Third decimal place in BPM

digitalhermes · Post by **digitalhermes** » Wed Sep 28, 2005 3:30 am

Some tracks are not recorded at an exact BPM. For instance, I am currently trying to mix a track that I'm pretty sure is exactly 142 with another that appears to be around 142.11.... To be blunt, two decimal points is not fine enough a measurement for the length of mix that I would like to be able to perform. Furthermore, there is an internal measurement of these decimals already. There are an infinite number of locations where I can move a beat marker to on a track between the BPM of 142.11 and 142.12. Each location has an effect on the playback speed of the track. At least give me 100 more displayed locations. 1000 (four decimal places) would be better.

Clearscreen · Post by **Clearscreen** » Wed Sep 28, 2005 6:54 am

i'm not quite sure what you're getting at here. with live you can warp the tracks and have them sync for as long as you like, so knowing the 'exact' bpm is kinda irrelevant.
are you talking about the zoom resolution when placing warp markers? obviously you can zoom in futher than 0.00 to place you warp markers, but do you really need to know that in that section the bpm is 141.5648 when you drop a marker on a transient?
don't take this the wrong way, i'm just curious really.

subterFUSE · Post by **subterFUSE** » Wed Sep 28, 2005 1:00 pm

More precision on the master tempo would be useful for beatmatching Ableton to an external source such as vinyl or CD...

So this feature gets my Thumbs Up.

digitalhermes · Post by **digitalhermes** » Wed Sep 28, 2005 5:07 pm

Clearscreen wrote:i'm not quite sure what you're getting at here. with live you can warp the tracks and have them sync for as long as you like, so knowing the 'exact' bpm is kinda irrelevant.

Well in general I'm talking about the difference between analog and digital. If ableton really wants to have a leg up on analog control then we need more precise control over our timing. If this means finer display of those numbers, than that is what I want.

Specifically, I'm talking about this one track that is giving me a whole lot of trouble in the beat matching department. Believe me, I know that if you have two tracks with exact tempos then you can basically sync them forever. But I don't think that this track has an exact BPM. So far I'm able to place it some place between 145.11 and 145.12 but anything further is a shot in the dark since Live doesn't give me a display of those numbers. Eventually it is either too fast or too slow.

Clearscreen · Post by **Clearscreen** » Thu Sep 29, 2005 1:26 am

More precision on the master tempo would be useful for beatmatching Ableton to an external source such as vinyl or CD...

ah... i get it now!!

digitalhermes are you talking about two tracks inside live though? you should be able to stick warpmarkers on every single beat, hat... everything (if you have enough time) and make it sync perfectly. you don't have to warp just based on the total track length. sorry if i've got the wrong impression, but it sounds like what you're talking about should be do-able is all.

digitalhermes · Post by **digitalhermes** » Sun Dec 25, 2005 7:13 am

OK, after 6 months of use I STILL think that the bpm display needs decimal points, at least two.

I've probably stiched together around 200 tracks at this point and sometimes I have to slightly adjust the warp markers. A track is supposed to me 150, but for some reason it needs a little adjusting. I move the warp marker which is changing the bpm, but if it is just slightly, the ppm doesn't change, it is still 150, even though I KNOW the track is now slower. This isn't accuracy, this isn't precision and it frankly doesn't give me the information that I want and need. Add some decimal places to this display, it can't be that hard.

djsynchro · Post by **djsynchro** » Tue Dec 27, 2005 9:24 pm

What a load of bollocks!

digitalhermes · Post by **digitalhermes** » Thu Dec 29, 2005 6:48 am

djsynchro wrote:What a load of bollocks!

First, mad props for the music you used to make. You certainly defined a unique sound back in the day. Good luck with your current stuff as the last handful of albums that I heard only made it through one listen... Perhaps living in Amsterdam has had its effect. Seriously though, "Science Friction" is a classic.

Now perhaps you can offer something more than a childish exclamation. Just what is so crazy about wanting more timing accuracy? And why would you prefer less?

djsynchro · Post by **djsynchro** » Fri Dec 30, 2005 5:20 am

Yeah that wasn't very constructive sorry. Look, first of all 2 decimals behind the point is really fine resolution and from a musical, listening point of view there really is no point in having finer resolution.

It is waaaaaayy finer than for example Pioneer CDJs and people CAN mix on those (but they do drift sometimes depending on the tracks being matched)

I think you have syncing problems and that means you don't have your tracks properly "clamped down" in the warp markers. Once tracks are warped properly - that's it, if you loop them for 10 years they'll stay in sync, regardless of original tempo.

The minimum amount of markers a track can have is one, but I find that even with a recent, electronically produced track 2 is better. Autowarp is awesome, but you do need to adjust it. When the metronome is tight with the beat start, middle and end of the track, then it's "mix ready"

Some tracks just won't warp, then you have to go in manually and put a marker every 16 or 32 bars. Tracks from vinyl drift. Some older tracks produced with midi & hardware synths/samplers might also drift a bit!

mike holiday · Post by **mike holiday** » Sat Dec 31, 2005 3:15 am

i'v ripped tracks from vinyl that wobble and have had no trouble what so ever placing warp marker to fix the drift

also i'v warped over "skips" from vinyl recording and was able to warp around the skip so the track kept time..

Rxkimo · Post by **Rxkimo** » Fri May 07, 2010 7:32 pm

I agree that a 3rd decimal place for BPM would be useful. It would help for purposes of analyzing original stems or tracks.

For example, say I'm doing a remix and I see the track BPM is 118.25. And one of my goals is to understand the finer nuances of the beat placements of a track (e.g. do they take place 1/64 ahead of the start of the bar to add groove?). I import the track with Warp OFF, and set the master BPM to 118.25. I find the track looks synced, but as the track progresses it gets further and further off the master tempo because in actuality the real track BPM is 118.254.

And I don't want to warp the track becuase I want to see the track's original timings in relation to the grid.

Rx

alienguts · Post by **alienguts** » Sat May 08, 2010 10:22 am

seems totally non-standard to me.

Third decimal place in BPM

Third decimal place in BPM

Re: Third decimal place in BPM

Re: Third decimal place in BPM