Looping

paulmccallick · Post by **paulmccallick** » Tue Dec 13, 2005 11:08 am

In Logic you can highlight an audio region in the arrange window and hover your mouse over the right side of it which gives you a looping icon. You can then drag out the loop as far as you want.

Does DP have an equivalent function? Having to type in the number of times you want something to repeat is close but no cigar.

westla · Post by **westla** » Tue Dec 13, 2005 11:48 am

Did you check the manuel?

chamelion · Post by **chamelion** » Tue Dec 13, 2005 12:13 pm

Hey Paul!

I think you're on the wrong site. You may be happier here:

www.nitpickers.com

Damn! I'm going to lose sleep over that dang loop handle thingy. If only DP was a little more like Garageband...sigh

Geoff

westla · Post by **westla** » Tue Dec 13, 2005 12:32 pm

chamelion wrote:Hey Paul!

If only DP was a little more like Garageband...sigh

Geoff

Is that a joke??? You got a good laugh out of me.

paulmccallick · Post by **paulmccallick** » Tue Dec 13, 2005 1:22 pm

chamelion wrote:Hey Paul!

I think you're on the wrong site. You may be happier here:

www.nitpickers.com

Damn! I'm going to lose sleep over that dang loop handle thingy. If only DP was a little more like Garageband...sigh

Geoff

All RTFM aside, I'm just trying to find a better way of handling loops in DP. For all I know there IS a way of doing in DP that I don't know about. These programs are so deep its impossible to know every little trick in the 500 page book.

magicd · Post by **magicd** » Tue Dec 13, 2005 1:37 pm

Chapter 20 of the DP manual is entitled Looping. There are numerous entries regarding working with loops in the index of the (996 page) DP 4.5 manual.

Do you have a DP manual?

Magic Dave

westla · Post by **westla** » Tue Dec 13, 2005 6:21 pm

paulmccallick wrote:[These programs are so deep its impossible to know every little trick in the 500 page book.

There's a thing called an index at the back of the book. Start there.

blue · Post by **blue** » Tue Dec 13, 2005 7:38 pm

jeez guys, lay off the dude. it's a simple question.

i, for one, agree with the original poster about the loop thingy. i never use it anymore because the repeat command is so much quicker. it would be nice to be able to drag the side of a soundbite to loop it, ala logic et. al.

in general, i think motu is going to have to start considering the growing number of composers who rely less on live recording and more on VIs and loops. that means making functions such as loop editing and browsing more transparent in the gui.

i love dp, but that doesn't mean i think it can't be improved.

Guitar Gaz · Post by **Guitar Gaz** » Wed Dec 14, 2005 1:29 am

There's been lots of threads about the manuel (sic) - some seem to love it for its detail. I hate it as I think it is poorly laid out compared to other software - and when you are trying to do something intuitively in a hurry, do you really want to read a great big chapter of a massive manual? It does tend to kill the inspiration. I know we should all read the manual from cover to cover and work through all the examples, but apart from the fact that the style of this one makes my eyes glaze over, life is too short.

For Christmas Santa is bringing me two books on using DP - I will let the forum know what I think so that other manual haters can decide whether they are worth it. Love the program, hate the manual.

musicarteca · Post by **musicarteca** » Wed Dec 14, 2005 5:35 am

There is a nice program called GarageBand ...

Guitar Gaz · Post by **Guitar Gaz** » Wed Dec 14, 2005 5:53 am

Having said that it is simple to loop a chunk - so if you have a soundbite in a chunk, just loop that - isn't that the easiest thing? To work on a loop I use Bias Peak, but is that what you are after? You could move chunks about in the Song Window to chain/arrange loops together (assuming you put the soundbites in separate chunks).

boonier · Post by **boonier** » Wed Dec 14, 2005 6:46 am

magicd wrote:Chapter 20 of the DP manual is entitled Looping. There are numerous entries regarding working with loops in the index of the (996 page) DP 4.5 manual.

Do you have a DP manual?

Magic Dave

I agree that looping in the waveform editor is a sore point of DP. It is very difficult to define a region with the I-beam tool, and audition it without it stopping everytime you drag the left or right markers. Is this by design??

Sometimes to define a soundbite its good to be able to hear the loop update in real time, without having to stop and then start again hoping that you haven't nudged the boundary too far!

TheHopiWay · Post by **TheHopiWay** » Wed Dec 14, 2005 9:02 am

While not a huge issue for me it would be nice, after creating a loop section by beats and bars in the sequence editor for say 8 measures, to be able to "grab" the grey area and drag it out to 10 measures if I change my mind.
As to the repeat command vs. looping some caution is needed. Not all loops are exact to the length they claim to be ( several reasons for this, 1- mathematically impossible at most BPM vs. sample rate to get exact length and 2-Most host based dsp softwares don't stretch consistently to the exact length of the measure*. Pro Tools with the HD set up will but native DP or ProTools won't. *note: If you don't believe this run your own tests and then call digi and motu. Tech supports confirm this anomaly. 40% or so of my income comes from cutting loops for software companies and this is teh main reason I own a PT HD192 rig. I still prefer my DP setup for mixing.

blue · Post by **blue** » Wed Dec 14, 2005 10:04 am

TheHopiWay wrote:While not a huge issue for me it would be nice, after creating a loop section by beats and bars in the sequence editor for say 8 measures, to be able to "grab" the grey area and drag it out to 10 measures if I change my mind.
As to the repeat command vs. looping some caution is needed. Not all loops are exact to the length they claim to be ( several reasons for this, 1- mathematically impossible at most BPM vs. sample rate to get exact length and 2-Most host based dsp softwares don't stretch consistently to the exact length of the measure*. Pro Tools with the HD set up will but native DP or ProTools won't. *note: If you don't believe this run your own tests and then call digi and motu. Tech supports confirm this anomaly. 40% or so of my income comes from cutting loops for software companies and this is teh main reason I own a PT HD192 rig. I still prefer my DP setup for mixing.

the repeat function works with time regions, so as long as you have 4 bars selected all subsequent clones of the loop will start exactly at a downbeat every 4 bars, even if they are not perfectly cut.

i have noticed a lot of loops tend to be a wee bit short. i usually stretch them to fit.

paulmccallick · Post by **paulmccallick** » Wed Dec 14, 2005 10:31 am

musicarteca wrote:There is a nice program called GarageBand ...

...and an even better one called Ableton Live. Seriously, I do use Live to come up with ideas when playing with loops but when its time to mix down and do some real sequencing, DP is where I want to be.

Thanks to the people that added some insight into looping with DP. I think the program does have room for improvement in regards to this.