Line 6 Helix Stadium Native Plugin Quickstart Guide

Line 6 Helix Stadium Native is a plugin for your DAW that provides all the modeled amps, cabs, and effects from the Helix Stadium hardware units. Record a clean guitar track — or keyboards, vocals, drums, or anything else — in your DAW, and you can audition and tweak the full range of Line 6 Agoura amps and effects and mix down to your ideal tone. You can load presets and Cab IRs from the original Helix family of hardware units and convert them to Stadium format. You can translate your Stadium Native tones from the studio to the stage by uploading presets to your Helix Stadium hardware unit. Let’s get started.

• Installation & Setup
• Read the Stadium Native Owner’s Manual Online
• Navigating the Plugin
• Importing Presets from the Original Helix Family & Helix Stadium
• Line 6 Helix Stadium Native Tutorial Video
• SweetCare Line 6 Helix Stadium Guides

Installation & Setup

Activation

When you buy Stadium Native from Sweetwater, you’ll get a link to our Line 6 Software Activation Instructions.

Click the link to open this guide, follow the instructions, and then come back here.

Setting Up Stadium Native in Your DAW

Stadium Native is a plugin that you use inside your DAW (digital audio workstation software) on macOS or Windows. Stadium Native is not a standalone app.

Stadium Native can be used in VST3 format for Windows, in VST3 and AU formats for macOS, and in AAX format for use with Pro Tools on Windows and macOS.

Within your DAW, you use Stadium Native by attaching it to the insert on an audio track.

When you first open Stadium Native for editing, you’ll be prompted to sign in to your Line 6 account, which will authorize the plugin to your computer.

Read the Stadium Native Owner’s Manual Online

You’ll need to use the Line 6 Helix Stadium Native Owner’s Manual as a reference. It’s online at this link.

Navigating the Plugin

Stadium Native Plugin vs. Helix Stadium Hardware

Stadium Native provides all the features from the Helix Stadium hardware units that are relevant to working in a DAW to process an audio signal — not just guitar but also voice, keyboards, a drum bus, anything else — with the highly detailed Agoura amp models, speaker cabinet models, and huge range of studio-quality effects that Line 6 is famous for. You can use Focus mode inside the plugin to quickly dial in tones just as you would on the Stadium hardware.

The Helix Stadium hardware units provide the Proxy cloning engine for creating your own captures of amps, speaker cabinets, and distortion pedals. The Stadium Native plugin doesn’t support creating Proxy clones on your computer, but you can load Proxy clones created on Stadium hardware into the Stadium Native plugin.

The Helix Stadium hardware units provide the Showcase multichannel audio playback and live automation engine, also known as Song View. The Stadium Native plugin doesn’t include Showcase because your DAW already provides its own highly flexible methods for multichannel audio playback.

You can use the automation features of your DAW to control virtually everything that happens within the Stadium Native plugin through MIDI commands using the plugin’s MIDI Learn function.

You can also connect an external MIDI hardware controller to your DAW and use it to control parameters in the Stadium Native plugin in real time. In fact, you can use a Helix Stadium hardware device as a MIDI controller through the Helix Stadium hardware’s Command Center function. Learn more in the Helix Stadium Native Owner’s Manual > The Plugin Window > Automation/Controller Panel and in the MIDI Control section.

Editing Stadium Native Presets

Getting Started

1. Create a session or project in your DAW with at least one audio track.
2. Using your audio interface, record unprocessed, dry guitar or another instrument to the track.
3. Add the Stadium Native plugin as an effects insert on the track. Consult your DAW’s documentation for the particulars of inserting and working with an audio processing plugin.

Learn more in the Helix Stadium Native Owner’s Manual > Getting Started.

The Plugin Window

Selecting a factory preset

Start by examining the signal chain of one of the factory presets that come with Stadium Native.

Click the Preset window in the top center of the plugin, expand the Factory folder, and select a preset.

The default view of a factory preset

You’ll see the full signal chain of the preset, including blocks that represent components such as Amp, Cab, and various Effects.

Select a block, and in the pane on the bottom you’ll see a list of different models you can assign to that block. On the right, you’ll see the parameters for the model you have selected. You can adjust the parameters to your liking. If your audio track is playing, then you can hear the changes you make in real time.

