Make MIDI Drums Sound (almost) Real

How to make vst drums like Addictive Drums and EZ Drummer sound (almost) real.

There truly is no way to fully replace an acoustic drum performance recorded live. Unfortunately though, for most of us, recording our own drums is simply not an option. And so what we're left with are VST instruments like Addictive Drums, EZ drummer, Steven Slate, and others.
But thanks to incredible advancements with these pieces of software, there's still hope for us and there are ways to make our midi drum productions sound almost indistinguishable from a real live drum performance.
So in this video, you're going to learn my approach for designing a drum sound, and making it sound as REAL as possible, while using a VST drum kit. Enjoy!

00:00 Intro: Make Virtual Drums Sound (almost) Real
00:37 The song we're using ("No Surprises" by Radiohead)
01:35 Getting the midi performance right
02:47 Can I just draw in the notes?
03:09 Quantizing (don't make this mistake!)
04:50 Midi note velocity (and why it matters)
06:41 Make midi drum fills sound human
07:37 My favorite plugins for drums
07:58 GIFT: The 7 Steps Guide
08:52 RC-20 plugin
09:53 Warm, distortion plugin
10:36 Sausage Fattener plugin
11:35 Room Reverb
12:09 Inside Addictive Drums
12:45 Closing
13:19 The Final Result