for more complete FX control.
For this to be possible, though, you need to enable on the Mixer menu the option Show FX inserts when size permits. The table below summarizes these and other activities.
In order to do this ... … you do this
Change the order of plug-ins in the FX Chain.
Drag and drop up or down the order.
Copy FX from one track to another.
Drag and drop FX to FX area on another track.
Display FX context menu.
Right click on any displayed plug-in name.
Display the Add FX window.
Click in any vacant area of the FX area.
Display the FX chain and its control window.
Ctrl click on any displayed plug-in name.
Move FX from one track to another.
Alt drag and drop to another track.
Open and float a plug-in’s control window.
Click on the plug-in name.
Remove a plug-in from FX Chain.
Alt click on plug-in name.
Remove all plug-ins from a track’s FX Chain.
Alt click on track’s FX button.
Toggle offline status of a plug-in.
Ctrl shift click on plug-in name.
Toggle bypass state for a plug-in.
Shift click on plug-in name.
Right-click over the FX inserts area of any track in the Mixer for a context menu. We have already introduced some of the most used commands (e.g. Add FX). Some commands (e.g. Copy FX) will not be available if you click over an empty slot. Here is summary of all the commands …. :
Add FX... Opens FX browser for you to add any installed FX plug-in(s), Quick Add FX Displays a sub-menu of recently used FX: you can select any item from this menu to add to the track's FX chain. Add FX Chain Displays a menu of FX chains, any of which you can select and insert in this track. Replace FX... Opens FX browser for you to replace selected FX with any other: any existing routing configuration will be preserved. Quick replace FX... Opens sub-menu of recently used FX, from which you can choose any item to replace the selected FX. Copy FX Copies FX to clipboard so that it can be pasted to other tracks or items. Notice the option to include automation envelopes. You can also use Ctrl drag to copy from one track to another, or Ctrl Shift drag to copy the FX and its automation envelopes. Show FX parameters in panel Opens up a submenu displaying all parameters associated with the particular FX. You can select any parameter(s) to display its controls in the mixer, or choose All parameters to display them all. Whether or not parameters are displayed with or apart from their host FX will depend on whether the option to Group FX parameters with their inserts is enabled.
Paste FX/ Paste Replace FX Pastes FX in clipboard to the selected track, optionally replacing existing FX. Float FX configuration Opens the FX window for the selected plug-in. Show FX chain (Ctrl click) Opens FX chain for the track: same as clicking on the track's FX button. Bypass chain Sets FX chain for this track to bypass. Same as clicking on the FX enable/disable button. Bypass FX (Shift click) Sets individual plug-in to bypass mode: it is removed from the FX chain but still works – for example, it still consumes CPU. However, no audio is passed thru it. Offline FX (Ctrl shift click) Sets individual plug-in offline: more of a “sledgehammer” approach than bypass. The plugin is turned off (and may be unloaded). Any FX set to offline does not consume any CPU. Its previous status is restored when it is put back online. Delete FX (Alt click)Removes this plug-in from this track's FX chain. Rename FX instance Allows you to give an individual name to this particular FX instance.