alt-click-drag to extend regions across multiple tracks?

[TotalSonic]

Bob -
One thing I really love about SAWStudio is that pretty much any edit that you can make to a single track you can also do to multiple tracks at once when their tracks are selected in the multitrack. One omission that I'd really love to see changed would be using alt-click-drag to extend or shorten region lengths. Right now you have to do this one track at a time. When I'm editing I'd often love to be able to do this to a number of tracks at once. Any plans to change this in the future?

Best regards,
Steve Berson

[Carey Langille]

I too would Love to see this option. Sometimes i want to drag and extend 6 or 8 tracks at a time to the same length. Maybe it could act on Selected tracks like the (K) key does...

[AudioAstronomer]

Place cursor and hit U should do it IIRC? [edit] nope. Just tried, defnitely a "missing" feature. Darnit, im going to need that one today too. (just tracked drums last night with one of the worse drummer's ive EVER encountered. Even worse, a total meglomaniac rock star who insists he does everything perfect)

[Bob L]

I have visited this idea many times and still have not decided on an effective way to go...

Many issues to think about... what actually should happen? When you drag a boundary on one track, which boundary do I attach on the next track... the one x numbers of samples earlier or later, because there most likely will not be one at the same exact sample point... what decision is the right decision...cut the next track if there is no boundary... how far do I accept a no boundary condition... 5 samples away... 500 samples... 5000 samples... what else should I do if the boundaries are not the same... make all tracks the same thereby extending or shrinking the lengths of other track regions... should the other tracks simply scale the same amount thereby leaving them distinctly different but moving all together... what criteria do I use to make these decisions... etc.

If you think about if for a few minutes... it gets quite complex...

Each person will have a preference, but then its my job to satisfy as many of those preferences as possible and I see that as a tough job on this feature idea.

Besides... I must say that if you do have 8 tracks of drums, you will really need to adjust each track separately when it gets down to details... no two tracks, even if they seem to be the same material, like overhead left and right cymbal tracks, will zero cross at the same sample point, or decay the same amount, thereby meaning that each track should be adjusted for that track's material at that particular edit position anyway, so you probably won't gain much by having done all tracks together because you will find yourself zooming in and tweaking each track individually anyway.

Yes, one obvious solution is that the track region boundaries must be exact to be affected... so this only happens when you do a selected track (or all tracks) cut and then grab to extend the boundaries of the cut... but...

It already is a pretty simple edit procedure to do roughs like that now anyway... simply position the cursor and use the U key... then simply click down the 8 tracks one at a time... the cursor does not change position (a very valuable feature) and press the U key again... in the end, I would almost bet that this method is as fast or faster to do what you are asking than to have a global selction option and then go back to fix the areas where the code made the wrong choice of which boundaries were supposed to be affected. :)

Trust, this is not something I just missed or forgot about... I truly do live, eat and breath this code 24 hours a day, and I would be willing to bet I have features and actual code already in beta that many engineers have never even thought about in their wildest dreams. :)

So, while this sounds like a good feature... I am still inclined to keep looking at it for a good solution before diving further into the code.

Bob L

[Oz Nimbus]

and I would be willing to bet I have features and actual code already in beta that many engineers have never even thought about in their wildest dreams. :)


Bob L


Somehow that statement doesn't surprise me, Bob. :eek: We're all looking forward to whatever you cook up next!

-0z-

[TotalSonic]

I have visited this idea many times and still have not decided on an effective way to go...

Many issues to think about... what actually should happen? When you drag a boundary on one track, which boundary do I attach on the next track... the one x numbers of samples earlier or later, because there most likely will not be one at the same exact sample point... what decision is the right decision...cut the next track if there is no boundary... how far do I accept a no boundary condition... 5 samples away... 500 samples... 5000 samples... what else should I do if the boundaries are not the same... make all tracks the same thereby extending or shrinking the lengths of other track regions... should the other tracks simply scale the same amount thereby leaving them distinctly different but moving all together... what criteria do I use to make these decisions... etc.
So, while this sounds like a good feature... I am still inclined to keep looking at it for a good solution before diving further into the code.

