Hi,
I feel like I must be missing something very obvious but I don’t seem to be able to set the BWF Metadata field ‘Origination Date / Time’ to enter the date and time of the recording automatically. There is no ‘current’ setting and the field sdoesn’t accept the auto variable codes.
Is there a way to automate the data in this field?
Regards,
Damien
No. This is true this is missing and should be added in the future.
Hi Philippe.
Thanks for the response. It would be good to see this added.
Damien
I agree.
Hi Philippe,
are there any plans to allow the BWF “Origination Time / Date” field to automatically show current rather than saved values? This would be super helpful. Thanks!
Not sure what you mean. Do you speak about the request at the top of this thread?
yes. the field seems to always display a stored value, unless I manually click the clock icon. Is it possible for a current value to be embedded in the file, at the time of creation? I’m using W Pro 9.5.
Thanks
You mean, at the time of recording, you would like an option for WaveLab to write a BWF meta data with the current time?
Yes. Actually, while this would be useful, it would be almost as useful to have the Origination Date / Time field NOT appear at all, because at present it usually contracicts the Date field in the INFO chunk, which I populate using the @Date12@ variable.
FYI, in the new WaveLab 12, if you record a file and have the following option, the recorded file will get the day/time stamp.
Wonderful, thank you!
activating the functionality is a little advanced, hence I prefer to take the lead and give you some instructions:
This is great. As an archival digitiser this will save me a tonne of fiddle around time. Thanks.
Hi,
Sorry to come back to this old thread. I would still find it more useful if a metadata template could include a variable value to use the file system creation date/time to populate this field. or for a template to NOT include this field.
IN my common workflow it saves a lot of steps to apply the metadata template after recording (as I need to standardize file names, top and tail, a re-generate MD5 and loudness values. However, loading a template overwrites the existing datetime stamp. an option to pull it from the system file creation data would be great and true. This would also allow batch processing of wave and other audio files from elsewhere to conform to BWF.
To prevent any misunderstanding, could you explain in more detail your workflow and what is missing? Thanks.
Hi PG,
Thanks for the opportunity.
The overarching application is digitising from archival formats. I’m currently doing a large collection of gramophone discs so I’ll use that example.
(skip to the block quote for the crux of it)
We digitise historical gramophone discs using a dual-path capture:
Flat Master: Direct signal, no EQ
Co-Master: Signal with RIAA de-emphasis applied (prior to A to D)
Each capture includes rich metadata:
Full Coding History (turntable, preamp, converters, capture data, software, etc.)
MD5 checksum and loudness values
Accurate Date/Time metadata reflecting the actual capture moment
Recording
WaveLab records two stereo files simultaneously.
Input numbers are appended automatically to filenames.
Post-Processing
Files are renamed to standard suffixes (_m.wav, _c.wav)
Head/tail trimmed manually
Metadata template applied (includes coding history to record signal path, checksum/loudness flags, as well as a few other fields)
Manual Metadata Edits
Save and Close
Post Wavelab Timestamp Correction
Metadata Limitation
WaveLab’s metadata templates currently behave as “all or nothing.”
Applying a template after editing resets checksum/loudness generation flags—but also overwrites Date/Time with static values from the template.
Applying a template during recording captures the correct timestamp—but checksum/loudness values become invalid after edits.
This forces a workaround using BWF MetaEdit to restore accurate file creation timestamps.
Template Option: Use Filesystem Timestamps as system variables
Allow metadata templates to optionally pull Date and Time from the file’s creation timestamp. e.g. %%creationdate%%, %%creationtime%%
Allow use of these in the templates Date and Time fields
Granular Template Scope
An additional, slightly related addition would be Per-Input Metadata Templates
When recording multiple inputs simultaneously, record templates configured with per input settings:
Metadata template
Custom filename suffixes
Subfolders
This would dramatically reduce manual steps, improve efficiency, and reduce risk of operator error. At scale, even a <1% error rate can cascade into costly rework.
Damien
Just to make sure, when you speak about that timestamp, loudness and checksums, you speak about these?
Hi PG,
Yes. Those are what I’m referring to. Thanks.
Damien
