I’ve been trying to lock a bar and beat to a specific SMPTE value on a project, and so far failing. Unable to find anything on the forums, I turned to AI, and both ChatGPT and Google are adamant that it’s possible.
ChatGPT is talking about a features from Dorico 4 up which can be found in properties (telling me to go to ‘time’, then ‘timecode’).
Is this a real feature or is AI just making it up?
If no, is there any way to do this? I want to be able to move around and write different sections of a film score without having alignment change if I change tempi.
I’m not sure we are on the same page so please clarify the question if you need to:
Dorico lets you create markers with time code that are locked in the sense that they are locked to a certain video frame. If I then add bars or change tempo, the marker doesn’t change its value - it always stays at the same frame. But the beat and bar at which the marker appears in the score could shift - By showing you where the marker now lands, Dorico is showing you the result of your tempo change or whatever. It isn’t overriding your tempo, compressing or stretching your tempo to keep a section of the score to its original duration if that is what you mean.
It’s also not locked in the sense that you can’t edit it. You can edit the marker itself if you want to change which frame(s) are important to you.
As far as SMPTE - meaning locked to some other Device or software via SMPTE - that is also possible but it currently requires a plugin purchased from another vendor. I find the combination of Cubase and Dorico synched together to make the most sense for me whenever video is involved.
Sorry - your question stuck in my brain and I re-read it this morning. I think what you are asking about is essentially that you are working on multiple cues. So yes… It works like this:
For each flow you create in Dorico you can assign a starting point by Timecode under video properties. Just right click on a flow in setup mode to find it. And it always starts there, no matter what you do on any other flow. You are basically using different flows as different cues then. There are several independent video settings for each flow you might use, including each flow not necessarily using the same video file.