-=Great audio editors for Creating Loops?-=
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- KVRAF
- 11358 posts since 18 Aug, 2007 from NYC
What software are you currently using? I'm only asking because you might already have all you need...
Ableton Live for example is extremely easy to use for creating Loops (by enabling "Loops" in audio preferences), and I imagine other hosts similarly make it easy.
Ableton Live for example is extremely easy to use for creating Loops (by enabling "Loops" in audio preferences), and I imagine other hosts similarly make it easy.
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- KVRian
- 1143 posts since 25 Apr, 2004 from 48Hz
Sound Forge for me._
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- KVRist
- 147 posts since 17 Mar, 2009
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thecontrolcentre thecontrolcentre https://www.kvraudio.com/forum/memberlist.php?mode=viewprofile&u=76240 - KVRAF
- 37262 posts since 27 Jul, 2005 from Scottish Borders
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- KVRAF
- 11839 posts since 23 Nov, 2004 from west of east
Nice product, but no longer available -- a source of frustration to those who don't already own it.
We escape the trap of our own subjectivity by
perceiving neither black nor white but shades of grey
perceiving neither black nor white but shades of grey
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- KVRAF
- 2696 posts since 3 Aug, 2003 from Narnia
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- KVRian
- 573 posts since 14 Nov, 2005 from León, Spain
Define "in depth", because this is pretty subjective. Things I need, beyond common DAW functionality:
1. A good browser, especially one that can route MIDI loops to the current MIDI track to preview them, instead of having to drop them in the track first, which is a major workflow spoiler. I have a pretty large MIDI pattern library and that is important to me. BTW, I am currently astonished that Live 8 is not Able
to do that. Reaper's media explorer is good, Project5 2.5 is acceptable and I think that Sonar 8.5 might have this nailed (finally), too, but I am still in version 6.
2. Fast audio loop recording and editing. Recording in Live is acceptable, but audio editing is not quite so, any other program I use is better in that area, although the procedure for bouncing a clip to audio through a software instrument varies. If you need to record external audio, your needs will increase, too.
3. Warping, slicing, and such. From that point on, Live is very good...as long as you are creating content FOR Live. Both Sonar and the discontinued P5 are also able to acidize files and export them, so other programs like Kontakt recognize the slices. You do that directly from the loop construction editor with a "Save as" button.
4. Fast file exporting. For this Sonar wins hands down, if you do not need to acidize the loop first you can just drag and drop the file from Sonar to a Windows Explorer window, or the Windows desktop. Nothing is faster than that. Live is much more clunky in that area, if you need the actual audio file and not a Live Clip you need to fish it from the project folder, rename it and so on. P5 and Reaper are somewere in between un usability (for me, of course...)
For me, today, Sonar 8.5 might be the best choice for creating loops, even without taking into account midi editing, the step sequencer and so on...if you need to choose just one tool. About Live, I am trying really hard to like it for loop creation, but those points above make it less likeable than others for this particular task, and that even without gettin into the thorny issue of MIDI editing.
Of course Live's strengths are other, and as soon as I want to start stacking audio loops, doing creative processing and triggering and resampling the results Live is my first choice...until I get Sonar 8.5 and test drive the Groove Matrix and the Step Sequencer. Speaking of which, both apps have a capability that I do not know of in other programs, the posibility of introducing random variations using probabilities, Live with the Clip Follow options, and Sonar 8.5 at the Step Sequencer step level.
Anyway, I still see Live more like a sampler, and if you use it like it was intended at first, as an instrument for hands on playing you'll get the most of out it, but for content creation and library building I see that it is much easier to put things into Live than is is getting them out from it, so even though Live is one of my first stops every day when I am in loop creation mode I keep on finding myself closing it and opening other apps pretty often...which has been a bit disappointing for me because I had been looking for a comprehensive loop creation tool for a while and I was hoping that Live was this, but for me it is not, yet.
1. A good browser, especially one that can route MIDI loops to the current MIDI track to preview them, instead of having to drop them in the track first, which is a major workflow spoiler. I have a pretty large MIDI pattern library and that is important to me. BTW, I am currently astonished that Live 8 is not Able
to do that. Reaper's media explorer is good, Project5 2.5 is acceptable and I think that Sonar 8.5 might have this nailed (finally), too, but I am still in version 6.2. Fast audio loop recording and editing. Recording in Live is acceptable, but audio editing is not quite so, any other program I use is better in that area, although the procedure for bouncing a clip to audio through a software instrument varies. If you need to record external audio, your needs will increase, too.
3. Warping, slicing, and such. From that point on, Live is very good...as long as you are creating content FOR Live. Both Sonar and the discontinued P5 are also able to acidize files and export them, so other programs like Kontakt recognize the slices. You do that directly from the loop construction editor with a "Save as" button.
4. Fast file exporting. For this Sonar wins hands down, if you do not need to acidize the loop first you can just drag and drop the file from Sonar to a Windows Explorer window, or the Windows desktop. Nothing is faster than that. Live is much more clunky in that area, if you need the actual audio file and not a Live Clip you need to fish it from the project folder, rename it and so on. P5 and Reaper are somewere in between un usability (for me, of course...)
For me, today, Sonar 8.5 might be the best choice for creating loops, even without taking into account midi editing, the step sequencer and so on...if you need to choose just one tool. About Live, I am trying really hard to like it for loop creation, but those points above make it less likeable than others for this particular task, and that even without gettin into the thorny issue of MIDI editing.
Of course Live's strengths are other, and as soon as I want to start stacking audio loops, doing creative processing and triggering and resampling the results Live is my first choice...until I get Sonar 8.5 and test drive the Groove Matrix and the Step Sequencer. Speaking of which, both apps have a capability that I do not know of in other programs, the posibility of introducing random variations using probabilities, Live with the Clip Follow options, and Sonar 8.5 at the Step Sequencer step level.
Anyway, I still see Live more like a sampler, and if you use it like it was intended at first, as an instrument for hands on playing you'll get the most of out it, but for content creation and library building I see that it is much easier to put things into Live than is is getting them out from it, so even though Live is one of my first stops every day when I am in loop creation mode I keep on finding myself closing it and opening other apps pretty often...which has been a bit disappointing for me because I had been looking for a comprehensive loop creation tool for a while and I was hoping that Live was this, but for me it is not, yet.