Cue sheet in Numbers (or Excel)

[joelfriedman]

Hi all,

Has anyone found or created a cue sheet that also calculates (I'll explain)? I don't mean a blank Word/Pages or Excel form to just list cues, that's easy to find or make. What I mean is something that will:
1. Allow you to input each cue's start (in) and stop (out) times and then calculate the length of each cue.
2. Take each calculated cue length and add it up to get a total for all the cues.

I don't have Excel on my work machine only iWork Numbers, but I believe it opens most basic Excel docs and I'm not into fancy formatting, just the numbers m'am (or sir).

Thanks,

Joel

[MIDI Life Crisis]

No, but if you find one let us know! I would guess Excel would be easy to do that, but formatting a spreadsheet to conform to a Music Cue Sheet submission standard might be tricky.

[joelfriedman]

Yeah, it's more the calculation part - what is that: base 60????? - that seems hard to me. ESPECIALLY if it had frames (e.g. 23.976)!

I'll keep looking.

Joel

[MIDI Life Crisis]

If all you need are the totals and the work is in DP, you can have it calculate lengths very quickly with the selection tool. Was missing for years and I made a lot of noise about it, but they probably did it because they simply needed to.

Do you know how to do that?

[joelfriedman]

Oooo.. why no, no I don't! If you tell me will you have to kill me?

Best,

Joel

[MIDI Life Crisis]

No, but I may find another reason eventually - like if you stop using punctuation in your posts.

In DP Preferences, INFORMATION BAR, be sure SELECTION is checked in the screens you want to see the data. From the screen(s) you selected, click on the circled S. From the drop down of the resulting window, select Configure Info Bar. Be sure SELECTION DURATION is checked. depending on what else you check, you should have a start time, end time and duration time of your selection. OMG, I waited so long for that!

Excuse me... what was that? You dropped a participle! j'acuse!

Enjoy. Are you doing TV cue sheets?

[joelfriedman]

Will definitely take a look. That IS so cool. I've just about finished by 1st film score (an indie supernatural-horror-thriller feature) and I'm doing my 1st cue sheet for ASCAP (going on the assumption that it might earn me royalties... some day...). Alas, for me, I had to do most of the cues as separate project files due to both the ever-changing instrumental palette and that I had run into all sorts of severe crash problems at 1st with Mach5, chunks, and larger files (I had to do a total clean install of everything to get past that). So it will be an effort to open each one up and find the lengths. Ah well...

I don't think I need a total number of minutes of the score for the cue sheet (but own my curiosity really wants it). I think ASCAP and BMI have a formula that takes the length of each cue and weighs it by the type (MT, BI, etc.) to derive payment. Of course there probably won't BE payment....

Joel

[MIDI Life Crisis]

Submit them anyway. You never know what can happen with cue sheets. The good, the bad and the very ugly. And the occasional happy surprise.

Sorry you're having DP issues. Have you contacted MOTU? Squeaky wheel...

[joelfriedman]

Actually I'm happy to say that after last July's reinstall (and my change in strategy of using smaller, separate files - 1 per scene or cue(s)) I've been pretty trouble free. Of course I'm not using M5 so much anymore, more Kontakt and Komplete. Still, a huge learning curve and it's been MUCH better and more productive.

[FMiguelez]

.

I remember, from my college days, there were these 2 apps that I think did what you want (and a million other things). One was called Auricle (for PC) and the other one Cue (for Mac).

Are they still in use? I remember Cue was particularly cool. That's what we used in the music editing classes.
If it still exists, you should definitely check it out.

[joelfriedman]

I may have something in iWork Numbers to post if people are interested. I'll keep you posted.

Just curious about the logging process:
1. Do you log the cues according to the length you composed or the length that was actually used in the film? I've already found times in earlier mixes where the post engineer and director sometimes faded in or out on my cues not exactly as I had, uh, imagined it. That means scrubbing a DVD to get my in/out times for cues - which is not only a PITA, but less accurate. I assume what you log is the actual music used/heard IN the film, not what was originally intended, no?
2. The categories the cues are listed under (I'm thinking about what ASCAP lists on their cue sheet template) - The whole Background Instrumental, Main Theme, etc. It seems that cues can change their function so what to do? Also, what's a "Theme" vs. a BI or Main Theme etc. Does it really matter beyond the obvious ones like the opening and closing Main Theme vs. a BI? It starts to get into "how many angels on the head of a pin" territory!
3. How are trailers logged? On the same cue sheet and under what category?
4. PITA, but I guess it makes sense to divide cues that come in and out of longer scenes into smaller separate cues? It's one thing to have a measure rest and count it, but it's another if there's only 3 minutes of actual music in a 6 minute scene, right? I can't get credit for 3 minutes of assorted rests I would think.

Thanks!

Joel

[MIDI Life Crisis]

Dude, you need to do some serious research. Check with your licensing agent for those answers.

Does it really matter beyond the obvious ones like the opening and closing Main Theme vs. a BI? It starts to get into "how many angels on the head of a pin" territory!

Hardly how many angels territory! Again, you need to learn this stuff and you need to get the info from your licensing agent. Screw up your cue sheets and you run the risk of loosing a lot of money in TV work (and you really don't stand to gain anything by filling them out incorrectly). Probably, no one will call you on it, you just won't get paid.

Sure, someone could give you all those answers here. One could also describe counterpoint, orchestration, notation, and synth programming - but it's beyond the general focus of the board and frankly, most people actually doing TV music cues don't really have a lot of time to help you teethe. Suffice it to say all cues are not created equal and the differences, while elusive to you, have very significant purposes. It is not an arbitrary system.

[joelfriedman]

Gosh! I didn't mean to sound so naive, but it is my 1st film and it IS an indie so I am doing pretty much everything myself. I meant the "angels" comment as a joke, I do understand they are different. What I meant is that a cue could start as a Visual Instrumental and then become a Background one, and then I've seen references to "Featured Instrumental" which isn't even on the cue sheet template ASCAP distributes. It's only the idea of subdividing cues into different categories as they unfolded that seemed a bit insane.

I'll check with people at ASCAP.

Best,

Joel

[MIDI Life Crisis]

Featured instrumental is when there is someone playing (or singing) one of your cues and the focus is on that performance and the music as opposed to a story element. That's why I like BMI. Everything is very specific and you get paid fairly for the actual works used and exactly how they are used - not bulked into the grand scheme of things as in a "point" system. That could work out to your advantage in some instances, and I think the methods are very similar in their final impact on your wallet, but that's another discussion.

If there is ONE BUSINESS THING that a film or TV composer MUST know how to do is create accurate cue sheets unless you hire someone to do it for you. Good luck on your film. Try not to let the editors and directors get so far away from you that you don't know how they are using your work - especially in a low budget indie. You are essentially part producer if you're working cheap or for the experience.

The other thing is REGISTER YOUR COPYRIGHTS! It's the cheapest insurance against theft you will ever see anywhere.