Repro steps:
- Add a short transient sound (or note for instrument track) then add reverb with long tail
- Set export range after transient sound (so if you started playback at the start of the export range it would be silent)
As you can see in the photo the reverb tail of the track is ending up in the export, but if we’re starting export after the point at which this sound would have been generated then why is this happening? It’s like the playback engine is pre-rolling up to the start of the export range… has this always been the case?! I feel like after 20 years of Cubendo I’d have noticed this before now!
I have just confirmed this in N14.0.41
Clean session, sample with shimmer reverb on it, left locator well after sample end.
The audio export contains the reverb tail as if it pre-rolled the export.
Crazy!
It’s what the project would sound like at that moment in time.. it’s been like this for as long as I can remember.
I’d be pretty upset if I did a mixdown of a section of something to send to a client for approval but it sounded totally different than what it would be in the whole project!
Yeah at first I was thinking on the lines of “well, that’s strange, cause I can’t really export isolated elements unless I worry about any reverbs that come before it.”
But I agree with you. Your point makes absolute sense, this is the only way we can export an excerpt of sound that would sound exactly like it would in context.
If this can’t be optional, the current way is best IMO.
Well kinda; it only pre-rolls from a second or so before, so if you had any frozen reverbs or something like that earlier on it wouldn’t be present. Which makes sense because otherwise you’d have to wait for the entire timeline to happen before it exported.
Yep I tried N12 and same behaviour.
In my case I export consecutive blocks of loops or solos for Fmod, starting from the bit I want, and I switch things in and out for quick iteration instead of being sensible and separating everything. Have worked like this for a very long time so I’m astounded I’ve never noticed it before.
Reaper doesn’t have this pre-roll at all, interestingly
It makes total sense to behave in this way for audio export as others pointed out. You might want to try the render feature instead - which can do blocks and will be sure to only export the events selected.
Sure, although one wonders why Reaper doesn’t do this, if it does indeed make such total sense.
Yes I could use that but it’s not as quick as just bouncing things straight out to FMod, not to mention the mess it creates in your project. Although as I say that I realise I could/should probably just make a macro that sorts out most of my irritations with that partially baked feature!
Honestly I think that Reaper should do it, but definitely everyone has their own workflows as you have adapted one. For the render feature there is a version of it that will render them out as “Export Selected Events” - which you can send to a folder on your computer with naming convention that doesn’t even need to be dropped back into your projec to keep it clean. Maybe that works for it.
Oh wow I was not aware that was a thing, that must have passed me by when it was added… This is absolutely what I want to be using - thanks for highlighting this, that’s saved me a whole lot of time in future - I owe you a beer!
