Sonar time/snap editing? Am I dreaming...

[grandmatarkin]

Hi there... I've been reading recently about Sonar 7, and by far the feature that most caught my eye/ear was the time editing functionality.I forget the official name, but now you can basically quantize not only midi but audio material as well. A couple of questions...1) can any other DAW do this with audio (i know midi quantize is standard)2) to what extent does this compromise the sound of time-edited tracks.3) assuming that it's not too "sound-compromising", is it really as good as it sounds? For me, it really seems like the holy grail of recording. If it works well, I think it might be time for ye grande olde switch to Sonar. Lord knows that I have spent way to much time aligning tracks so they match the beat/feel... etc. If I could say goodbye to this, I would be a *very* happy person.By the way, if there are any other features specific to Sonar that I am missing but might help sway me, feel free to give them a mention. Thanks in advance !-dave

[sgs4u]

Logic does these things very well. How much compromise, is a matter of how great a range of semitones or tempo bpms you're moving. One semi-tone is perfect, 2 almost. After that it depends on the sttings you use to edit things with, Melodyne is fabulous at that stuff, in my experience, of time compression/expansion and pitch shifting. And of course tuning things and moving increments is amazing, as well as being able to create harmonies from existing tracks. I don't think Sonar can do all that Melodyne stuff. See you in the corner buddy, elbows up. Chuck (cr7string) is the Sonar king. Sept 8, 2008, 9:35pm, grandmatarkin wrote:Hi there... I've been reading recently about Sonar 7, and by far the feature that most caught my eye/ear was the time editing functionality.I forget the official name, but now you can basically quantize not only midi but audio material as well. A couple of questions...1) can any other DAW do this with audio (i know midi quantize is standard)2) to what extent does this compromise the sound of time-edited tracks.3) assuming that it's not too "sound-compromising", is it really as good as it sounds? For me, it really seems like the holy grail of recording. If it works well, I think it might be time for ye grande olde switch to Sonar. Lord knows that I have spent way to much time aligning tracks so they match the beat/feel... etc. If I could say goodbye to this, I would be a *very* happy person.By the way, if there are any other features specific to Sonar that I am missing but might help sway me, feel free to give them a mention. Thanks in advance !-dave

[grandmatarkin]

Thanks Stevo! I think most of my changes would be small fixes after tracking. A guitar note that is a little early, etc. BTW, whoever wins the anthem money owes the other a beer

[sgs4u]

Sept 8, 2008, 10:06pm, grandmatarkin wrote:Thanks Stevo! I think most of my changes would be small fixes after tracking. A guitar note that is a little early, etc. BTW, whoever wins the anthem money owes the other a beer Do they drink flats of beer in Newfoundland?

[crs7string]

Dave,The feature you are referring to in Sonar is "audio snap".There are some videos on You Tube that demonstrate how it works.I do use it to do minor corrections like quantizing a quarter note guitar pattern.You can also extract the groove from one track and quantize other tracks to the extracted groove. ie: quantize the bass part to the drum feel. There are swing options on the option to quantize by %.You can also groove quantize audio as well.Sonar Producer also includes V-Vocal. This is based on Roland's Variphrase technology and offers pitch correction. I have only used this a little and it works well to correct pitch if it is just a tweek. ( although I know it does more things like correcting timing, I haven't spent any time doing this) There is a video on You Tube on this as well.I have been a Sonar user for a number of years and the program continues to evolve.I am not one of the fervent users that protect my turf on what I use. Sonar is a tool, and does what I need it to do. There are other tools that do the same job.I do plan on adding Melodyne for more detailed editing. I like the new polyphonic editing feature.HTH Chuck

[grandmatarkin]

Thanks Chuck. It pretty much sounds as good as I thought. I watched some videos of audio snap in use and was quite impressed. I currently spend a lot of time lining things up by hand, and it's something I really don't look forward to doing. I didn't know about Melodyne's polyphonic editing feature. I'm going to check that out. Actually, I've only used Melodyne a couple of times. Seemed impressive though. And it's all the rage with the kids! Thanks again.

[ncc1701]

I've used Sonar 5 Studio Edition for a couple of years and have my upgrade to 7 sitting in the box waiting to be installed once I get my new computer set up.I've used the V-Vocal a lot for pitch and some for timing. For the few things I've done with it, I haven't had a noticeable loss of quality if the tweaks are small. Kathleen

[davewalton]

Sept 9, 2008, 10:03am, kelysian wrote:I've used Sonar 5 Studio Edition for a couple of years and have my upgrade to 7 sitting in the box waiting to be installed once I get my new computer set up.I've used the V-Vocal a lot for pitch and some for timing. For the few things I've done with it, I haven't had a noticeable loss of quality if the tweaks are small. KathleenI don't have anything to compare it with but I like V-vocal. I've only used it a few times selectively but it does a great job is easy to use overall as well as for one-note tweaks. I will say that I didn't even touch Raags vocals on the Bollywood track... just added a little reverb, sat back and smiled.

[rld]

SONAR user here.I don't really use the fancy bells and whistles.First time I time stretched anything (actually shrunk) was just the other day when I had to make my :20 "King of the Hill" pitch a bit shorter.Worked flawlessly.I also like V Vocal. One of the keys to using it successfully is to "bounce to clips" after you are satisfied with the edit.If you leave multiple instances of the tool open, problems start to arise.

[ibanez468]

I've got it too ( Sonar 7 Producer Edition). I'm wrestling with it a bit trying ta' see how well it handles all of the virtual instruments. I've had it crash on me a few times when I've started a new project and couldn't figure out why. The meters on the CPU or the disk hadn't even come close to goin' in the RED, so I don't know what caused the crash. The funny thing about it is, that it seemed to have been running alot smoother out of the box before the upgrade to 7.2 is it? Have Melodyne too, haven't gotten into that just yet, but I feel that it's gonna be something alright!I-468