Batch File Generator (BFG) Updated to 0.6 [24/16bit fix]

[Jon Marshall Smith]

Hi Everyone,

I've fixed the nasty and regretable bug that was truncating 24bit output to "16bit padded as 24bit". It's available here:
http://jms-audioware.com/bfg.htm

...or the direct download URL:
http://jms-audioware.com/progs/BatchGen_beta6.exe

As always, let me know if I've broken anything else!

Jon Marshall Smith
stuff for SAW at http://www.jms-audioware.com

[bcorkery]

Jon,

Thanks. Does this also clear up the BFG to Lace MP3 conversion?
I get a shortened MP3 with the end clipped off.

I'm downloading now and will check it out when I get a chance.

-Bill

[Dave Labrecque]

Hi Everyone,

I've fixed the nasty and regretable bug that was truncating 24bit output to "16bit padded as 24bit". It's available here:
http://jms-audioware.com/bfg.htm

...or the direct download URL:
http://jms-audioware.com/progs/BatchGen_beta6.exe

As always, let me know if I've broken anything else!

Jon Marshall Smith
stuff for SAW at http://www.jms-audioware.com

Great, Jon! Thanks so much!

[TotalSonic]

Thanks Jon!!

Best regards,
Steve Berson

[bcorkery]

I had a chance to try the latest LACE to MP3 and it seemed to work fine. Thanks Jon!

[IraSeigel]

Hi Jon,
I noticed when you posted this on your site a couple weeks ago. Does this mean you're back? I remember you said late last year or early this year that you had projects that would be keeping you very busy.

In the meantime, Bob has opened the SAC playground for you!!:)

Ira

[Dave Labrecque]

Hi Everyone,

I've fixed the nasty and regretable bug that was truncating 24bit output to "16bit padded as 24bit". It's available here:
http://jms-audioware.com/bfg.htm

...or the direct download URL:
http://jms-audioware.com/progs/BatchGen_beta6.exe

As always, let me know if I've broken anything else!

Jon Marshall Smith
stuff for SAW at http://www.jms-audioware.com

Jon, many thanks for the update!

I notice that BFG still responds to the Auto Zero Cross mode by altering the predefined marked area boundaries when clicking a BFG-defined area onto a track with underlying audio regions. This then affects the resultant buildmix from such a BFG entry. I wouldn't think this is usually desirable. (though I could be wrong)

Any plans to change that? This has caught me by surprise on several occasions. Hopefully, by now, I'm not as surprised when it happens. :o

Please weigh in with your opinions, people.

[Ian Alexander]

Jon, many thanks for the update!

I notice that BFG still responds to the Auto Zero Cross mode by altering the predefined marked area boundaries when clicking a BFG-defined area onto a track with underlying audio regions. This then affects the resultant buildmix from such a BFG entry. I wouldn't think this is usually desirable. (though I could be wrong)

Any plans to change that? This has caught me by surprise on several occasions. Hopefully, by now, I'm not as surprised when it happens. :o

Please weigh in with your opinions, people.
Interesting question, Dave. On one hand, it sounds like it's very important to have the length of each CD track equal a whole number of sectors (1/75 of a second, I think). On the other hand, I've burned lots of disc at once CDs where I marked the tracks in the SS MT with no attention to sectors. Even choral recordings where the sound continues from track to track. No clicks or anything other than seamless audio. Have I just been lucky? Or do burning apps correct this by trimming or repeating samples to hit the sector boundaries? I wonder if such minutiae appear in the help file.

[Naturally Digital]

Jon, many thanks for the update!

I notice that BFG still responds to the Auto Zero Cross mode by altering the predefined marked area boundaries when clicking a BFG-defined area onto a track with underlying audio regions.

Please weigh in with your opinions, people.I think you should turn off the Auto Zero Cross Mode when you don't want it to affect your selections.

[Dave Labrecque]

Interesting question, Dave. On one hand, it sounds like it's very important to have the length of each CD track equal a whole number of sectors (1/75 of a second, I think). On the other hand, I've burned lots of disc at once CDs where I marked the tracks in the SS MT with no attention to sectors. Even choral recordings where the sound continues from track to track. No clicks or anything other than seamless audio. Have I just been lucky? Or do burning apps correct this by trimming or repeating samples to hit the sector boundaries? I wonder if such minutiae appear in the help file.

Ian, I think you're confusing BFG with CSG. My point is unrelated to CDs.

