Editing Tasks With Logic Pro X Introduction to Music Production Assignment 2 Larry Stephenson - October 24, 2014
Logic Pro X Main Screen
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Introduction My name is Larry Stephenson. I live in Blind Bay British Columbia, Canada. I am relatively new to Logic Pro X. I started working with DAW about a year ago and am just beginning to scratch the surface of all that it has to offer. I hope to learn more about its capabilities through this assignment. I have taken an audio file that I recorded at the beginning of October at a local Coffee House. The original track is a recording of a set performed by a local favourite… “The Dust Puppets”. Because each set consists of three songs, I plan to split the track and create an individual track for each of the songs performed. This project will provide several opportunities to try out the following important editing tasks : trim, separate, crossfade, merge, grid, cycle, markers, zoom, name and colour. To begin with, the recorded file was opened in Logic Pro X. The main window appears below:
Editors button
Control bar
Tracks area
Inspector Track headers
The bulk of this work will be done using the audio track editor which is opened in any of the following ways: by selecting a track and then clicking the Editors button, by double-clicking in the Tracks area or by selecting a track and choosing View > show Editors.
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The main window now looks as it appears below: Track area tools pop up menu
Add audio track button
Audio Track Editor outlined in blue
Audio Track Editor menu bar
Waveform display
Ruler
Separate: Due to the nature of the project, the first task is to divide the recording into three separate regions. One for each song in the set. The original recording appears in the screenshot above. To separate the first song from the track, I created a second audio track for the first song by clicking on the add track button at the top of the track headers. I then named it by clicking on its title in the track header area and typed in “Midnight Special”. Then selecting the marquee tool from the track area tools pop up menu I moved the cursor over the waveform representing the first song and selected copy ( ) or select Copy from the Edit menu. The new track (Midnight Special) is selected, ensure that the playhead is positioned at the beginning of the track, and paste the copied region into the new track ( or Paste from the Edit menu). Tool Pop-up menu items
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The first song “Midnight Special” has now been separated from the original track and exists in a separate track of its own. The main screen now looks like this:
Further editing of this track in The audio track editor can now occur. Trim: I want to trim off the band’s introduction and cross fade the applause into the beginning of the new song. I mute the main track and hit the play button (or hit the space bar). The playhead is stopped when the applause for the band’s introduction begins. The pointer is placed over the lower-left edge of the region and it changes into a trim pointer. The pointer is now dragged up to the playhead positioned at the end of what is to be trimmed. Releasing the mouse cuts the trimmed portion from the track. Playhead
Trimmed section
The region can now be positioned at the beginning of the track and the end of the track can be trimmed in a similar fashion.
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Naming tracks/regions: Before continuing with the editing, I would like to visually identify the new track and region from the main track. To do this, I will add a colour to the track and then the region. I will then rename the region. The track to be coloured is selected by clicking on the track header. Then, Assign Track Color is selected from the Track menu. A colour palate pops up and a colour is chosen by clicking on it. The bar at the front of the track header assumes this colour. Grid control menu
The region colour can be changed by using the option-C ( ) key command which will bring up the colour palate. To colour it the same colour as the track itself, the track header Functions menu can be used or you can access a pop-up menu right clicking on the section itself. By selecting the Name Color menu item you can pick a separate colour for the section and you can also name the section here as well by choosing to name it the same as the track or the region can be renamed an original name here as well. I have chosen to assign the track name “Midnight Special” to the region as well. I want to crossfade the applause from the introduction into the beginning of the song. In Logic Pro X, crossfades can be applied automatically between to regions of a track. The Midnight Special region must be split in the middle of these two areas before a crossfade can be applied. Splitting the region: Toggle the Audio Track Editor back on by clicking the Editors button or by double-clicking the audio region itself. I want to zoom into the waveform to increase the accuracy of my section split. To begin, the marquee tool was selected from the audio track editor’s tool menu. A selection of a portion of the region was made slightly before and after the beginning
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of the song. The horizontal zoom slider in the audio track editor’s menu bar was selected and the button was dragged to the left until the proper magnification was achieved. Marquee tool selected from audio track editor’s tool pop-up menu.