Bob L

Bob -
Bringing this one back to the top!
I've thought about this - so let me describe my working habits & needs in this regard and hopefully others can chime in whether my suggestions would also work for them.

When working with recordings of chamber music I record multiple tracks (usually a close mic per instrument, an x/y pair in front of the ensemble, and an m/s farther back for the room sound). So for a string quartet I have 9 tracks - with everything "bleed". (and I believe this would apply for those regularly tracking things like drums or bands where all the elements across multiple tracks are live) Standard procedure for me is to do multiple takes of the same piece and then splice together the best performances for each section.

When I used to do this in SAWPro I would build a stereo mix of each section that I liked and then crossfade the splice points together on a seperate 2 tracks soloed in the same edl. Problem with this procedure is that every time I wanted to tweak the mix I would have to go back to the original track files and remix that area and then overwrite the exact same file that I had built that contained the regions I was using for that section. While this worked fine it could often be time consuming - and in a complex piece with many splices could be very confusing to reconstruct at later dates.

When I first started working with SAWStudio I still stuck to my old editing procedure because I was still thinking "inside of the box" and was used to old habits. I quickly came to a problem point with this as unlike SAWPro, when you overwrite a soundfile in SAWStudio all the regions in an edl that had their originating sound file overwritten would disappear (something I had emailed you about 3 years ago that you told me was a deliberate feature to avoid edl corruption). My work around was to rewrite the soundfile, close the session without saving it after the regions had disappeared, and then reopen it. This was pretty awkward - but on your suggestion I started to check out the power of splitting across multiple tracks and using softedge.

so - SAWStudio and soft edge to the rescue!! I soon realized that instead of building mixes and then editing the stereo file together it was much easier and more satisfying to select all 9 tracks - hit the K key at the places where I wanted my section to start and finish - select and ctrl-right-left click to drag these to 9 other tracks where I had my "good" section's tracks lined up - softedge the splice points on each track - and create my final mix there. Sometimes though I would find that I would need to change the timing of . If I needed to shorten one of the multiple track regions it was very easy to do across multiple tracks by selecting them and then hitting the D key. But if I wanted the to extend the regions after selecting them and shift-clicking them to pull them apart I would have to alt-drag to extend for each and every track - in this case - doing the same move 9 times. While I could still get very satisfying results this way it would still take much longer to do many edits this way than if I could just have alt-drag work across multiple tracks.

Anyway - the U key doesn't work for me in this regard because again I have to do the procedure on a track to track basis - whereas I want to be able to do this all in a single action and be able to easily sweep my start or end point.

So for me the actions that I'd like to see is this - when multiple tracks are selected alt-dragging at a region boundary sets all the tracks to the exact same point regardless of the other track's zero crossings. If the border on the hot track gets extended past the region end for the other tracks the region end would just stop at the . Any clicks at the splice point could then be removed in nearly all cases by applying a soft edge at this point. If things need to further tweaked it's easy enough at that point to focus on an individual track and move it's region start and end points - but I've found for 95% of cases I didn't need to do this. Anyway - I've used this procedure - and it works! - it would just be nice to be able to use the alt-drag to do it to multiple tracks at once.

Best regards,
Steve Berson

[Bob L]

Steve,

Many of us have been here before and I even wrote beta code at one point and took it all out after actually testing it in reality... there are still more details than meet the eye here.

What if you select a track that was not included in the orignal cut... now depending on where you grab on the other tracks, this point will be closer to the beginning or end of some other unrelated region on the track that shouldn't have been selected and will trash that track... sure, undo will fix that when you catch it... what if it was offscreen... you could do serious damage that is not so easily visible later as to how to fix it...

What about this multi-track drag code when you have slightly adjusted splice points on a multi-track cut, and the points are no longer at the exact same position... what do I do to decide which end of the nearest splice point should be altered and how should it be altered, should it be forced to match, or scaled in the same relative difference from the other points... and so forth...

