Any good cue sheet (dubbing log) programs?

[Ginger]

Hi,

Anybody using a good cue sheet or dubbing log generator? I'm looking for something that will allow me to just drop my session doc on to it and generate a cue sheet for me so I don't have to write them up. Not lazy, just pressed for time;-).

There use to be something called Trackit back in the PT 4.3 days. Not sure what happened to it.

I've heard about Tape from the people at Wild Sync but it's kinda expensive just for what I need. I'm doing music so I don't need all the conforming and other features the sound department uses.

Let me know if you're using something you really like.

Thanks.

[mfranken]

Check out MixMap

I haven't used it for a few years but back it's simple to use, let's you set track widths, track headers, fonts etc, and now I see it can open 5.1 sessions and print fades.

Mark

[Richard Fairbanks]

I'm not sure MixMap is a current program. It is OS9 now and appears to be the same version I looked at in January 2002. Perhaps it works in classic mode, I do not know. I wanted to buy it at the time and after two emails and a phone call, about a week after, I got a call back. The fellow I spoke with had no knowledge of OSX nor any other future changes. I got the feeling that if I had given him a credit card number during that call I could have purchased, but they did not return my followup phone call when I wanted to buy. I decided that it was not a smart purchase for me as it did not seem to be very well supported. Your mileage may vary. Now I reformat Pro Tools' text exports or spend inordinate amounts of time preparing ADR sheets. For Foley work, we just rely on our wits and notes made directly to the timeline. It seems mickymouse but I tell myself we are helping to save the world's forests.

There must be a better way.

[Ornum]

You may want to talk to a chap by the name of Timothy Mehlenbacher, you can get a hold of him through http://www.mehlenbacher.com he has written a pretty whicked utility for cue sheeting.

[Dan Pinder]

Huh? that is a baffling web page with no way to get in without a username and PW.

Me and a couple of other music editor friends of mine were thinking about paying some software engineer to make one based on our specs, but it seems like it would be very expensive to pay for the time of a good engineer. in the meantime, I suffer through the old Tape Cue Sheet and wait for Rick to re-write it in OS X.

[Pietari Koskinen]

Check out Tracks! It used to cost $140 when I bought it, but it's now $20 shareware. OS9 only, I think, but should work in Classic.

[JKD99]

Hi Richard
You mentioned the Foley side of cuesheeting, I may have a tip for you. The Foley stage we use (Post Creations in Van Nuys, fantastic work) shoots Foley directly to Pro Tools. So, when we're programming, we basically take a file of blank audio and "cut it" into the session for each cue. So, our "cue" session looks like a finished reel of foley, but there's nothing but regions of silence. We send this to the stage, and they open up the session and can then record each cue in place of the blank regions; no sheets neccessary. Sometimes the artists want sheets so they can see what's coming up, sometimes not...Another cool thing about this is that you can conform the session if you get a picture change before the foley is shot, you don't have to make a whole new cuesheet.
Personally, I HATE cuesheets. Such a waste of paper. Save the trees, indeed!
You very well may already be cueing/shooting Foley like this, so if this is a "duhhh" post, sorry. Maybe someone else can get something from it!

[Noiz2]

We've been doing it that way for awhile, works great. Even if your going to cue sheets its easier to create the session and cue sheet it.
SK

[Richard Fairbanks]

Yup, that is mostly what we do also! It is a great tip and I'm glad you took the time to lay it out for the DUC. One of the Foley walkers I use from time to time likes to work from a paper list in order to see what is coming, organize her props, and help keep the recording efficient. Except for that, and ADR cuesheets, I have not printed an EDL in a very long time.
Sometimes I prefer to record to a single track and pull keeper takes to their destination. This way, I can easily deliver recorded takes grouped in a way that makes sense in the mix, and adjust them as I go, even though the spotting cues are often grouped by surface or particular prop. We go through a show and record all similar things (boots on concrete for instance), then go to the next cue track and skip through the show doing all of them, and so on.

[Tiago Silva]

Hi, Richard, just trying to understand how do you keep yourself organized: if you write the cues in "silent slug" in Protools tracks and forego cuesheets, how do you keep them arranged by surface/prop/shoe etc? Lots of tracks? My mixer hates lots of foley tracks, because the producers don't give him enough time to mix them...

This forces me to record foley one scene at a time; when the scene is completely covered, then we move on. Not very efficient, I know, but this way we never miss anything (always a danger because prep time before a foley session is never paid around here, therefore it's nonexistant) and the foley artists get a good feel for the scene after seeing it a few times.

I'm also a fan of recording to a dedicated track and then "checkerboarding" the tracks in a consistent way, hopefully one that allows the mixer to know that under that fader it's almost always John, under the other one it's John's props, etc.

This is just to say that I once tried to build cue sheets before a foley session, but gave up.