Working with audio tracks

[Neilz]

Hi all. I'm new to Tracktion, and this forum, and fairly new to the whole music production thing too - although back in the day I did do some work with Cubase, AtariST, Midi samplers etc - so I do have some idea of the basics of sequencing software. I'm hoping you can point me in the right direction with something.

I want to take an old audio track (it's a song from an old band I used to be in, converted from 4-track cassette to mp3) and put it into Tracktion. In particular, I want to align the drums with the beats/bars of tracktion, so that I can work on the song - add new drums, enhance with new layers, etc. Now clearly (as we were young and amateur) the original track won't be in time, and the tempo will vary slightly all the way through the song. So I think this means that I need to apply small time stretches, or shinkage, of segments of audio, matching the drum beats to the bars.

I'm hoping I can achieve this - how would you recommend I went about it?

Many thanks in advance!

[zzz00m]

This workflow manually lines up the tempo map in Tracktion with the beats in the recorded audio. So afterwards your "click" should match the audio track for additional work.

Tracktion T6 - Creating a Tempo Map
https://w-edstrom.wistia.com/medias/687engp5ar

[Neilz]

That's fantastic, thank you so much!

[Neilz]

Hi, another basic question, if I may.

I've inserted an audio clip, in this case a bass drum, on the first bar. I want to copy and paste this clip to every quarter bar for the entire project, ensuring that the clip snaps to the gridlines.

I can only seem to copy and paste one clip at a time, which is painstakingly slow. Or if I paste a few, then select them all and paste them, they don't snap to the gridlines. I'm sure there's a very simple way around this but I've searched the manual and can't find the answer.

Thanks.

[AGreen]

Set the end of the clip to quarter bar then loop it.

[Neilz]

I tried this, if I understand correctly - but the clip soon goes out of sync with the grid lines by a small fraction. I think this may be due to the tempo changes that I already made throughout the project. Can I loop it and ensure they always snap to the grid?

[zzz00m]

Hi, another basic question, if I may.

I've inserted an audio clip, in this case a bass drum, on the first bar. I want to copy and paste this clip to every quarter bar for the entire project, ensuring that the clip snaps to the gridlines.

I can only seem to copy and paste one clip at a time, which is painstakingly slow. Or if I paste a few, then select them all and paste them, they don't snap to the gridlines. I'm sure there's a very simple way around this but I've searched the manual and can't find the answer.

Thanks.

These videos are the "Missing Manual" for Tracktion/Waveform >>> https://www.tracktion.com/training/videos

This video covers basic audio editing and manipulating audio clips. Covers snap, duplicating clips, looping clips by duplicating them, splitting clips, using the controls on the clip header to trim and use clip loop mode to drag out repetitions, etc.

05 Waveform 9 Quick Start - Basic Audio Editing


You could also chop a drum loop and step sequence it with a step clip like this.

05 T6 Chop a Loop and Step Sequence It

[Neilz]

Thanks for the links to the tutorial vids, I've got a lot of watching to do.

And the step sequencer did it for me, cheers.

[zzz00m]

Agree that the step sequencer clip is probably the fastest, easiest way to nail the timing for a drum beat.

[Neilz]

I hope it's ok to ask for more pointers, but I'll keep it to the same thread, to reduce forum clutter.

I'm adding effects. I get how to add them for the whole edit, with one setting which is applied throughout. But I can't see how you would

a) Apply an effect for one section, i.e. just four bars

b) Apply an effect which has a settings change, i.e a reverb added over four bars where the amount of reverb is gradually increased

Any further tutorials out there which would cover this?

[Watchful]

Automation will cover both questions. The Waveform manual goes into sufficient detail on this.

[zzz00m]

The User Guide is an excellent resource for this info!

Chapter 32 - Clip Effects: Inserting plugins on individual audio clips.

To insert a plugin on an Audio clip, drag the plugin from the Browser or the plugin object, and drop it onto the Audio clip. You’ll notice that the plugin thumbnail appears in the lower right corner of the clip. You can add as many plugins as you’d like to create a chain of effects, all operating on that one clip

Chapter 41 - Clip Layer Effects: To use Clip Layer effects, click on new FX icon in the header for any Audio clip.

They offer quick offline rendering of many common audio processes but arranged as layers. You can add or remove layers at will and the effects are rendered in quickly. You can even rearrange the layers. Effects are applied from the top down through the layers.

[klangbastler]

a) Apply an effect for one section, i.e. just four bars

for this you have a second option besides automation:

cut out the four bars as clip and drag the filter symbol that you would use to create track-effects (the arrow with the plus-symbol from the upper right in tracktion) onto that clip. the effect will be used on the clip only. has only one downside, no tails outside the length of the clip, they are cut at the border.

sidenote: it is a longtime request from me to have the option to hear tails from clipeffects after the clip ends. this would make workflow elegance sooo much better ... had a discussion with drow about that back in 2016 ... i am still hoping
link to the old thread: http://www.kvraudio.com/forum/viewtopic ... s#p6410235