EDM with DP sucks big time!!!

[Babz]

I actually never knew the terms "absolute" and "relative" grid until I looked them up as terms used in Logic. The only time I ever needed a grid, I always wanted absolute snapping. And if I dragged in a loop it *did* snap to the grid.

When I somehow accidentally moved something off grid and then couldn't get it to snap back, I just thought I was doing something wrong, some DP command I didn't know. It would also drive me crazy when I was edge-editing a soundbite and wanting it to snap to the grid line and holding down Command seem to do the opposite of what I would expect. I always managed somehow by zooming and nudging and telling myself I would look this up in the manual when I had time.

Believe it or not, the idea of "relative" snapping never occurred to me as something useful or desirable. To me what we are calling "absolute snapping" here is the very definition of "snap to grid". If I am a using a grid, with snapping on, it is because I am working on something where I want quantized, rhythmic precision right on the grid line. If I need something to fall off the grid, that's when I turn snapping OFF.

Maybe I just haven't ever encountered a situation where relative snapping would be useful. It's hard for me to envision.

One way or another I have managed to get audio or MIDI where I need it in DP, but I definitely experienced some grid confusion and frustration, most recently in the remix project I just came out of. This thread has definitely given me some things to think about on the topic of grids and snapping.

Babz

[bayswater]

Maybe I just haven't ever encountered a situation where relative snapping would be useful. It's hard for me to envision.

I'm sure you have. E.g., you have a sound bite or a string of MIDI notes that start playing 120 clicks after the start of the 10th measure. You decide they need to start in the 8th measure instead. Drag them over by two bars with snap on and they will still start 120 clicks after the start of the 8th measure. With absolute snap, the MIDI would start wherever the closest snap point is, and the audio starting point would depend on where the reference point in the bite is.

[Shooshie]

Maybe I just haven't ever encountered a situation where relative snapping would be useful. It's hard for me to envision.

Imagine a groove such that you've got the basic elements of the rhythm happening on the beats. You want to distribute this to other measures or verses. That's a good place for Absolute Grid.

Now, you've got the inner elements — the stuff between beats. That's where the real groove is. That's what separates John Phillip Sousa from Duke Ellington. (well, that's not ALL that separates them, but work with me here). You find that some of those elements do not fall exactly on a 16 or a triplet, but somewhere in between, and it changes slightly from beat to beat. It's perfect, but it can't be quantified; it has to be felt. You want to option-drag those to other measures or verses, too, but an Absolute Grid would destroy them. That's what Relative Grid is for.

If you want absolute, you can use the shift command (or other methods) to get a note, event, phrase, or group to start exactly on a beat or gridline. It's really not hard to drag them there, then nudge a click or two for accuracy. But to move a groove… that's not something you can do by eyesight, and you don't know how to type in a destination for the shift tool to get it there. Quantizing certainly doesn't work. It takes a relative grid to do this.

And that's just part of the story. But it's enough to give you reason for a relative grid.

Shooshie

[Babz]

I guess I can envision situations, but when I'm moving something a great distance, like to another verse, etc. I tend to use something like Shift. Or if something doesn't start right on a beat, I'll do a time range selection of the entire measure, and then cut and paste.

I use Snap to Grid-dragging is for shorter distances, or things that butt against each other.

I'll just have to play around with it, now that I understand the concept of "relative" grid better, and I'm sure its use will become clearer.

B.

[bayswater]

Or if something doesn't start right on a beat, I'll do a time range selection of the entire measure, and then cut and paste.

Good point. If the default was absolute snap, you could simply do this where that doesn't work.

[Shooshie]

Or if something doesn't start right on a beat, I'll do a time range selection of the entire measure, and then cut and paste.

Good point. If the default was absolute snap, you could simply do this where that doesn't work.

Yeah, the Tracks Overview actually makes it easy to do that. I wasn't thinking of that, yet I've used it just for that purpose a million times!

By the way, if you hold down the Command Key you can select individual events in the Tracks Overview if you just get good at reading that hen-scratching "region" notation. Or select it in another window and go to the Tracks Overview to move it.

I guess everyone knows this stuff; I find myself repeating it just-in-case.

Shooshie