Effects and Busses, still very confused

[Christopher-Mark Gilland]

Before I even chime into this discussion, let me start by saying this is 
really humilliating, my lack of ignorance.

Though a ton, and probably even a majority of you on this list are, and have 
been, very! willing to help me.  Others however have said, jus, go, RTFM, 
OK?

Let me say this one note before I start:  I have done just! that.  I have 
read and red, and read.  This still makes no sense.  With this in mind, I am 
not going to ask you all how busses work, or how to apply effects... Quote: 
I mean, in what way, Chris?"... End quote:  oh, I just am trying to apply 
them...  No... don't worry.  I have some very very specific questions, so 
let's get started, shall we?

1.  I completely get the concept of an insert.  It's basically a place 
holder for any number of plugins.  I also get that in PT, you get basically 
2 sets of 5 of them per track, adding up to 10 inserts, A-E, then F-J.  I 
also totally get how to inject, for lack of better word, a plugin onto an 
insert.

2.  Where I am getting confused, however, is when dealing both with buses, 
and with auxiliary tracks.  I understand that an A U X track, in itself, 
doesn't really carry data, per sey.  I mean, it technically does, in the 
sense that you can route things to it through a bus, or we can set input and 
output paths on it to different places on my interface, then get audio to 
play through it, but that is just it... it can receive! audio, but it can't 
literally hold audio.  Correct me, if I am not reading things correctly. 
For instance there is no track record enable button on an AUX track.  Why? 
Well, bluntly, I edon't think there will be, as you can't record onto an A U 
X track.  The way my friend explained it, who's not a PT guy, but uses A U X 
tracks all the time in his studio setup, was to think of it like an A U X 
track being basically an empty pipe.  Because it's opened on both ends, you 
can't put anything in it to stay.  You can however make things flow through 
it.  Anyway, let's go on.

3.  I also partially! understand, sort of ish, what a bus is.  I know that 
it's basically a placeholder to send certain things from one point to 
another.  For example, I may have the output of a set of P A head speakers 
set on one particular bus.  Let's just call that bus for sake of example 
"Bus A."  I now could take the audio being fed either in or out, for that 
mind, from a track, send it, with a send, to "Bus A," and then receive a 
copy of it on that bus, thus meaning, the audio would be then fed through 
the P A speaker monitors.  I hear this is also good if you have, say, an 
external dat machine, or CD burner, etc.  We could put those on a bus, then 
send the audio from a track to, say, that bus, then basically on the fly, we 
could record the audio from that track into the device.  I'd imagine really 
the possibilities could be endless.  Now, moving on to number 4, here's 
where I'm now, getting stuck...

4.  OK, I have set up a session in PT.  I have two tracks in the session. 
One of them is a mnono audio track.  One of them is a mono A U X Input 
track.  I arm the mono audio track for recording.  I have my in,  set to l/r 
1, and my out, set to l/r1.  I now can hear my mike on my monitor, and 
hitting F12 to record does work.  OK.  Now, on the mono A U X track...  I 
insert an air reverb mono plugin on insert A.  Keep in mind:  I have not put 
anything at all on the insert of the audio track.  That's really important 
for you to remember to get what I'm trying to do.  Now, back on the audio 
track, I interact with the sends.  On send A, I set that to bus, and under 
the bus sub menu in this pop up, I set it to bus 1.  Now, I go back down to 
the A U X input track.  I set the input path on this to bus 1, instead of 
being set to no input, as it was by default.  Now, I play back my session 
with space bar.  When I do, I am noticing that the reverb is not being 
applied to the audio track.  See... this is where I'm confused.  I thought 
that sense we assigned that auedio track to bus 1, we're sending a copy out 
from that track.  Well, you can't have an out go to an out, it just doesn't 
work.  So, wouldn't that mean the input of the A U SX track now needs to 
receive that bus's signal?  This is why my logic of thinking told me to set 
the input path of the auxiliary track to that same exact bus, and leave the 
output path on the A U X track alone on 1/2 mono just like it was all along. 
Even if I move the A U X fader all the way up to +12DB, I get nothing.

5.  The only way I have been able to make this work, and this is not even 
using the sends at all, it is, using buses, bu not sends.  What I do is, I 
record my audio track.  After it's recorded, I then, set the output to bus 1 
on that audio track.  Then, I make an A U X input track.  I set it's input! 
to bus 1.  In other words, the same exact bus that I have set for the output 
on the audio track I have set as the in, on the A U X track.  Now, I insert 
my revergb plugin on insert A of the A U X track.  Now! if I play it back. 
Boy? do I ever! hear the difference!  It works perfectly!  So, now I'm 
extremely baffled.  Can someone explain to me why that worked with my 2nd 
method, but not my first?  I know I probably am not understanding how sends 
exactly work and are used in context, but have mercy on me.  I've read and 
read the documentation.  I even have gone as far as to google and try 
finding things out about how buses and sends work, but it's just not seeming 
to obviously add up.  Just as I think I get it, I obviously don't.  I'm 
judging that I don't, based on the fact soly, that what I am doing quite 
obviously for one reasn or more, isn't working.  I also hear with sends that 
I can send not the audio, but just! the effects to an A U X track.  That is 
essentially what I am wanting to do.  Basically the ultimate goal here I'm 
trying to achieve is to be able to feed the effects to an A U X track, then 
be able to use the fader of that A U X track to turn up or down the amount 
of effect being sent to the... w'w'w'w'w'w'wate a m'm'm'm'minnit!  Hark!  I 
may have just hit on something.  I just said a major key word!  I wanna 
send! hint hint? the effects from the A U X track.  Does this mean I need to 
set the sends on the A U X! track, not! on the audio! track?

God, I am so confused!  LOL!  OK Kevin, this is gonna part a our next 
lesson.  LOLOLOLOLOLOLOL!  You all're probly lookin at me gowen, W? TF? is 
he doing!

Anyway, you all let me know and maybe someone can clear up some of this.  I 
don't expect you all to teach me audio concepts as this list is for PT, not 
for learning how to mix or learning  different concepts like this.  I gotta 
say I'm quite  humilliated at my ignorance even after reading the docs. 
Please help me.  I really don't wanna be a pest asking so much.

Chris.