I am still inclined to feel that this idea is potentially more harmful than the simple use of the U key and the down arrow to do the operation on your nine tracks... one at a time, rather than all at once, with the potential of all kinds of things going weird.

And so, should I decide to perform the action on selected tracks only if the splice point is exact as on the HotTrack... or perhaps if its within certain samples, how many samples... forward or backward... again there are things to consider.

I have done huindreds of these types of edits in projects and I feel that this need is quite frankly overstated... I simply jump to the next track without moving the cursor and the end result is exactly what you are looking for... but, again, I am still looking into it. :)

Bob L

[Mogers]

Hi Bob

Like Steve I do many projects where I record multiple takes of one-mic-per-track multitrack with lots of bleed, and then assemble the best takes before mixing. I have just completed a flute orchestra CD with 11 mics, and found myself thinking about ways to make the multitrack editing easier and quicker.

So, a few thoughts:

When I insert the incoming take into (i.e. over) the outgoing take, it is very common to get the timing not quite right.

Incoming too early

If the incoming take is too early, then I can select all the incoming take regions, slide them to the right, and am then left with a gap. This is tedious to fill, as it involves an Alt-drag on each track. U can't be used, as it only pulls the nearest region boundary, thus not guaranteeing the desired butt splice of the outgoing and incoming takes. Maybe there could be a new U-type function that pulls the boundaries of the regions to the right and left of the cursor position to the cursor position, thus creating a butt splice. Please forgive me and enlighten me if this already exists!

Incoming too late

If the incoming is too late, then I position the cursor in the outgoing take where the incoming take should have come in, and press Alt-D. Easy!

However, I think there may be an easier way for both these situations - what I think of as a "slide" mode:

If I select a block of regions (e.g. the regions of the incoming take), then initiate a "slide" move (instead of a normal Shift-Left-Drag move), then I would be free to move the region block left and right (i.e. making it "earlier" or "later") - and sliding it over the existing regions to the left and/or right. So:

(1) If the left edge of a selected region moves left, then the right edge of any preceding and butt-spliced non-selected region gets reduced (moved left)
(2) If the left edge of a selected region moves right, then the right edge of any preceding and butt-spliced non-selected region gets increased (moved right) - if possible
(3) If the right edge of a selected region moves left, then the left edge of any following and butt-sliced non-selected region gets increased (moved left) - if possible
(4) If the right edge of a selected region moves right, then the left edge of any following and butt-spliced non-selected region gets reduced (moved right)

This would make it easy to place a new take - even one where you are just replacing one or two notes of an otherwise good take - and then slide it around to get the correct timing. Once the timing is right, then all the butt-splices can be happily blurred with softedge. And it would also work in situations where not all of the butt-splices line up exactly to the same point.

Hope this makes some kind of sense!

cheers
Mark

[TotalSonic]

Hi Bob

Like Steve I do many projects where I record multiple takes of one-mic-per-track multitrack with lots of bleed, and then assemble the best takes before mixing. I have just completed a flute orchestra CD with 11 mics, and found myself thinking about ways to make the multitrack editing easier and quicker.

So, a few thoughts:

When I insert the incoming take into (i.e. over) the outgoing take, it is very common to get the timing not quite right.

Incoming too early

If the incoming take is too early, then I can select all the incoming take regions, slide them to the right, and am then left with a gap. This is tedious to fill, as it involves an Alt-drag on each track. U can't be used, as it only pulls the nearest region boundary, thus not guaranteeing the desired butt splice of the outgoing and incoming takes. Maybe there could be a new U-type function that pulls the boundaries of the regions to the right and left of the cursor position to the cursor position, thus creating a butt splice. Please forgive me and enlighten me if this already exists!

Mark

Mark -
Yes, that's exactly the same function I would love to see addressed also! Really - to me it's one of the few editing shortcuts that I feel is missing from SAW. Thanks for articulating the needs and some possible workable solutions so well.

