Bookmarking, thanks for links, Crotchety.
I also thought there was a thread or someone had in there sig “Protecting Your Comps”, but I can’t find that. Anyone else able to?
[Edit]: Ah, here! Steinberg Forums . It’s so fast though, and I don’t know how to pause/rewind the animated .gif, that I can’t tell if/how the old/previously considered “discarded” segments can be “reactivated” after recording a new take.
Thanks -
+1
I admit that there could be some improvements/refinements to the new lanes functionality, but I could NEVER go back to the old way.
No, personally I don’t like the lanes constraints… And, I don’t see why I need to be constrained. I understand entirely what it does but it just doesn’t fit with how I want to work.
I always thought that Steinberg the ethos was to avoid constraints and provide many flexible ways of using the tools in all sorts of different ways. That’s This one seems to go against the grain here. It second guesses what I’m wanting to do, and in this case it’s not the right guess.
As for whether Steinberg should make changes like this, I’d prefer a more piecemeal approach to changing things that are already implemented. Excellent to add big new features, I think that’s really good, but changing my daily workflow so radically isn’t for me.
I like to use this forum to put forward my opinion, and I’m sure Steinberg weigh up the comments here.
Mike.
I’ve had a careful look at Comping in Cubase 6 the last couple of days. The Cubase 5 Part Editor adds up to a complete carefully honed set of surgical tools allowing you to sculpt a take (multiple lanes) in any way that serves your vision. In Cubase 6 the deciders at Steinberg seem to have concluded “You user types don’t need all this complicated fecal matter. So we’re taking that confusing stuff away. Here’s a fire axe. It works great and it’ll save you time.”
I suppose this is pretty much OK for folks who craft little grooves and then add a vocal. I am a composer/songwriter so, no, it’s worse not better. Much worse.
I’ll continue to do most of my work in Cubase 5. Hopefully I’ll find some use for some of the new stuff in Cubase 6, but they aren’t file compatible so why not see what’s up in SONAR, Pro Tools, Logic, etc ? No reason at all. This not the golden age of loyalty.
Happy New Year-
Jan
Too fast for me too(*) but I guess the answer to your question is ‘yes’.
(*) You could always download the gif but none of WMP, Winamp or VLC like the format. QT plays it but won’t slow it down.
[Edit] You can always save unused segments on a separate track (or Part, come to think of it).
Btw:
This new lanes business is full of traps for the unwary. Adding a lane of audio below a comp will mask the comp and if you don’t realise in time you can lose/forget what you had (hence the gif). Colour coding can help. Be careful when scrolling events using the numbers, it might push everything in front of it out of the way. Copying and moving can produce unexpected results, shall we say, because of conflicting event/lane priorities, resulting in pasted events either ending up in different lanes from where they started or pushing exiting events out of the way. In short, if I were you I’d become intimately acquainted with ‘Save As’ while learning.
complete carefully honed set of surgical tools allowing you to sculpt a take (multiple lanes) in any way that serves your vision
Yeah, I like that description of the old method. I’m after flexible tools rather than constrained tools.
Still, there’s plenty of people arguing both sides, but one thing’s for sure it’s caused a big stir. Hopefully enough for Sb to review their approach to new changes in the future.
Mike.
Can some kind soul who is better able to stay up with this animated .gif than I … please explain how it shows how to incorporate a later-recorded take into the comping process, while “protecting” the old comp?
Any help at all will be much appreciated - thanks!
[Edited: Wrong link initially]
Haha, reminds me of a Charlie Chaplin movie 
And, kind of goes to show how kludgy the new system is I think.
Mike.
Hey Mike -
Thanks for your reply, I agree it is hard to follow, but I think we’ll get more real help if this thread stays “clean” - no complaints about the software, just trying to use it to the best of my ability.
Thanks again! 
What I think he’s doing, and I haven’t tried it, is to package up the first comps into a Part. Then when you record further takes and split those takes then the Part gets split but you can glue it back together again and within the part the original takes and their splits, i.e. the comps, are fully preserved. Thus you can preserve previous comps while recording and editing more versions. Apart from being fast, the video is confusing because you can’t see what he’s doing sometimes cause the menu is off-screen, I think it’s Dissolve Part being used at times as well as.
Mike.
Yeah, that sounds about right - dissolving parts. Try it . The other thing you could do is bounce a comp to a new file and track. Or you could duplicate track and just keep the bits you want. In both cases the unused bits are preserved on a track you can Disable.
Not tried Parts but it might be more elegant, that way.
Thanks for the explanation, guys. With that play-by-play of the animated .gif, GargoyleStudio, I will have a go, hopefully if there’s anything else I’ll be able to figure it out.
Thanks again -
Have now and pretty impressed as a way of working. I’ve got a riff I recorded several times round a loop and I want to pick out maybe four comps to be used at various points in the project, for the sake of some variety.
I can pick out the first combination that sounds good and drop it into a part. I don’t even have to put them all on a lane to do this. You continue in this way with the remaining events till you have as many comps as you can muster.
Doing it like this means that events in the Part keep the lane they had in the Arrangement and try to get back there when you Dissolve Part. They don’t - quite - because creating the Part grabbed a lane but I’ve just tried it with three Parts deliberately taken from all over the place and they all dissolved in an orderly fashion.
I suppose this must be close to what JHP was showing us so thought I’d share it with y’all and get it straight in my own head into the bargain.
Tell ya what… the tune’s sounding much better and it really didn’t take much time at all.
Well, night all.
C
Hi - I think I’m able to do this now
I’m able to follow the animated .gif through protecting the comp by putting events to part, then recording another take. One thing that made me pause at this stage is that the composite track was “hidden” by the newly recorded take. I had to drag tracks around to “uncover” the composite track, and drag it to an empty lane, this part of the process seems messy to me, I’m sure there’s a more efficient way to get things done here - any suggestions appreciated!
I couldn’t follow much of the rest (too fast for me), but I wonder if the following gets the job done anyway?
A) After toggling back and forth between the created comp and the newly recorded take during playback, if there is a bit on the new take that sounds better, highlight that bit, so it appears in the composite track at the top. The range selection tool is the easiest one for me here.
B) Delete overlaps
C) Highlight each of the separate sections on the comp track at the top, and put “Events to Part” again.
D) Then bounce. (I get a “Create Part from Region?” dialogue here for some reason)
If anyone has any comments or suggestions on this, they are gratefully anticipated.
Thanks!