Can't crossfade between regions

[Chris Coleman]

I empathize with Gremz- How are we then supposed to be able to create smooth punch-in's/out's? If that dialogue comes up and I select "adjust boundaries," it moves the fade to a place where there is sufficient audio file data, but not where I wanted the fade. Also, if fades cannot be done on punch-in's/out's, then why is there a preference for the length of the fade automatically put on a Quick Punch record point (and why doesn't it place one there when I'm IN Quick Punch mode?!) I can see this as being a potential problem, especially on very specific edits/punches/fades. What is the "work around" on this one, Jon?

[DigiTechSupt]

There are workarounds but there is not a fix because it's not a bug. It's not possible to crossfade something that isn't there. Just to be clear, I forgot to mention in the previous post that it has nothing to do with the bit depth of the session or files, it's all about the region/file/crossfade lengths.

A couple of workarounds are:

- For punchins use the Quickpunch feature. Without going into great detail here about it, you can avoid this situation. Check out the manual for more info on Quickpunch or let me know and I'll go into more detail on how it works.

- Punch in on an adjacent empty track and make your punch in and out points sooner and later so that you can spot the new file into the track and have "handles" to crossfade with.

- Instead of trying to make a crossfade between the two regions put a fade out and a fade in on the two regions.

- For recording in general, record a little bit longer than your source material is long. This will give you handles to work with.

Jon

[Chris Coleman]

Jon-

Thanks for the ideas, but I still have a problem with the Quickpunch feature- I used it when I was dropping into record (by selecting the point in the track I wanted to start the punch, using a 10 second pre-roll, and then hitting record while in the Quickpunch mode), and it wasn't applying the automatic fade it should have. Please specify what is needed to get that fade. The frustrating thing is that I'm very experienced with Pro Tools and this seems to be a new problem to me. Looking forward to more of your help...thanks again.

[DigiTechSupt]

Using Quickpunch won't put in a fade automatically but it will give you plenty of "handles" so that you can put crossfades where ever you like with out running into the dialogue we're talking about.

Quickpunch starts recording at your cursor location not at the point you hit the record button on the transport and stops recording when you stop playback NOT where the record button was hit the second time. Think of it as recording a file underneath the original file where the new file is only "exposed" where you hit the record button.


If you were to copy the file you created while Quickpunching and pasted it to an empty portion of a track, you would be able to trim out or expose a lot more than just what you punched in. "Handles" in other words.

Not only does Quickpunch allow you to crossfade freely but it also allows you to move your punch in and out points AFTER the fact.

Jon

[Chris Coleman]

Jon-

Thanks for clearing that up, but I have yet one more question on the QP matter:
You said it starts recording where the cursor is, well what if that's right where the punch is? My case: I record guitar alone leaving me with no free hands to press record right when I need to, so I pick the punch point with the cursor, set the pre-roll for about 10 seconds in order to get ready, then press record. Now, if I'm in Quickpunch mode, will it start the file where the pre-roll starts? If that's the case, I'm in business. If not, please tell me a better way to punch-in. Thanks again, Jon!

[DigiTechSupt]

Quick punch is for manually punching in on the fly. So the only way to do it if you are the talent and the engineer is by using a footswitch.

Connect any keyboard foot pedal and you should be able to punch in and out.

In your example I might not use Quickpunch but use another track.

Set up an empty track right above or below the track you want to punchin on. Record (punchin) on the empty track but make the punchin and punch out points start much earlier and stop much later than the actual punchin that you want.

Once you have recorded the piece that you want, using the grabber tool, hold down the control key while you drag the punched in audio from the empty track to the punch in track.

Holding down the control key will prevent the file you're moving from slipping forward or backwards in time. It will only move up and down from one track to another.

Then using the trim tool, trim the original track over the new piece to the desired in and out points, apply crossfades as necessary.

The process of doing this is much easier and quicker than I make it sound here. Once you do it a couple of times it's very quick and effective.

Jon

[witt]

DigiTechSupt

Couple of quick questions concerning this issue.

Why did you change it?
4.0 would just mix black into the fade, irreguardless of the boundries.... It would make the fade work no matter what was selected. This was so much faster, easier and better sounding. Did you have to give this up in order to implement some other feature? If so, what feature was it?

This change was a big let down, please tell me that you guys will fix this in the future.

[Arno Peeters]

I agree here: most of the time, you KNOW that there's no audio on one or both regions, you don't need PT telling you that. I used this option a lot in 4.3: works easy, since it saves you several steps.

[jpan]

This is an interesting thread, but it would be even more helpful if I knew how to overlap audio regions. It seems like I can use audio regions like eraser tools... when I drag one audio region over another, the intersecting region seems to disappear. Also, when I punch in, any regions that I record over disappear.

I love the loop record because I can groove to a lead section over and over instead of playing a single take. But now I want to glue pieces together and use crossfades to make the transitions smooth. How do I do this? I'm sure this is an easy question for the more advanced users.