As for your CD point, though... years ago I used to do as you say -- building CD tracks from SAW's MT without regard for CD frame "quantizing". I never noticed a problem until I learned about the concept for the first time from folks around here. After that, when I'd listen closely, I'd usually hear a little pop at continuous-material index points. Oddly, I don't recall that it was ever a "big" pop, like we might hear when editing a waveform far off of the zero-energy point. So, maybe there is something going on in the background with the authoring process or even with the CD player?

Steve Berson?

[Dave Labrecque]

I think you should turn off the Auto Zero Cross Mode when you don't want it to affect your selections.

Yeah. I figured that much out. :)

I'm just wondering if anyone has a need for it to behave this way. Seems like unpredictable changes to the BFG-defined areas would usually not be a good thing. Reading about why Jon created BFG in the first place (instrument sample creation, I believe), it certainly doesn't seem like it's the correct behavior.

[TotalSonic]

Ian, I think you're confusing BFG with CSG. My point is unrelated to CDs.

As for your CD point, though... years ago I used to do as you say -- building CD tracks from SAW's MT without regard for CD frame "quantizing". I never noticed a problem until I learned about the concept for the first time from folks around here. After that, when I'd listen closely, I'd usually hear a little pop at continuous-material index points. Oddly, I don't recall that it was ever a "big" pop, like we might hear when editing a waveform far off of the zero-energy point. So, maybe there is something going on in the background with the authoring process or even with the CD player?

Steve Berson?

You may not have noticed this before - CSG will automatically place any index points at the nearest CD Frame (75 frames a second) crossing point - which it must do in order for the results to be Red Book spec compliant. You can see this in action if you zoom in closely to the multitrack prior to pressing the "+" button - often the actual created index point will be a few sample distance away from where your cursor was originally.

When creating track index points across continuous audio it's important to be aware of this issue - as if you are not careful you can end up with a click when advancing to this track id via a remote or transports control if the CD Frame the track index point is on is not actually on a zero energy crossing point.

Since afaik BFG was created by expanding CSG's code I'm wondering whether BFG follows the same CD Frame compliant rules when marking region beginnings or endings.

Best regards,
Steve Berson

[Dave Labrecque]

You may not have noticed this before - CSG will automatically place any index points at the nearest CD Frame (75 frames a second) crossing point - which it must do in order for the results to be Red Book spec compliant. You can see this in action if you zoom in closely to the multitrack prior to pressing the "+" button - often the actual created index point will be a few sample distance away from where your cursor was originally.

When creating track index points across continuous audio it's important to be aware of this issue - as if you are not careful you can end up with a click when advancing to this track id via a remote or transports control if the CD Frame the track index point is on is not actually on a zero energy crossing point.

Since afaik BFG was created by expanding CSG's code I'm wondering whether BFG follows the same CD Frame compliant rules when marking region beginnings or endings.

Best regards,
Steve Berson

Yeah, I know about CSG's frame boundary thing. That's why we love it! :)

BFG is responding to the auto zero cross setting on the Options menu and not CD frames so far as I can tell.

[Naturally Digital]

Reading about why Jon created BFG in the first place (instrument sample creation, I believe), it certainly doesn't seem like it's the correct behavior.Really? It seems correct to me. I would prefer that it follow the auto zero cross option. Having said that, I haven't had a need for the auto zero cross in quite a few years...

[TotalSonic]

Yeah, I know about CSG's frame boundary thing. That's why we love it! :)

BFG is responding to the auto zero cross setting on the Options menu and not CD frames so far as I can tell.

Thanks for the clarification - I never have auto zero cross activated so I had never noticed this when using BFG.

Seems it should respond this way though as when creating regions for exporting to individual loops you would want the starts and ends to be at zero crossing points.

Best regards,
Steve Berson

[Bob L]

Dave,

The plugins have no control of auto zero cross... that happens in SAWStudio... you either turn it ON or OFF... simple as that.

Bob L

[Ian Alexander]

Ian, I think you're confusing BFG with CSG. My point is unrelated to CDs.

As for your CD point, though... years ago I used to do as you say -- building CD tracks from SAW's MT without regard for CD frame "quantizing". I never noticed a problem until I learned about the concept for the first time from folks around here. After that, when I'd listen closely, I'd usually hear a little pop at continuous-material index points. Oddly, I don't recall that it was ever a "big" pop, like we might hear when editing a waveform far off of the zero-energy point. So, maybe there is something going on in the background with the authoring process or even with the CD player?

