MOTUnation.com

Ahh! I see the light. Thanks guys for taking your precious time to explain that. I now see what I was missing. Snapshot applies current SETTINGS to automation. It DOESN'T take a snapshot of the automation. So if I'm getting this now, you couldn't take a snapshot of a two measure ramp in volume for a guitar track, but you could put the cursor at any point in that ramp and take a snapshot of the settings at that point in time. That's what I was not getting. When the manual talks about a time range and "recording" the data, I thought it was recording (or copying, kind of like clippings) the AUTOMATION DATA of that time range. Instead it's actually applying the SETTINGS from a POINT in time to that time range. I also couldn't wrap my head around the fact that it's a single operation. I was thinking copy then paste - take a snapshot then apply it somewhere, which isn't how this works. (That's why I kept asking what's next. I had the copy part, now how do I paste.) So my whole mindset was wrong. Am I getting this? If I still have it wrong, just shoot me.

Anyway, getting back to the OP. Oh yeah, remember waxman? I don't think this will do what you're trying to do. It's what I thought snapshots was all about, but I was way off the mark. Sorry for hijacking your thread, man, but this was so important to me. I hope the discussion helped you in some way too.

Shooshie and FM, thank you, thank you, thank you! I've been using DP since version 2.7 and I've never taken a serious look at snapshots because it just never made sense to me.

Oh yeah, in case I forgot, thank you!!
Phil

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Glad I could help!
Sounds to me like you got it, Phil

Just keep in mind that you CAN have the automation drawn not only as straight lines, but also as ramps. When you take a SS (snapshot) you can tell DP to make a straight line or a ramp from a previous point to a next point, for instance. There are many options, and one of them will always do whatever you want.

One more cool thing about them is that there are many "states" of snapshots. If you click on the little camera in the mixer, it will remember whatever your last setting for the SS dialog box was. If you click in the SE camera, it will do the same with the last-used settings you applied when you clicked the camera FROM the SE, and if you invoke the SS from a keyboard shortcut it will remember your last setting too. So depending on where you invoke it from, it will remember 3 different last-used states. Very cool.

Shooshie pointed out a great method that can be very useful when mastering a bunch of tracks. So the SS together with the Automation Setup dialog box are a great combo.

Happy snap-shooting

It's funny to read this thread as I have been in Phil O's boat too!
I have many DP projects called "Snapshot Test" and "Snapshot Experiment" etc. where I've messed around with the thing and (for a while) understood it.
But I have never used it on a practical level.
Never saw a need for it.
FM's example where you turn off the automation and find a new setting for a different part of the track and then apply 2 snapshots is the example that jumped out at me in this thread and I like that idea. You could theoretically save yourself a new instance of the plug. Thanks for that tip!
In the past, I've been turned off by the amount of automation lines that clutter up the track with snapshots but I suppose that's where the view filter comes in.
One thing I will say, I've just upgraded to DP7 (awesome, by the way) and I miss the little camera icon.

Camera icon is still there; just at the bottom.

Shooshie wrote:Camera icon is still there; just at the bottom.

I meant on the plug-in itself.

Shooshie wrote:putting automation to sleep

Now I get it. I was in the same boat as Phil.

b.g. wrote:

Shooshie wrote:putting automation to sleep

Now I get it. I was in the same boat as Phil.

Well I guess it's comforting to know that this may have helped other people as well.


Thanks again, guys.
Phil

Oh, I suspect that the Snapshot is a feature like Polar and many others that look and sound great, but that most people never even try out. That's why I'm into helping people get into the deeper aspects of DP. There's so much to this app that simply remains unknown to so many.

Shooshie