adjusting the tempo of an imported audio track

[erocker]

hello,

I have Pro Tools 7.4.2 with an Mbox 2 mini on a Leopard operating system.

I was listening to some music last night and came across a song that I absolutely loved. I became inspired to create a remix...( adjusting the tempo, adding more drums, and some more instruments to the song). However, I can't get past step 1: identifying the tempo of the imported song. For some reason, the IDENTIFY BEAT function does not work! I even have a book that explains how to do it... I went through all of the steps, but for some reason, I seem to get a tempo around 120 bpm REGARDLESS of the actual tempo of the song.

Can someone help me fix this issue and get this remix rolling???? PLeasee!

[flommer]

I think the thing most people miss with Identify beat is that YOU have to make a selection that is exactly on the beat (in other words, it will loop perfectly) and then YOU have to enter the correct start and end points....

For a 1 measure section at the very beginning of the piece, the start and end are:

1 | 1 | 0
2 | 1 | 0

to measure the tempo of the next two measures

2 | 1 | 0
4 | 1 | 0


etcetera...

For a whole song, YOU have to count the measures

For music that varies in tempo throughout the song, you would want to find the tempo in smaller sections..

Now I would think that if you are remixing, then the original tempo doesn't matter that much as you are going to set it to what you want it to be. Maybe it's a starting point... Is that what you are wanting to do?

[erocker]

The strange thing is, I am measuring the start and end points of the song and I
am pretty sure that I am entering them in accurately. I still get a tempo around 120 bpm regardless of the actual tempo of the song. I don't know, maybe there is some kind of setting I need to change or maybe I am not doing
something correctly. And yes, I would like to create a remix with the song so I will probably end up changing the tempo later anyway. I just don't know why I am unable to get an accurate tempo reading because I went through all the steps from my Pro Tools book, I even checked out Youtube videos. This is the steps I take:

1. I change to samples
2. Then I highlight the song
3. Then I click on Identify Beat
4. Then if the default start and end points are correct, I press enter. If not, I enter them in myself.

After these steps, I get a tempo reading at the beginning of the loop that is always at or around 120. Ex: 119.23 bpm

[flommer]

Originally Posted by erocker

The strange thing is, I am measuring the start and end points of the song and I
am pretty sure that I am entering them in accurately. I still get a tempo around 120 bpm regardless of the actual tempo of the song. I don't know, maybe there is some kind of setting I need to change or maybe I am not doing
something correctly. And yes, I would like to create a remix with the song so I will probably end up changing the tempo later anyway. I just don't know why I am unable to get an accurate tempo reading because I went through all the steps from my Pro Tools book, I even checked out Youtube videos. This is the steps I take:

1. I change to samples
2. Then I highlight the song
3. Then I click on Identify Beat
4. Then if the default start and end points are correct, I press enter. If not, I enter them in myself.

After these steps, I get a tempo reading at the beginning of the loop that is always at or around 120. Ex: 119.23 bpm

So what are you changing the Start and End values to? Give me an example..

Plus, If you are just selecting the whole song, does it start and end exactly on a beat?

[DigiTechSupt]

4. Then if the default start and end points are correct, I press enter. If not, I enter them in myself.

I think I know what the problem is. The step #4 is where you should specify the length of the audio section you're trying to identify the tempo for.

If you had selected a 4 bar section, you would enter 1|1|000 and 5|1|000 in the Start and End fields, so that it knows it's dealing with 4 bars.

If you're just entering the beginning and end points that show up, no changes will take place. You need to tell it exactly how many bars and beats the audio you've selected actually is.

From the Pro Tools Reference Guide:

1 Place a one-bar drum loop at the beginning of
an audio track.
2 Select View > Rulers > Samples. This ensures
that the selected audio material will be sample-
accurate.
3 Select the audio region with the Time Grabber
tool and choose Event > Identify Beat.
4 In the Bar|Beat Markers dialog, specify the
start and end locations for the inserted Bar|Beat
Markers. Since this example deals with a one-bar
loop, enter 1|1|000 and 2|1|000. When working with a selection, the Identify Beat
command only calculates a single tempo for the
selected range. If the tempo varies from measure
to measure, or beat to beat, you’ll need to use
the Identify Beat command for each tempo vari-
Bar|Beat Markers inserted

[erocker]

The step #4 is where you should specify the length of the audio section you're trying to identify the tempo for.

OK that seemed to fix it. THANKS!