hi,i dragged a shaker loop to bar 1 and when i press play the first part of the loop isnt clean,its ok when i put it on cycle.just when i press play from bar 1 the first hit isnt right,but if i move it to bar 2 and press play its fine.
am i better starting project from bar 2?
although that seems extreme
thanks

 

Edit: I totally misunderstood the issue.

 

Last edited: Jul 21, 2023

Personally I never start on the first bar. Usually I leave some lead-in for a click / timing / or splice point. That doesn't always fix the buffer issues you are experiencing though.

The 2nd bar might fix the problem but I was always though to leave a full phrase of lead-in. So that's going to be 4/8/12 and so on bars depending your particular project. That way if you have time dependant phrases of beat points, things will line up without need to do any math.

The people who instructed me on this came up on tape machines and said something to the effect that tape is cheap, digital is even cheaper and you can always trim off what you don't want later, but having it there can keep a lot of grey hairs off your head.

Good luck.

 

It's best to leave at least two bars before the beginning of the project for various reasons.

I've seen the behaviour that you describe (the initial transient is missing), though I don't have the issue myself.

Examples for leaving bars before the start are setting automations, sending MIDI commands (ie. Program Change messages), allowing room for pre-downbeat sounds (not everything starts on the 1) and simply leaving room for a count in before the start.

In Cubase the best way to set this up is in the "Project Setup Dialog" by setting the "Display Bar Offset" by whatever amount is your preference. That will mean that your first bar number is still 1 (preceding bars will have negative numbering). The only drawback to this is that VSTs will still see the very beginning of the project as the start and will behave accordingly. ie any LFOs, arpeggiators or other time based parameters will start from the beginning as they do not understand that you have moved bar 1 later (an issue that Steinberg need to fix). This can be worked around if it's an issue of course by changing the start/phase of parameters to coincide with the bar offset. With existing projects that may be more hassle than it's worth but for new ones not so much.

https://steinberg.help/cubase_pro/v.../project_handling_project_setup_dialog_r.html

 

Last edited: Jul 21, 2023

I always start at 1:0. if I start after 2 bars, it bothers me when thinking about the math of blocks/arrangement. I don't like doing it at all, and i really like everything being some multiple of 16.

if I want to bounce with 2 bars of silence, Logic has a function called Cut/Insert Time, and Insert Silence Between Locators. All the automation stays where it is supposed to be. People did the extra 2 bars of silence for a long time in Logic. they finally fixed it, so now I only add it before exporting it.

 

I usually start at bar 5. Additionally Reaper has the option to define this (any) as bar 1 which turns the bars before it to -x.

 

i had the same issue so now I always start with some space before

 

I usually begin at bar 200 and play from the start, it gives me a break from the crap I produce.

 

Me too, it helps when playing instruments live if you have a count in, and you can also leave a silent space at the start when rendering.

 

Last edited: Jul 21, 2023

Would be good to know on which DAW your are? I'm on FL and Reason and never expierenced something like this.

 

I've got this issue in Cubase 12, so I always start at Bar 8, for the sake of visual arrangement in the daw and some space for possible lead ins, etc.

 

How strange that only happened to me when I had the buffer configured wrong, I don't use plugins that consume a lot of processing either, I try to use plugins that use very little processing, I make up for it with creativity in the song, many ornamental sounds, details, sparklesssss.

 

sorry,forgot i wasnt on the cubase forum,hehe
its cubase 11 pro. like someone said its because of the 16 bar thing,just visually easier dragging things in 4,8,16,32 bars etc.

 

OK, you're using Cubase so this doesn't apply, but for the archives: Ableton does a very quick fade in when starting playback, and this also can apply (or at least has applied) to renders/bounces. So I start from bar 5 or 9 and render from bar 4 or so to avoid this.

Also there's a "render as a loop"-option when rendering clips/sections which is useful when you have time-based FX like delay that bleeds into the loop start on repeats.

 

isnt there a setting in preferences to turn off fades? I forget.. but still, sometimes the initial transient gets clipped or muffled when start from 0.

 

To my knowledge there isn't one, or at least I can't find it on Live 11. Don't think there was a setting previously either. So yeah, it still does it-

 

Most DAWs have a pre-bar region that can be assigned as a lead-in. I usually start on bar 1. Yet, I can see the advantages of having a 2-bar buffer and start on bar 3.

 

Setting regions helps too.

 

They have this on by default, but if you want to disable it; it is for the entire project or daw Global? In Logic, this is in the Inspector and applicable to every audio region for fade in/out. The same as your clip gain. This doesn't get annoying for any channels you want side chained to another channel's kick transient? Or do you just get around it using a Midi?

decap video shows it, but it's about a 1 min video with no info other than pointing out the setting. If it impacts the whole project, it's probably easier to just put up with it and use a different sc trigger?

 

Thanks for the vid, but I'm not talking about this. This adds a short fade to the start and end of a clip and it can be set individually or by defaut, which you can override. I don't think it's on by default, at least I can't remember ever using this.

I'm referring to a short fade at the beginning of a render/bounce that affects all audio and it at least has eaten the first transient when rendering from the first beat onwards. Hence the space added to overcome this.