Creating a fade-out AND a fade-in within a region

[Jay Terrien]

1.) I am having problems creating both a fade-out AND a fade-in within a region. I have gone to great lengths to try and make this occur over the last 8 bars of a song, whereas the listener hears 4 bars fade-out and then the volume cresendos back in over the last four bars to a dramatic stop.

How can I do this? Do I need to break the multiple tracks into multiple regions and then just batch fade them up or down? I tried this and it will only let me do a fade out when I want to do a fade in and vice versa.

2.) I have a vocal track that has a nice little peak in it for about 1/2 bar. Distorted, miserable, mic-shattering. What plug-in can I use to reduce or remove this little blip? And, can I use that plug-in to treat that area and NOT the entire track? I have a custom machine running XP and I use the Digi002.

3.) I am looking for some fresh ears in the Chicagoland, IL area to listen to some of my mixes before I send them out for professional mastering. Ideally, I'd like to have someone over to my Hyde Park studio. I can compensate you with food, beverages, or studio bass playing if you are currently working on a project. I'd rather have some really solid insanely competent engineer take a gander at my sessions and mixes before I go to a mastering house and have them tell me to redo my mixes. You can go to my website at http://www.grasstain.com/home.htm to listen to some older MP3s which will give you an idea of what I am doing, musically speaking. In a nutshell, there are no electric guitars on this moody, alt. rock album. It's "solo bass composer meets do it yourself business renegade"!

You can e-mail me at jay@grasstain.com with the answers or reply back here.

[Paul Curtiz]

1. Create a Master Fader (CTRL-Shift-N) and use the finger tool to draw a fade out where you need it, same for a fade in. Click (will create a "volume event" - it shows as a small point on the volume line of the Master Fader track in the Edit window) where you want your fade to start, then do the same at the end, and simply drag the volume line down.
This will fade your whole song.

2. You could always try to zoom in the waveform to the sample level and draw out the offending clip. Otherwise, a very short Audiosuite Gain change over a small section can sometimes do the trick.

Good luck

[Jay Terrien]

Ideally, I did not want to touch the master fader as I have been told to "leave that open" for the Mastering House Whizzos.

What do you mean by implementing a small Audiosuite gain change? Is this a plug-in?

I could draw out the waveform but this type of destructive edit will drive me batty since I want to preview my changes before I finalize them. Can I preview this type of change before I finalize it. THANKS!!

[Paul Curtiz]

- You can always draw out/undo a fade in/out on the master fader, and keep an unedited version of your session for mastering purposes.

- "Gain" is an Audiosuite plug (thus, not real time). You can preview the change, or you can process and then undo (CTRL-Z), or duplicate the section to another track (ALT-Drag) and keep that one unaltered. The same goes for drawing out.

PS : in french, your name (Terrien) means "earthling". I like that

[Jay Terrien]

It is very difficut to do the fade in and fade out with any sense of precision. I just wish Pro Tools would do EXACTLY what you want to do when you are fading in or fading out. You highlight WHATEVER you want and BAM! You can then choose to fade in or fade out. I am baffled that you can do almost anything in PT but when it comes to fades, things are not as simple.

[Jay Terrien]

Applying my pre-IPO project manager skills into the fray, I remembered all of those times I drew up project grids and timelines in VISIO. I drew in the diagonal fades and fade outs and they worked great! Thanks for the awesome tip.

Jay