Best regards,
Steve Berson

[Naturally Digital]

Just want to chime in here and say that I too have found multitrack editing/comping awkward for the same reason. It's as though there is an obvious missing function, as Mark illustrated. IF there could be an enhancement in this area, it would speed up some of my work.

I used to do this regularly in Samplitude with no problems whatsoever. Sure you have to be 'aware' of what's going on with each of the tracks but that's what these types of edits are all about.

I understand the points that Bob raises but somehow it sounds over-complicated. Of course, I may be guilty of over-simplifying!

Take care,
Dave.

[Bob L]

The slide mode sounds good... I'll have to look into how to try to wedge that into the already overcrowded keystrokes. :)

Interesting, that I have no problem doing that kind of edit by just simply adjusting each track one at a time while you guys feel its imperative to try to do everything with one command... just a different focus I guess. :)

By the way don't forget that the Ctrl-U functions can move both splice sides and also the Shift-U can do the pull or push following entries... I use these all the time to do similar things as your example. (The Alt-Shift-Drag and Alt-Ctrl-Drag do the same).

Bob L

[TotalSonic]

The slide mode sounds good... I'll have to look into how to try to wedge that into the already overcrowded keystrokes. :)

Interesting, that I have no problem doing that kind of edit by just simply adjusting each track one at a time while you guys feel its imperative to try to do everything with one command... just a different focus I guess. :)


Thanks for looking into it! Anyway - I certainly don't have a problem getting it to work now as things already are - it's just that I've actually had something like nearly 30 splice points once over the course of a 10 minute piece - so you can imagine that having to adjust each track often multiple times for each splice as I perfect the start and end times at the splice can get a little tiresome. It's the price payed for wanting perfection while not being a virtuoso performer! (aka - we're "cheating" :) )

Best regards,
Steve Berson

[AudioAstronomer]

Thanks for looking into it! Anyway - I certainly don't have a problem getting it to work now as things already are - it's just that I've actually had something like nearly 30 splice points once over the course of a 10 minute piece - so you can imagine that having to adjust each track often multiple times for each splice as I perfect the start and end times at the splice can get a little tiresome. It's the price payed for wanting perfection while not being a virtuoso performer! (aka - we're "cheating" :) )

Best regards,
Steve Berson

I look at this thread again and completely agree with bob. I just did a 3 minute song last night with over 100 splices PER drum track. Took me an entire 15 minutes or so. The way it is setup now is extremely quick ;) And offers quite a bit more flexibility. There's little tricks here and there you can use to speed things up very quickly ;) I even completely reconstructed a bass part in time with 11 well played notes... sounds damn good ;) It was a reggae/ska feel though.. if it were chug-along rock that'd be near impossible, but still ;) I feel like there's so many things I can learn from you guys, but this seems to be the one thing I feel I can teach hehe.

What I am wondering, or suggesting is a hotkey for turning on select mode? I maybe missing that one, Ill double check the manual.

[AudioAstronomer]

Incoming too early

If the incoming take is too early, then I can select all the incoming take regions, slide them to the right, and am then left with a gap. This is tedious to fill, as it involves an Alt-drag on each track. U can't be used, as it only pulls the nearest region boundary, thus not guaranteeing the desired butt splice of the outgoing and incoming takes. Maybe there could be a new U-type function that pulls the boundaries of the regions to the right and left of the cursor position to the cursor position, thus creating a butt splice. Please forgive me and enlighten me if this already exists!


my solution for this is:

Take the end of the left region and alt-drag it to create a splice with the region on the right. Place the cursor where you want both parts to splice and ctrl-U or if you want to move the right-most adjoined region, use shift-u.

really just 2 steps. And the variations on this become very powerful. Most of my edits last night were replacing drum kits or bass notes. I just made regions (with the soundfile view) of each note and descriptively named them. (and later made a library, for the first time!) Then used a blank track below the track Im editing, and dropped regions there to ctrl-drag them up and adjust from there. If the position was wrong, ctrl-<, shift-drag then ctrl-drag back up. More steps, but more power for sure.

