How are YOU using chunks?

[Shooshie]

Originally posted by garys:
But I find the Song part of DP incredibly clunky compared to Vision - when you drag a chunk to the song it doesn't even copy the Conductor track across - and sometimes with Virtual Intruments like Reason, playing back a song you either don't hear the sounds, or the balance is too loud. It seems to be something to do with Aux tracks.

It doesn't copy the conductor tracks for a reason. First of all, you can copy the conductor tracks any time you're ready--it's a menu selection. But it doesn't do it automatically, because it can't guess which ones you want to copy. Because you can stack chunks so that they overlap in as many layers as you want, it's quite obvious that you would have a conductor track conflict on your hands very quickly. So, you select the chunks you want to lead the tempo, then copy those conductor tracks.

I can't address your second problem, as I don't use virtual instruments much at this point (though I plan to), and haven't experienced that as a problem. I'm guessing it's nothing you can't fix with careful settings of levels beforehand... but I can't say for sure, of course.

Anyway, the conductor track thing is a non-issue. It's a feature, not a bug, because it has to be up to the user to determine how to do it. And once you make those decisions, it's easy to do it.

Shooshie

PS: GaryS, I'm not positive that the chaining feature works without a pause. I'm not in a position to test it at the moment, but I normally use the "Cue" feature, so that it stops the previous chunk, cues up the next one and waits for me to hit "play." But, if there was a gap, first check to see if you have set the end time for the previous sequence. That's done in the Chunks window meni-menu. Set "Auto-Manual End Time" for the moment that you want that sequence to end. That may fix the lag if there is one. If not, then I apologize... but I thought it played through without a pause.

Oh well, you can always do it by putting them in a Song and copying the conductor tracks.

<small>[ July 22, 2005, 10:34 AM: Message edited by: Shooshie ]</small>

[shepherdgary]

In Vision a song sequence is just a chained version of all the sequences you want to put there in order and playing without pause - and it plays at whatever the sequence tempo is set to. I can't understand why DP can't do this simple but essential thing. You say DP can't tell which conductor tracks you want to copy - but surely its obvious ! Its the chunks you are dragging to the song with their individual conductor tracks. It seems silly to have to copy those separately again when each sequence (sorry I mean chunk) has its own one. I just think DP's version is clunky compared to Vision's easy and elegant way of doing things i.e. by sequences. I have already made my decision about the conductor tract in the original chunk.

The aux track thing does seem to be a bit of a problem - acknowledged in the manual without explaining what you need to do about it. Once again why it doesn't work as it does with the individual chunks is beyond me.

I guess I got used to Vision's way of working - hence my continual griping !

I will experiment with the chaining although I don't think it will work without a pause - which the manual seems to think is a good thing. I reserve judgement on that. Cheers again for your input.

[Kubi]

Originally posted by garys:
In Vision a song sequence is just a chained version of all the sequences you want to put there in order and playing without pause - and it plays at whatever the sequence tempo is set to. I can't understand why DP can't do this simple but essential thing. You say DP can't tell which conductor tracks you want to copy - but surely its obvious ! Its the chunks you are dragging to the song with their individual conductor tracks. It seems silly to have to copy those separately again when each sequence (sorry I mean chunk) has its own one. I just think DP's version is clunky compared to Vision's easy and elegant way of doing things i.e. by sequences. I have already made my decision about the conductor tract in the original chunk.

A) You can just use the Song's own Conductor track, it can be set to whatever tempo you wish.

B) You can have two or more sequences AT THE SAME TIME, or overlapping, or one after the other. This is why DP's own way of doing things is so far superior to Vision's. If you're just chaining sequences one after another in a song, well, then Vision may save you a single step (and it's just one single step: select all, duplicate conductor track), but being able to layer, overlap and otherwise throw things around as you damn please is well worth this "cost." Once you have two sequences with different tempos of their own running at the same time (or three, or seven, or twelve), you do have to tell DP which tempo to use. Hence the extra step.

Originally posted by garys:

The aux track thing does seem to be a bit of a problem - acknowledged in the manual without explaining what you need to do about it. Once again why it doesn't work as it does with the individual chunks is beyond me.

Maybe using V-Racks for Auxes takes care of this now? Worth trying out.

<small>[ July 22, 2005, 01:40 PM: Message edited by: Kubi ]</small>

[thracks]

Originally posted by Kubi:

Originally posted by garys:

The aux track thing does seem to be a bit of a problem - acknowledged in the manual without explaining what you need to do about it. Once again why it doesn't work as it does with the individual chunks is beyond me.

Maybe using V-Racks for Auxes takes care of this now? Worth trying out.

You nailed it. This is why I was so happy to see V-Racks. It makes the song window usable with soft synths. Set up a V-Rack with you Reason Auxes, add other synths if you want, each sequence (chunk) can reference the V-Rack.

