There’s an atmosphere of departure around where I am, I’d like to find out which DAW suits me the most.
On Cubase, the above-mentioned wasn’t possible or impractical. I’d like to know how it is with Nuendo. And what about other DAWs? (while we’re at it)
On the former, there’s the following option: File>Export>Audio Mixdown where you can choose attributes to automatically define the file name but none of these attributes are exactly functional to me. “Name” or “Project Name” have to be set manually first. And there isn’t a “Track Name” attribute either. Besides, other metadata isn’t considered by that option at all.
Alternatively, there’s File>Export Selected Track but it requires you to choose an empty folder for exporting every time. Also, it only allows exporting in .flac
Lastly, I don’t see any Export options in the settings menu.
With EVERY DAW, metadata is a bit of a hit and miss and you won’t find one that does everything. In terms of metadata management Nuendo it’s the most complete one (which still means it will do to a certain degree). But you will need to learn a bit of HTML and with that dive into the iXML and work with it using both BWF MetaEdit and Wave Agent.
A workaround in the Nuendo Environment will be to download the files in a specific folder, then include that folder in your MediaBay. From there, click on the folder where you exported all your files, select one or multiselect and change the iXML data in the Attribute Inspector (the right column of your MediaBay).
If some data are missing, you can add them manually (with BWFMetaedit) in the iXML, then they will probably show up next time you open MediaBay.
All the iXML info are here:
http://www.gallery.co.uk/ixml/
If in the meantime you will find a DAW that manage metadata better than Nuendo, please share with us in your same situation.
sounds frustrating
So, you’re saying you actually tried out all the big ones?
I know that metadata editing on Reaper is as inefficient as on Cubase, too. Someone told me it’s the same with Logic.
What about Studio One? I heard it has a lot of Quality of Life type features, so I wonder how that one handles it.
Wavelab is supposed to have automatic metadata fill-in based on your sample, but that software looks quite different from Cubase and I’m not sure if I like it. Gonna have to try
Do you mean actual metadata or how your files are named on export?
Metadata is indeed a tricky beast.
I mean why should a exported audio file inherit the data from the first file imported in a project? That really doesn’t make any sense either. That file might as easily be a reference file or whatever.
That would Not be a smart/practical way to deal with metadata.
And metadata in most cases are very specific and individual to each audio file.
For post production that is what makes it useful.
Saying that, beeing able to push data like track or cycle marker names to metadata when exporting could indeed be very useful.
The best way still to edit/batch description type metadata is using sound miner. Nothing else really comes close that I have seen.
Note there is no one single way to enter metadata either.
It can be entered and simply defined in the bwav header itself (in the very start of the bwav file). Or as a ixml data chunk at the end. The metadata “definition types” are not standardised so different applications sometimes use them differently.
The problem i a similar to AAF. There are standards, but also ways to customise and possibly interpret the standard itself as well as its use or meaning, and with the possibility to add a custom “layer” within that standard making it difficult to relate to if you don’t know what the reasoning behind this custom layer was.
I mean most importantly naming of the track and artist, plus the correct song art. Year of release and genre would be nice too.
What’s a reference file?
By the way, my use case is that I regularly make small edits to samples and then export the file. So, it would be practical for the output file to adapt the name of the sample (+ perhaps a suffix like “cut” or “eq’d”)