Horizontal zoom slider
Section of region selected with Marquee tool to keep it centred within the zoom
A more exact position of the split point can be achieved by selecting Off from the Snap menu in the track area menu bar. This allows you to position the playhead at the exact point you select instead of snapping to a specified position. When the playhead is positioned correctly, the region can be split by: selecting split from the main Edit menu, by selecting split from the audio track area’s Edit menu, by placing the pointer over the playhead in the waveform of the audio track editor and right clicking the mouse to bring up a pop-up menu from which Split at playhead can be selected. Crossfade: The split at the playhead resulted in an audio artifact from a guitar chord strummed prior to the start of the song. To remove this unwanted sound, the marquee tool was used to highlight the area and the delete key was used to remove it. The two remaining sections were then merged. To merge the two sections, the left section was selected by clicking on it then holding down the shift key, the right section was selected so that they were both highlighted at the same time. Join selections was chosen from the audio track editors Edit menu. A new merged section was created. This section was once again split in the middle of the change from applause to the start of the song and an automatic crossfade was applied. X-fade was selected from the Drag: menu in the track area menu bar. The pointer was positioned at the split point. The cursor change to a trim cursor and a drag to the right was completed. The left edge was then adjusted to provide a cross fade linking the two sections. The results from the automatic crossfade were not satisfactory. A fade out was added to the first section by selecting the Fade tool from the audio track editor’s tool menu. Starting from
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the split, the tool was dragged to the left to a point from which the fade would begin. A fade in for the section to the right was accomplished in a similar fashion. The fade curves were adjusted on each side to accomplish a satisfactory effect. The end result is diagramed below:
After completing the edits required for the first song, I realized that if I had originally set markers in the main track, I would now be able to simply use them to continue on to the second and third songs. To see the entire first track, I decreased the horizontal zoom by sliding the horizontal zoom control all the way to its leftmost position. I also recognized that track 1 would benefit from being renamed to something more meaningful. I decided to do that first. Right clicking on the track header for track number one brought up a pop-up menu from which I selected Rename track. This is what the main screen looks like at this point:
Mute buttons
I decided to rename track 1 from DustPuppets04.10.14 to DustPuppets04.10.14complete. The name Record merged_0140.9 for the track’s region is not very meaningful either so I renamed it by following a similar procedure. I right clicked on the region and selected Name Regions by Tracks because I wanted the region to have the same name as its track. The Midnight Special track was muted by clicking the mute button and mute was turned off on track 1 by clicking its mute button.
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I could now go looking for the end of the first song and the beginning of the second. The playhead was positioned where the waveform indicated the end of the first song might be by clicking on the ruler. The space bar was pressed to begin playing the track. Applause indicating the first song had ended was heard so the playhead was moved back and play was triggered again. A marker was placed right where the last chord of the song was played and the applause began. The next portion of the track requires further editing later on. A second marker was placed here and named Edit. The marker list was opened by clicking on the List Editors icon. Marker was selected. With the playhead positioned at the second marker, Edit was clicked in the marker list area and cut this portion was added below the marker name. Marker Track Button
List Editors
Edit Marker List
The marker track has been toggled on by clicking the Marker Track Button ( ). The marker track was widened to allow the text to be displayed by positioning the pointer tool at the bottom edge of the marker track and dragging downward (a common method of changing the vertical size of the main window components. This procedure could now be continued for the remainder of recorded track and markers placed where appropriate to indicate further edits as well as beginning and end points for the third song. Cycling: There was not a need to use the cycling feature with the edits I was making to this file. However, in Logic Pro X, the cycling feature is turned on by clicking the Cycle button in the main window’s control bar. A yellow cycle marker appears in the ruler area. Position this marker by dragging it to the portion of the region you want to cycle. The beginning and end of the cycle may be extended by positioning the pointer on either left or right edge. The pointer changes to a trimming tool and the length of the cycle region may be adjusted in either direction. When play is pressed, this portion of the region repeats until stop is pressed. This appears in the diagram below:
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Cycle Button
Portion of region to be cycled
This assignment has allowed me to work through some of the common editing tasks faced when working with recorded files. I was able to apply the assignment to a project I was working on. In an attempt to meet the objectives of the assignment, I found it necessary to pay closer attention to the details of editing using Logic Pro X. Even though I have worked with this particular DAW now for a while, I feel that I now have a better understanding of the workflow associated with performing project edits and have learned editing procedures that I might not have otherwise evoked.
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