[Shooshie]

Garys, from working with Vision, I think you've gotten accustomed to something which causes you to miss the point of Chunks. In the Song window, you can create columns that the chunks will snap to. Then, you can STACK chunks on top of each other. So, one chunk may run throughout the whole song, while another one starts at bar 15 and runs three measures, and yet another one starts at bar 15 and runs 10 measures, and so on and so forth. You may have a hundred chunks stacked throughout the song. So, you can't have all those conductor tracks trying to tell it what the tempo is. They're overlapping!

So, you select the chunks that are going to be your guides, and copy THOSE conductor tracks. See? Once you do it, it makes perfect sense. If DP tried to do it automatically, you'd have a train wreck on your hands.

(and while we're griping about features... that "Record Hits" command never worked for me. Not ONE of my albums has become a hit! )

Shooshie

PS: what Kubi said. I didn't read his post before posting this. Same deal. There really is a great rationale behind the way the Chunks window works.

Shooshie

<small>[ July 22, 2005, 04:24 PM: Message edited by: Shooshie ]</small>

[shepherdgary]

I take your point - although at the moment I can't see why I would want chunks overlapping or stacked as anything I wanted would be in the original chunk - as I say I just don't work that way, I work in defined sequences. The way of using chunks as you describe is about having bits of music here and there which is probably more flexible and maybe they are not "finished" sequences - in effect they are like Vision's "sub-sequences" which they brought in near the end and could be just a loop or a riff - but its not my method . So maybe the flexibility is wasted on me - or maybe over time I'll get used to a different way of working. As I also admit, the fault is probably with me rather than DP. But this forum is really useful for getting help and opinions - so thanks for your input.

[aboutfaceaudio]

I bring a band or a singer in and record them in one chunk. When I record the next song, I copy the chunk, (copy and paste in the chunk window) erase the soundbites and then I record again. Same microphone set-up. Same song or different songs.

Saves loads of time.

There are variations on the theme. Works very well.

[Timeline]

Kubi...

That should be at the front of the official Manual explanation.

Well done.

By Kubi>

Okay, here's a simple summary.

Chunks are like having separate DP files inside the same file...

<small>[ July 23, 2005, 07:22 AM: Message edited by: Timeline ]</small>

[shepherdgary]

I just posted a new topic - I can't get audio in the Song window - yet its there in the Chunks - what do you have to do in the Song window to get audio? Its kind of related to all this about chunks - and I admit I'm beginning to get really fed up that such a simple thing as chaining chunks together in a song doesn't seem to work - my audio tracks just don't seem to be there when playing the song. Hate to harp on about Vision - but when you created a Song, when you played it back it all played perfectly - audio and MIDI . Can't seem to get it to work in DP. Does no-one else use audio in chunks and then try to chain them in a Song?

[thracks]

Originally posted by garys:
I just posted a new topic - I can't get audio in the Song window - yet its there in the Chunks - what do you have to do in the Song window to get audio? Its kind of related to all this about chunks - and I admit I'm beginning to get really fed up that such a simple thing as chaining chunks together in a song doesn't seem to work - my audio tracks just don't seem to be there when playing the song. Hate to harp on about Vision - but when you created a Song, when you played it back it all played perfectly - audio and MIDI . Can't seem to get it to work in DP. Does no-one else use audio in chunks and then try to chain them in a Song?

Maybe a stupid question, but you did play enable the song in the chunks window? How about your studio size? You may be running out of voices with several chunks in a song.

[shepherdgary]

No thats all okay - last night I had two chunks each with one track of audio (as a test) - and the Song was play enabled. So I don't understand why I can't hear the audio. I thought I would give the Song window one last chance till I abandon it for good ! If no-one knows the answer that may well be sooner rather than later. Shame though.......

[shepherdgary]

Maybe a stupid question, but you did play enable the song in the chunks window? How about your studio size? You may be running out of voices with several chunks in a song. ----------------

Steve - you may be right about this as a search showed this to be the answer for someone else - I'll check the number of voices versus the number of tracks in the chunks. Thanks.

[shepherdgary]

Steve - thanks you were right - I had a small number of voices on that piece which screwed up the playback in the Song window. Thanks very much.

[m2]

Another handy use for the chunks feature is for templates.
You might want to keep a rhythm section template as one chunk and an orchestral template as another; a sound design template; a mastering template and so on. All of these would be in the same project file that you use to start everytime you begin a new piece.

The chunks feature is one of the HUGH advantages that DP has over ProTools. You can have multiple pieces of music or sound design chunks in one file and jump between them. Very handy for also importing a piece of music you may have done a while back and you want to import the whole sequence to see how you did a particular section/orchestration/chord voicing/plugin setup or sound.

[thracks]

Originally posted by garys:
Steve - thanks you were right - I had a small number of voices on that piece which screwed up the playback in the Song window. Thanks very much.

Cool!