brand new user..HELP

[satchvai]

Well, i shelled out the money for an M-Box, but so far i do not think it is worth paying that much for pro-tools. One of the main things I need help with is enabling grid snapping, similar to the paint feature in ACID. I am using Drums on Demand and betamonkey double bass mania drum loops. When I import them, they don't take up an entire block, so when i use, say verse 1 rythm, and then import a fill, i can't get them to play one right after another with no hickups. I am really confused. Does anybody know what I am getting at? It seems like the program is overly difficult in some of these simple respects. I am using 6.7. Can someone help?

[Sacred Spirit]

ProTools is not strong on midi if that's what you're talking about. You do have some tools in the MIDI tab clean up notes, however. You can equalize their lengths and you can force them to grid. There are a few defaults you can play with too.

[Dogcode]

At the top of the edit view, you will see three buttons. Select the trimmer tool, grab the waveform with it and simply snap to grid by extending the waveform. Not difficult at all. Maybe you should read your getting started guide. Protools is very intuitive, and easy to use. You could also do a search in this forum, next time you have a problem. Most topics have been covered many times.

...dog

[spkguitar]

I always recommend watching The DiskFlix tutorials for newbies; they can be very eye-opening. The specific one that might interest you is the Tempo Matching and possibly even Identify Beat

Another piece of advice I'd like to offer; don't get frustrated because it doesn't function how you think it should, or it doesn't function how another product does. Protools does things it's own way, it's just a matter of learning what those ways are. If you take the time to learn them, you might find yourself liking it a lot. Then again, you might find yourself hating it and calling me and idiot.

[satchvai]

I'm not using any midi at all. I have read my guides and have been using the pro tools le ignite book as well. When i dragged out the wave forms the tone of the drums changed. Have any of you guys ever used these types of drum loops? Acid pro? I'm now trying shuffle mode which is letting me drag them in from the audio folder on the right side, but some of the regions are longer than others despite being the same time signature and tempo.

[spkguitar]

You need to be in grid mode. Watch those videos I linked to.

Did you know that ACID 5.0 rewire's into ProTools? Might be easier if you're used to using ACID.

[satchvai]

i watched the video again, but if you time stretch drum loops it changes the sound and tempo of the drums for that measure. Side question: does anyone here record guitar with a POD 2.0 direct with the setting on line?

[Greg M]

Satchval,

I have used ACID (and other) loops in PTLE quite a few times. I am not sure how you are handling the tempo, but when dragging your loops to a track, make sure you line the loops up with the grid and not necessarily the end of the prior file. Depending on the loop you are using, you may have a gap or overlap from one loop to the next. Also, remember that PTLE is not a "Looper" program like ACID. Be careful about streching and compressing files in PT as you may end up with artefacts.

Hope His helps,
Greg

[spkguitar]

SatchVai, if you already KNOW the tempo of the loops you are using, and all the loops you are using have the SAME tempo, and you want to keep that tempo, here's what you should do:

Set the tempo in your protools session to match the tempo of the loops before importing them. Put yourself in Grid mode, making sure that you have it selected to grid to Bars/Beats. Now when you drag the wav files into your session, they will snap to the grid in tempo and there is no need to tempo match/stretch them.

If, however, all of the loops you are trying to import are NOT the same tempo (tempo, not length; short one bar wavs can be the same BPM as an 8 bar loop), you will have to do some stretching somewhere to get everything to the proper BPM. ACID does this automatically for you; ProTools does not, which is where I think your confusion/frustration is happening.

Stretching in PT does effect the tempo, but not the pitch.