Waveform Boundary - fit to window

[jgiannis]

To ask my question, I'm going to have to make up some terms, because I do not know the proper ones. I am attaching photos for clarification.

In Pro Tools, in the edit window, the audio waveform is contained within an "outer boundary" box. See the red outline in my photo. The horizontal axis indicates the time duration (but this isn't what I want to talk about). The vertical axis, however, is apparently meaningless in the outer boundary box.

Then there's an "inner boundary" box. See the blue outline in my photo. Again, the horizontal axis indicates the time duration (and I still have no questions/comments about it). But the vertical axis indicates the amplitude. The waveform literally cannot pass the inner boundary box (the blue outline).

The "Audio Zoom" button can be used to vertically-adjust the position of the inner boundary box (the blue outline). When the inner boundary box is adjusted to be WITHIN the outer boundary box (i.e., blue outline is contained within the red outline), then the area in between the blue and red regions is just wasted visual space. Nothing can go in there, so I find it useless and annoying to ever set the zoom this way.

However, using the "Audio Zoom" button to expand the inner boundary box beyond the outer boundary box results in a clipped waveform. See the bottom portion of my image. Of course, the waveform isn't truly clipped; it's just presented that way due to the zoom ratio.

My problem is that I cannot seem to FIT my inner boundary box to the outer boundary box (i.e., bring the blue outline to the red outline). It's either way below it (causing wasted space) or way above it (causing visual clipping). Most other audio programs I've used are set this way by default. It's driving me nuts that PT isn't doing this!!!!

[TOM@METRO]

This is a reasonable observation.

Why not post this on the idea scale?

http://protools.ideascale.com/

[albee1952]

Kind of looks to me like you are recording at too low a level. Are you aware of the quick command to zoom a clip(region) by highlighting the desired clip and hitting the "E" key(with keyboard focus ON). When I use that, it generally fills the screen as I believe you are wanting, but I also tend to record into the yellow on everything.