I wont even get into multitrack layers heh. That just takes it all up another notch, and of course I never work without the grid... even for a non-metronome project.

Honestly I dont really grasp the slide idea... I know steps 3 and 4 already exist, but 1-2 seem to as well so Im not sure if Im understanding right.

Perhaps if Alt-insert inserted the currently selected region at cursor position without moving the right-most newly created region further right. Currently if you insert a region at a position, it moves the following entires right. Given this being done, the slide mode idea is more or less done I think.

[Yura]

my solution for this is:

Take the end of the left region and alt-drag it to create a splice with the region on the right. Place the cursor where you want both parts to splice and ctrl-U or if you want to move the right-most adjoined region, use shift-u.
really just 2 steps.
here nothing you understood. if you do this, it moves EVERYtthing butt-spliced!
but here was talk about NO moving followed. but adjusting...



Honestly I dont really grasp the slide idea... I know steps 3 and 4 already exist, but 1-2 seem to as well so Im not sure if Im understanding right.

Perhaps if Alt-insert inserted the currently selected region at cursor position without moving the right-most newly created region further right. Currently if you insert a region at a position, it moves the following entires right. Given this being done, the slide mode idea is more or less done I think.
all the same.(Alt-insert not exists)
I am sorry, but here is talking about not only "slideing" but about to make it possible to apply to multiple tracks simultaneously!

Regards

[Yura]

Hi!

apropos to these new key comands (Shift+U, Alt+Shift+U)

Bob, do you realy use them often?
Good, you have reminding about that here!
because I found problems with them. Or there smthng wrong
with my barrow.
please check it out:

go to the butt-spliced point and stand cursor to the right side of the butt-spliced point. do the Shift+U. it must be pushing following entry(es)? some thing wrong. but where.

Thanks.

[Bob L]

Robert,

The S key to toggle Select Mode On/Off.

I am coming up with a concept for this slide mode... there is usefullness there, but I will say thanks for your current support. :)

Bob L

[Mogers]

The slide mode sounds good... I'll have to look into how to try to wedge that into the already overcrowded keystrokes. :)

Interesting, that I have no problem doing that kind of edit by just simply adjusting each track one at a time while you guys feel its imperative to try to do everything with one command... just a different focus I guess. :)

By the way don't forget that the Ctrl-U functions can move both splice sides and also the Shift-U can do the pull or push following entries... I use these all the time to do similar things as your example. (The Alt-Shift-Drag and Alt-Ctrl-Drag do the same).

Bob LSlide mode would be great if you can make it work... many thanks Bob!

I use Alt-Ctrl-Drag followed by Ctrl-U all the time - once the overall timing of the edit is correct (i.e. the incoming take is not early or late), then I can experiment with the exact edit point by Alt-Ctrl-Dragging one of the tracks, and then Ctrl-U-ing the rest. The Ctrl-U-ing has to be done to each track separately, but I've got used to having one hand on the mousewheel, and the other on the CTRL and U keys. This is OK when there aren't too many tracks, but when you've got a 24-track orchestral EDL up, and you're got a fussy client in attendance, and they've got a deadline to meet.... it's at those moments when you really wish you could move all the identical splices on all selected tracks in one operation :)

Totally agree with Steve on the cheating side! I recorded one orchestra recently - amateur in ability, perfectionist in desire - and at some points the EDL was around 4 edits every 2 seconds..... ho hum ;)

cheers
Mark

[Bob L]

Ok,

You'll all be happy to know that this multi-track Alt-Drag and U key combos are in the next update.

I managed to get past some of the technical issues I have run into before when looking at this code and it actually looks pretty stable at the moment... we'll see what happens when its released.

You still need to be responsible to make sure you select tracks that have similar edit points or unexpected results can occur.

3.8 should be ready soon. :)

Bob L

[Mogers]

Bob, you are a complete star! :)

cheers
Mark

[AudioAstronomer]

That quick? coool!