Focus View

Focus View

For many blocks and models, there’s Focus View, selected by clicking on the Lens icon, which looks like a camera aperture. You’ll see a photorealistic image of the amp or effect. Focus View gives you a way to quickly dial in multiple parameters by clicking and dragging the circle in the field of the five descriptively titled zones. Play back your audio track and listen to the sound morph as you drag the icon around. When you release the icon, the parameters stay where you put them.

Meters & Signal Levels

While your audio track is playing back, you’ll see the Input and Output meters to the left and right of the plugin window. As you move from block to block in your signal chain and dial in the parameters, keep an eye on the meters to help you with proper gain structuring to avoid unwanted distortion and noise.

Saving a Preset

Click the Preset Menu button and choose “Save Preset” or “Save Preset As.” The standard file dialog for macOS or Windows appears. You can save an unlimited number of presets in whatever folders you set up on your computer, although Helix Native uses the default path: Documents > Line 6 > Helix Stadium Native > Presets.

Learn more in the Stadium Native Owner’s Manual > Presets > Saving Presets.

There’s Much More

Stadium Native has a vast array of capabilities for creating and editing presets. Learn more in the Stadium Native Owner’s Manual > Building and Editing Tones.

Importing Presets from the Original Helix Family & Helix Stadium

Original Helix Family

It’s easy to import presets, setlists, favorites, and cab IRs from the original Helix and HX family of hardware units. You can export your presets by connecting your original Helix hardware to your computer through USB, running the HX Edit editor/librarian app, and saving presets to a folder on your computer. You can then open these from within the Stadium Native plugin running in a project on your DAW, which will automatically convert them to the new Stadium preset format.

You can also take presets from the original Helix Native plugin that are stored on the hard drive of your computer and open them within the Stadium Native plugin.

Helix Stadium

Connect your Stadium hardware unit to your computer and the Helix Stadium editor/librarian app over Wi-Fi. In a similar fashion, you can then save your presets from your Stadium unit to a folder on your computer and open them within the Stadium Native plugin in your DAW.

Before You Start Importing Presets

Be aware that converting presets from the original Helix family format to Helix Stadium Native is a one-way trip. Just like with the Stadium hardware unit, once you import original Helix presets and Cab IRs, they will be translated into the new Stadium file formats. You can’t export presets from the Stadium hardware, the Helix Stadium editor app, or the Stadium Native plugin for use in the original Helix hardware models or in the original Helix Native app.

To be on the safe side, make sure that you retain copies of your original-Helix-family presets and Cab IRs in their unaltered format in separate folders on the hard drive of your computer while also saving them in the new Stadium format after conversion.

Before you begin importing and converting presets, there are several things you need to know. Read the details in the Line 6 Helix Stadium Native Owner’s Manual > Preset Compatibility.

Further information and practical tips can be found in our SweetCare guide for the Helix Stadium hardware units, “Importing Line 6 Helix Presets into the Helix Stadium.”

Exporting Stadium Native Presets to Helix Stadium Hardware: Compatibility

Configure Compatibility Mode under Settings.

Helix Stadium hardware owners will want to create presets in Stadium Native and transfer them to their hardware for playing live. By default, compatibility is guaranteed in the Stadium Native plugin through a setting called Compatibility Mode.

However, because the Stadium Native plugin running on your computer in your DAW has even more digital signal processing power than the mighty Helix Stadium hardware itself, it’s possible for you to create presets in Stadium Native that are so complex that they would exceed the capacity of your Stadium hardware unit. If you want to experiment with this, then go to Settings > Hardware Compatibility > Compatibility Mode and set it to “Off.”

Learn more in the Helix Stadium Native Owner’s Manual > Building and Editing Tones > Hardware Compatibility DSP Limits.

Line 6 Helix Stadium Native Tutorial Video

Here’s Line 6’s brief introductory video.

Line 6: Helix Stadium Native Overview

SweetCare Line 6 Helix Stadium Guides

Here are links to our guides to the Helix Stadium and Stadium XL hardware units.

• Line 6 Helix Stadium Quickstart Guide
• Line 6 Helix Stadium Editor/Librarian App Guide
• Importing Line 6 Helix Presets into the Helix Stadium
• Line 6 Helix Stadium Firmware Update
• Line 6 Helix Stadium Data Backup and Factory Reset
• Line 6 Helix Stadium Showcase Guide
• Line 6 Helix Stadium Proxy Cloning Engine Guide

Knowledge Base