Hey,
Can anyone help me with this conundrum - I have a multitrack string quartet recording that I want to manipulate with some vst effects. To do this, i'd like to have the vst effects being told an accurate tempo of the piece at any given time.
Is there a way to listen through the recording and tap either every beat or every few bars to set up some kind of "tempo map" that will lineup with the recording? The recording is roughly in time throughout but it's fairly loose rhythmically. I figure something to do with creating a "master" clip with transient markers would work but I can't really seem to get that working for me - not sure what I'm doing wrong. Also being able to tap in the warp markers in real time would be greatly beneficial.
Thanks very much!
Easily creating a tempo map by tapping
Re: Easily creating a tempo map by tapping
Just to clarify, I don't want to warp the audio at all.
Re: Easily creating a tempo map by tapping
I’ve described the process for this a few times in the past. If you want some detailed explanations you can search my posts with master or slave I think as keywords.
In a quick explanation:
Have them lined up unwarped.
Warp one of them. (Probably the easiest one of the available choices)
Set it as the master.
As the master it is technically not warped as long as it is not Complex. If you feel insecure about this, just duplicate the warped channel and mute the warped one (so it can still be the master tempo) and unwarp the duplicated channel.
For warping dynamic material without obvious rhythm there is a process I use:
Find a downbeat that is clear.
Add warp markers every 4 or 8 or 16 bars at the appropriate places in the audio (don’t get lost in warping stuff within those intervals, that’s for a later step). This at least does half the work for you because the only parts that would be off then are the material within those parts.
Go back through now and start fixing areas between those markers. I usually find the area where it is most drifting and get a marker on that and push that in place. After that you should be mostly done. You might want to listen and troubleshoot to clean up. It can be a little bit of a nightmare if the material is very dynamic in tempo.
If I recall, you can hold shift before dragging a warp marker to change it to a different spot in the audio.
In a quick explanation:
Have them lined up unwarped.
Warp one of them. (Probably the easiest one of the available choices)
Set it as the master.
As the master it is technically not warped as long as it is not Complex. If you feel insecure about this, just duplicate the warped channel and mute the warped one (so it can still be the master tempo) and unwarp the duplicated channel.
For warping dynamic material without obvious rhythm there is a process I use:
Find a downbeat that is clear.
Add warp markers every 4 or 8 or 16 bars at the appropriate places in the audio (don’t get lost in warping stuff within those intervals, that’s for a later step). This at least does half the work for you because the only parts that would be off then are the material within those parts.
Go back through now and start fixing areas between those markers. I usually find the area where it is most drifting and get a marker on that and push that in place. After that you should be mostly done. You might want to listen and troubleshoot to clean up. It can be a little bit of a nightmare if the material is very dynamic in tempo.
If I recall, you can hold shift before dragging a warp marker to change it to a different spot in the audio.
Re: Easily creating a tempo map by tapping
Awesome - does the initial arbitrary tempo of the warped clip matter? should i set ableton to be ROUGHLY the right tempo first?
Re: Easily creating a tempo map by tapping
It could help. Make sure the warp markers make sense with how it sounds though.
Let’s say you do a warp marker every 8 bars.
Find the first note of the first bar. Have 1.1.1 placed there.
The 9.1.1 warp marker needs to be where the ninth bar is about to begin, or the same concept, has to be at the very end of 8 bars worth. And you need to hear it. If this example had a change or a part that repeats after 8 bars, you should know by hearing it that it is the case.
While warping it might sound garbled. But after you make the clip the Master, everything will be fine.
In preferences you can turn on playback that is triggered by clicking the lower half of the waveform in clip view. This will be a helpful tool for quickly demoing your warping to see if it is on point.
Let’s say you do a warp marker every 8 bars.
Find the first note of the first bar. Have 1.1.1 placed there.
The 9.1.1 warp marker needs to be where the ninth bar is about to begin, or the same concept, has to be at the very end of 8 bars worth. And you need to hear it. If this example had a change or a part that repeats after 8 bars, you should know by hearing it that it is the case.
While warping it might sound garbled. But after you make the clip the Master, everything will be fine.
In preferences you can turn on playback that is triggered by clicking the lower half of the waveform in clip view. This will be a helpful tool for quickly demoing your warping to see if it is on point.