Steve Berson?
Well, Dave, on reading your question again, it's my opinion that the letter sequences BFG and CSG are far too similar. So, um, nevermind...:o

[Dave Labrecque]

Well, Dave, on reading your question again, it's my opinion that the letter sequences BFG and CSG are far too similar. So, um, nevermind...:o

Did I offend? Sure didn't mean to. :(

[Dave Labrecque]

Thanks for the clarification - I never have auto zero cross activated so I had never noticed this when using BFG.

Seems it should respond this way though as when creating regions for exporting to individual loops you would want the starts and ends to be at zero crossing points.

Best regards,
Steve Berson

I agree, except that then the length of the loop changes, which is almost always a bad thing. When I've noticed it, it's lopped off the start or end of something I didn't want lopped. I always take care of zero cross editing myself, so that I can set the BFG zones exactly as I need. But sometimes a re-AZC action still changes things -- as the center of the "seek" zone changes, I guess.

[Dave Labrecque]

Dave,

The plugins have no control of auto zero cross... that happens in SAWStudio... you either turn it ON or OFF... simple as that.

Bob L

I know. I'm not expecting that. I'm expecting BFG-defined zones to stay intact, that's all. I'm not sure why auto zero cross even comes into it, actually.

Maybe BFG is using the B and E calls to mark it's zones? I wonder if there's a way for BFG to use the dragging-in-the-timeline subroutine instead. That would allow the zones to stay intact, regardless of the AZC mode.

[Ian Alexander]

Did I offend? Sure didn't mean to. :(
Couldn't you see my sheepish grin between the lines? Sorry. No offense taken at all.:)

[Dave Labrecque]

Couldn't you see my sheepish grin between the lines? Sorry. No offense taken at all.:)

Oh, good. Missed the sheepish grin, sorry. Must have something to do with wool being pulled over my eyes. OK, that doesn't actually make sense. :p

[Dave Labrecque]

Looks like at least one bug is still there: When the BFG interface is open, ctrl-right-arrow doesn't take you to the right side of the marked area in the SF view like it normally does.

[TotalSonic]

Looks like at least one bug is still there: When the BFG interface is open, ctrl-right-arrow doesn't take you to the right side of the marked area in the SF view like it normally does.

I haven't noticed this. Is it happening when your cursor is positioned over the BFG gui - or in all cases when the BFG interface is open? Does this behavior stop when you close the BFG gui?

Anyway - at the risk of obnoxiously repeating myself - just because Jon made a recent posting here on this forum does not mean that he has started regularly lurking here. If you are finding bugs with his products and you want him to actually address them you should email him directly at jon at jms-audioware dot com as it is likely he will not just see the reports made in posts on this forum.

Best regards,
Steve Berson

[Dave Labrecque]

I haven't noticed this. Is it happening when your cursor is positioned over the BFG gui - or in all cases when the BFG interface is open? Does this behavior stop when you close the BFG gui?

Anyway - at the risk of obnoxiously repeating myself - just because Jon made a recent posting here on this forum does not mean that he has started regularly lurking here. If you are finding bugs with his products and you want him to actually address them you should email him directly at jon at jms-audioware dot com as it is likely he will not just see the reports made in posts on this forum.

Best regards,
Steve Berson

Anytime the BFG GUI is open. Close it and the problem goes away.

I did email him about it today. Actually, I think I emailed him about it months ago, but... well, he's a busy man. :)

Can you confirm this bug, Steve?

[TotalSonic]

Anytime the BFG GUI is open. Close it and the problem goes away.

I did email him about it today. Actually, I think I emailed him about it months ago, but... well, he's a busy man. :)

Can you confirm this bug, Steve?

When I'm back in the studio later this evening I'll see whether I can duplicate it and if I can I'll email Jon as well.

Best regards,
Steve Berson

[Dave Labrecque]

When I'm back in the studio later this evening I'll see whether I can duplicate it and if I can I'll email Jon as well.

Best regards,
Steve Berson

Thanks, my man.

[TotalSonic]

Thanks, my man.

Dave -
I've confirmed the bug you found here (guess it wasn't just due to the "mystery vortex" that hovers around your studio after all) - and will email Jon to let him know about it.

Best regards,
Steve Berson

[Dave Labrecque]

Dave -
I've confirmed the bug you found here (guess it wasn't just due to the "mystery vortex" that hovers around your studio after all) - and will email Jon to let him know about it.

Best regards,
Steve Berson

Super. Thanks, again.

They say Tucson is far enough away from Sedona (http://www.lovesedona.com/01.htm) to avoid most vortex phenomena. But perhaps not all. :p