Importing audio to tracks with faders in one step?

[iGirl]

Pardon my newbie question, but I'm testing a few different DAW possibilities and can't seem to find a one step process in DP8 that allows one to import multi-track audio (DAW transfers) and have them just show up automatically as audio tracks with original names and faders in the mixer. Instead what I got is imported individual soundbites, requiring moving them to tracks manually, and then manually adding faders.

I was only able to move soundbites one at a time into tracks one at a time, but have been told in another forum that multiple soundbites can be dragged and auto-assigned tracks in one move, but can't find the way to select all and drag drop them. Even so, AFAIK it still doesn't put faders to them.

On another system I'm testing, import does it all automatically, but I'm sure I'm missing something equivalent in DP8...

[Robert Randolph]

You just drag and drop...

Here's a gif in case you're dropping in the wrong place.

Sequence window


http://i.imgur.com/vhS5PJQ.gif

Tracks overview window


http://i.imgur.com/RoniZBx.gif

[Robert Randolph]

Also make sure the settings in Preferences->Background Processing and Preferences->Audio Files are set the way you want.

You don't want DP doing any unnecessary analysis that you may not use.

[iGirl]

Thanks - yes I had it out of order - I had imported and then tried dragging all from the soundbites mini menu to the tracks and it wasn't working. Dragging from the source folder was the key here!

I did also notice it's crazy slow doing all the extra unnecessary processing so good to know that can be avoided if desired.

I must have done something wrong but for some reason the audio started at measure 2257 - easily snipped. Anyway this is great - thanks again!

[Robert Randolph]

Thanks - yes I had it out of order - I had imported and then tried dragging all from the soundbites mini menu to the tracks and it wasn't working. Dragging from the source folder was the key here!

I did also notice it's crazy slow doing all the extra unnecessary processing so good to know that can be avoided if desired.

I must have done something wrong but for some reason the audio started at measure 2257 - easily snipped. Anyway this is great - thanks again!

It's just people using standard smpte 1 hour pre-roll. It is really annoying if you're not doing film stuff.

Is there a way to ignore origin timestamps when importing?

edit: I wrote some total nonsense here before. My brain is fried today.

edit 2: Got it. You have to set the chunk's start time to the smpte offset. Then when you import, the files will line up (assuming they were also using the 1 hour offset).

Another animated gif for the visually-inclined.



http://i.imgur.com/11iP37q.gif

[Dwetmaster]

While dragging a soundbite to the timeline, I think that holding the CTL button will force a "Snap-To-Zero" drag

[MIDI Life Crisis]

While dragging a soundbite to the timeline, I think that holding the CTL button will force a "Snap-To-Zero" drag

I need to tattoo that to my hand! Thanks.

[Shooshie]

While dragging a soundbite to the timeline, I think that holding the CTL button will force a "Snap-To-Zero" drag

That's one of the most useful features! But it's not really "Snap-To-Zero." It's "throw to first obstacle." If there is another soundbite in the track, it will land up against it. If not, it'll go to zero.

Shoosh

[Gravity Jim]

That "throw to next obstacle" feature is one is use continually: an all-time fave.

[Shooshie]

That "throw to next obstacle" feature is one is use continually: an all-time fave.

It's one of those features that make you wonder how you ever got along without it. For the first year or so that I used it, I'd still have to go check and make sure it worked. Now I just trust it.

[Robert Randolph]

While dragging a soundbite to the timeline, I think that holding the CTL button will force a "Snap-To-Zero" drag

This only works if you've imported into the soundbites window and created the tracks yourself it seems. It also only appears to work for 1 file to 1 track at a time. That's quite a few extra steps if you're trying to import 80 stems into DP! The method in my animated gif automatically creates the tracks and inserts the soundbites at the origin time.

If simply ctrl-dragging files from finder to the appropriate non-track area in Seq or TO, it still snaps to the file's origin time.

Any other ideas, or maybe I'm executing this wrong?

Also, where is this ctrl-drag listed in the manual? (edit: page 43 of the DP8 manual, which also seems to have an error... it says cmd/ctrl drag, and cmd does nothing. Only ctrl works.)

edit: I've tested this in a few other softwares with the exact same files just to try and get some ideas. It's really amazing how slow DP8 imports files. In the time it takes DP to import and create overview (no beat analysis) for a set of 1 hour long files... I can launch the DAW, import the files and close the DAW 3 times with 3 different DAWs. That's with beat analysis in them too! Luckily I don't do this often or that'd drive me crazy.

[iGirl]

It's really amazing how slow DP8 imports files.

I noticed that too, but like you, it's not something I would be doing every day.

[Tesionman]

It's really amazing how slow DP8 imports files.

I noticed that too.

Me too... unfortunately! Compared to other DAWs.