Im awaiting to see all the surprises in 3.8!!

[Yura]

Hey!

so, will somebody ask for my previous question about Shift-U, that seems not working?
it is working only for one direction - to the left. I didnt find in manuals that it must work in one direction only.

[Carey Langille]

works both sides here, What version of SS do you Own??

[Bob L]

Yura,

Nothing is broken with that command.

The Shift-U works only on the left region of the butt splice... the alt-shift-drag version of it allows you to pull the left region shorter or stretch it longer while adjusting the following butt spliced regions to compensate.

The U command works by finding the closest region boundary to the cursor position and acting on it... if you think about if for one minute, you will realize that when the cursor is moved to the right of the splice point, there is no way it is going to automatically think its closer to the left region, therefore the Shift-U can only work by shortening the left region when the cursor is on the left side of the splice.

I have not worked on code for adjusting the right region boundary and pulling the left data to the right down the timeline... I really did not see any practical use for that in an automatic command.

The Shift adjustment was designed with dialog editing in mind... most of us will build the dialog from left to right, I'm assuming.

Bob L

[Yura]

therefore the Shift-U can only work by shortening the left region when the cursor is on the left side of the splice.

Not for next answering of course.

Sorry, I just was trying to follow the manual:

Ctrl-U:
"Update nearest MT Entry boundary to current cursor position and adjust following butt-spliced positions to remain attached"
nothing says about oneside working.

or, from another place:
"Pressing [Shift-U] does the same adjustment (as Alt-Shift-U) to the current cursor position. This operation does not alter edit points of the following entries".

[Bob L]

Ok, so we want to play the quote game huh? :)

Try this on for size... in the helpfile from the Using the MultiTrack / Operation - Normal Mode / MultiTrack Editing and Control - Waveform Display Area section:

Altering MT Entry Boundaries

[Alt-Left-Dragging] grabs the nearest MT Entry boundary and allows you to extend or shrink it. The [U] key does the same adjustment to the current cursor position. This operation only affects the current entry.

Grabbing the left boundary of a butt-splice and [Alt-Shift-Left-Dragging] extends or shrinks the left MT Entry and automatically adjusts the following butt-spliced positions to remain attached. Pressing [Shift-U] does the same adjustment to the current cursor position. This operation does not alter edit points of the following entries.

Grabbing either boundary of a butt-splice and [Alt-Ctrl-Left-Dragging] extends or shrinks both entries, keeping them attached and keeping the overall time sync unaffected. Pressing [Ctrl-U] does the same adjustment to the current cursor position.

Notice the Shift variation mentions the left entry.



Ctrl-U:
"Update nearest MT Entry boundary to current cursor position and adjust following butt-spliced positions to remain attached"
nothing says about oneside working.
The Ctrl U does work from both sides... the one side operation is only with the Shift-U as mentioned above.

I did find this in the Quick Key reference and it needs to be updated to mention the left side.

Key: Shift-U

Operation: Update nearest MT Entry boundary to current cursor position and adjust following butt-spliced positions to remain attached

So, there is a slight mistake in the Quick Key refernece, but the info is clearly explained in the other section.

Again, I recommend to people to read the whole helpfile or manual from front to back... the hour or so is well worth it for the info and concepts that you will pick up.

Bob L

[TotalSonic]

Ok,

You'll all be happy to know that this multi-track Alt-Drag and U key combos are in the next update.

I managed to get past some of the technical issues I have run into before when looking at this code and it actually looks pretty stable at the moment... we'll see what happens when its released.

You still need to be responsible to make sure you select tracks that have similar edit points or unexpected results can occur.

3.8 should be ready soon. :)

Bob L

AWESOME!!!! Bob - you are THE MAN!

Thanks so much - really looking forward to it - SAW keeps getting better and better.

Best regards,
Steve Berson

[Naturally Digital]

Thanks Bob!

That'll be a welcome addition for some of the work that I do.

Dave.