[FR] - Export pre-roll

Hi,

I know that this is probably not the right terminology for it, but it’s the closest thing I can think of… I was wondering if it were possible to add a pre-roll to the export function?

OK, a little background:

  1. I create a track which starts on exactly bar 1 - the kick drum is absolutely dead on, right at the very beginning
  2. I set the left/right markers and export the track
  3. I’m left with a file where the kick starts at 0:00 seconds. If I have a compressor over the top of the master channel it will behave a bit odd, because it doesn’t start reacting until half way through the first kick. Additionally, there is no breathing room before the first kick - that is not particularly useful/flexible.

What I want is for there to be a bit of silence in the exported file - so it starts off by playing a bar of nothing before the first kick starts, giving any compressors time to react. So in reality, it starts rendering from bar 0 rather than bar 1. If you were actually watching the rendering happen, you’d see the project cursor start just to the left of the 1 marker on the ruler at the top of the project.

Does that make any sense to start with?
And if so, can I request that this feature be added?

Don’t start the song on bar one or insert a bar or 2 before exporting…you can do this in the tempo track/process bars dialog.

even better, start your project on bar 5 and edit the bar offset in the project setup so it becomes bar 0 or 1 depending.
Then you get a -ve bar count in. Also you can edit the timecode start to start on 0 seconds too. Happy daze :stuck_out_tongue:

Or, consider it something to be done in mastering. Export to stereo > Insert silence > start mastering.

For sure. I usually start a project with a four bar offset. I like to use an instrument track to create my own two bar pre-roll. Then if I start recording from the beginning I have two bars of silence and the two bar count in to get ready.

The actual song still starts on bar one and you get plenty of wiggle room for where you want to start an export.

I’m pretty sure you can change the bar offset in the project setup menu at any time.

What I want is the export to happen exactly where I set the locators. If I want a bit of silence, I set the locateors that way. What I do not want is Cubase to add a bit of silence on its own.

Indeed. the main point is… don’t start your tune at the very start of the sequencer.

Indeed, that’s what I would always do - start the track at 16 bars so that I could set the left locator at 15 bars to give the track space. What would be better though is if there was an option to pre-roll though.

What I do is to put an event on a unused muted track at a point before the start and one at the end (after any audio stops), then it’s just a matter of Ctrl A (select all) P (set locators) then export. saves having to set the locator each time you do a mixdown and each export is the same length.

I’ve tried all of the suggestions above and none of them fit the bill.
See the problem I have is that if I have frozen tracks in the mix. If you move all tracks by a bar, the frozen tracks don’t. Same goes for trying any of the offset values in the project setup dialog box. They might look like they’ve moved, but they haven’t.
The only way to get a pre-roll in the way I want it is to unfreeze all the tracks, move everything (including automation) and then re-freeze. It’s a bit of a long-winded solution to be honest and not really what I was asking for.

Yes, I used to start a new track on bar 16, but what about a track which is not new? One which is already 99% complete?

Except mine. It does fit the bill.

Not really - the exported file still doesn’t have any breathing space before the first kick.

Yes, I can add more space after I’ve exported, but that does not fit the bill. Any processors strapped over any track still don’t have any more room to breathe. They will still sound just as bad.

no no, it works!
my solution
(incl. freeze tracks!)

go to…

  • Project > “Project Setup”
  • Bar Offset “+2” (important: positive value!)
  • apply “yes”

that´s it!
:sunglasses:
(erm… that´s quasi the same as Split wrote)

Isnt there an option to insert bars to the project in the TempoTrack? If not, you could use ArrangerTrack: You set a section being your song, than another section being one bar of silence and you flatten that. The final result should be what youre looking for.

Roger

Afraid, that doesn’t work. Frozen tracks still start at bar 1, even though they LOOK like they’ve moved

Do you know what? That might actually be a possible solution. In fact, I’ll try that in just a moment. One caveat: I have had issues with flattening arrangements in the past whereby automation can go a bit weird

Nope, flatten doesn’t work with frozen tracks in the project :frowning:

A compressor usually doesn´t react to silence anyway (given your threshold isn´t set to -°°), The compressor reacts to the signal that exceeds its threshold, within the attack time no matter, if there is 1 bar of “nothing” before, or 16, or what am I misunderstanding…?

My point was, that mastering a stereo mix is a separate process, so the compressor should be applied after exporting the stereo mix. And after adding silence…

This indeed leaves the question whether silence before audio start really changes the plugin’s behaviour, like thinkingcap says.

I’ve tried all of the suggestions above and none of them fit the bill.

Actually you ignored my suggestion in the very first response which is the one you want…tempo track/process bars dialog.

Here’s exactly what to do…Confirmed 100% working for all tracks including frozen.

Switch on Tempo Track from the transport & then open the tempo track from the project menu, set a tempo event at bar 1 of the tempo you were working at (You can use the pencil tool)…could be worth a quick check everything still lines up to the grid in the project window.
Then in the tempo track, click process bars, type 1 in the start box & 4 in the length box, click process, close tempo editor.