How to export all takes and parts from all tracks as new audio files like stems?

Cubase
1

I’m trying out Cubase 12. I have various projects created many years ago in Cubase LE 1.07. Each project has multiple tracks with multiple takes on each track. In some cases events on some tracks were combined into “parts” for comping, and some tracks were grouped into “folders” for working with multiple mics at once like on drums.

Here’s what I’m trying to accomplish.

  1. Export original, untouched takes from all tracks, except filling in blanks with silence and making sure they all start at the same place to ensure all line up properly in another DAW.
  2. Also export any comped audio parts the same way.
  3. Do the above as simply, quickly, and in as few steps as possible.

What menu/feature/option should I be looking for, and where can I find out how it works?

So far I’ve seen Audio Mixdown, which seems to address #2 but not #1. But not sure what other routes there might be to accomplish this.

2

A suggestion that could help, maybe, even if it might not answer to all your requirements…

For tracks with have multiple takes, I would do this, before any export audio mixdown attempt :

  1. Selection of the involved track
  2. (right-Click) > Select All Events
  3. (right-click) > Create Tracks from lanes
  4. Mute the original track

… and for tracks in which comping has been done :

  1. Selection of the involved track
  2. Edit > Render in Place
  3. Mute the original track

After these, all would be about a careful selection in the Export Audio Mixdown window…

1 Like
3

Ok, I tried the first part and did not work as expected. In the original projects, the takes basically show stacked on top of each other in the track, with some longer than others. I don’t recall anything about “lanes” coming into play in Cubase LE 1.07 until selecting them all and converting them to audio parts. But I also was brand new to digital recording at the time so maybe I wasn’t using it “right”.

So if I just do those first three steps as is, I get one track with nothing changed. I found the “Show lanes” button and it looks like the project considers all the takes to be in one lane, so that explains why.

If I first use “Clean up lanes”, then I “Show Lanes”, I see all of the takes plus one empty lane, and if I then “Create Tracks from Lanes” I get one new track for each take as expected.

So looks like in my case the first batch of steps are at least:

  1. Selection of the involved track
  2. (right-Click) > Select All Events
  3. (right-Click) > Clean up lanes
  4. (right-click) > Create Tracks from lanes
  5. Mute the original track.

However, what’s odd is after I choose “Clean up lanes”, a couple of the longer takes show an unexplained lighter shading up to a point, then darker after that.

Then when I hit “Create Tracks from lanes”, the takes that ran longer than other takes seem to get split into multiple events at whatever point the shading color changes. It’s not clear what the change in shading means or how it’s determining where that point is, though–it seems to be at the same point as the end of one of the other takes, but not always the shortest take, just one of the shorter takes. And the second-shortest take doesn’t get split. May not cause problems in the end, but it would be nice to know what exactly is happening there and why. I suppose it might be a holdover from something Cubase LE 1.07 did to the tracks, but who knows.

Anyway, not sure if it’s necessary, but seems like it might be a good idea to throw a “glue” in there to get rid of the mysterious splits.

Overall, though, looks like I’m going to need to make one or more macros to make this process actually work for a dozen or two projects. Doing one track at a time and fiddling with stuff like muting one out of five tracks looks tedious. And I’m not clear on whether there’s actually a way via the Audio Mixdown dialogue to get the takes in original mono form. Or whether Export Selected Tracks or Export Selected Events (assuming one event per track) might accomplish the same thing.