The Beat Detective Discussion

[James Murphy]

My problem with beat detective is that when i select a section, lets say the intro section, at the end of the section the drummer was rushing a bit and the cymbal hit for the first bar, of the next section of the song, is in the intro selection, lets say the verse is after the intro. So i beat detective the into and now its basically chopped up that cymbal hit that needed to be on the 1 beat of the verse or next section. This usually happens quite a bit and then I'm left with a bunch of chopped cymbals in the end that are not fixed with crossfades.

Does anyone else experience this and whats your work around for such a thing?

Sometimes I just slide the whole song or section to the right a bit but that can throw off the stuff thats played correctly and then beat detective throws hits were they should not be. Also what Ive done is sample the cymbals of the session and replace on those chopped hits when needed.

your problem is very easy.. you are choosing your intro section via the grid... do not do this... enter slip mode and choose your selection by starting it at the exact transient that bar one SHOULD be... not where it IS on the grid... end your selection just BEFORE that cymbal hit.... exactly at the start of the transient for it in fact... you have now chose then AUDIO that you want to conform to the grid... you cannot do this by choosing your selection on the grid.

this is basic Beat Detective actually, and is among the first instructions of any BD tutorial i've ever seen.... including the one i had already posted in the "I Love Pro Tools" thread.

many of you guy's problems with BD is that you are simply doing it wrong.

 

[James Murphy]

From my posts in a previous thread, regarding BD:

a key part of using Beat Detective is auditing the automatic results, using varying zooms... in this way you guarantee the sucess of the Region Conform and Smoothing steps.

Steps 1 and 2 are necessary, Step 3 is optional.

1 - on the first audit pass you just look for false and missing beat triggers... zoom in to where you can view a few to several bars at a time, depending on the density of the playing, and delete and add them quickly as you run through that pass... this goes very fast normally if you have chosen the best detection analysis algorithm and sensitivity to start with... just scroll through using your scroll wheel and add and delete as necessary... very quick. make certain you have beat triggers on every transient that should have one, and no "falsies" remaining.

2 - Then zoom a bit further in for the second pass.. make sure that "Show Trigger Time" is checked in the Region Separation pane, and that the radial button for Sub-Beats is indicated.... now scroll-wheel through and make sure the trigger times... the beat/sub-beat that BD will move each transient to, or closer to, depending on the Strength setting you have chosen in the Region Conform pane... is correct for each beat trigger. This goes much quicker than you'd think, especially once you're used to what the subdivisions will read as for each type of rhythm. Correct each one as necessary by simply double-clicking on the beat trigger and entering the correct value. Your success here will depend highly upon your remembering to Capture Selection and choose the appropriate subdivision in the "Contains:" drop-down in the Selection Pane for each section you work on.

3 - to get tweaky you can add a third step to the audit process: zoom very far in and move through each trigger via the Scroll Next button in BD... and manually moving beat triggers to fine-tune their location on the transient as desired.

then just make sure you've set a Trigger Pad of around 10-20 ms in the Region Separation pane and hit Separate. move to the Region Conform pane, set your desired Strength, and hit conform... if you've taken Audit step #2 everything should move to the correct location, or closer to it as per your Strength selection. then move to the Edit Smoothing pane, make sure the Fill and Crossfade radial button is indicated, and set a Crossfade time for one half the trigger pad value you set earlier in the Separation pane. Hit Smooth.

 

[greyskull]

in regards to the SAVE AS thing...here's how I label my sessions in the order I do the editing...

SONG TITLE Drums Comp
SONG TITLE Drums Edit
SONG TITLE Drums XF
SONG TITLE Drums Conso
SONG TITLE Drums Final

With this label/saving scheme, it makes it easy to back track if weeks/months from now you want to recomp the drums.

yes mate

 

[greyskull]

interesting to see how other people approach it. nice on james, like i said this is how i learnt to do it; and it works for me.

Just to reiterate in case no-one could be arsed to read all my ramblings; there is a bug in PT 7.3 certaintly in HD on the Mac where the strength and exclude within functions Don't work....

 

[greyskull]

What do you mean here?
You mean select the best takes and create a single takes with the best parts, and after that duplicate it to have a comped drums backup? (I know what's comp but it's to know if you mean the same thing in your explanation )

prezactly

 

[James Murphy]

here's the thing about why you cannot make your selection based on the grid... it should be very clear, just as in Joshua's example... that if you choose your selection in Grid mode you get some performance in your selection that you don't want if the drummer has rushed, and not all of it you need if he has been dragging. If by choosing your selection on the grid you would end up with only the part of the performance you actually wanted to edit... well then you may not really need to BD that section at all. So again... choose your selection based on the audio that you want to conform to a specific set of bars, in slip mode. do not use the grid to make this selection. select from the spot that you want conformed to x/1/000 through to the spot you want to be the x/1/000 of the very next section, but not including it.

 

[greyskull]

hmmmmmmm.
cunning

 

[::XeS::]

Yeah I select exactly like you James. Very good advices here guys.
James, you are the only one that plays with the trigger values before the chop, so I ask to you if you have the problem I mentioned some posts ago

 

[James Murphy]

Yso I ask to you if you have the problem I mentioned some posts ago

to minimize this "uneditable trigger" issue first thing is to make sure your selection does not cross Tempo or Meter changes on the Conductor lane... keep your selections to one tempo, one meter.

next, make sure you have the correct sub-beat value indicated in the Selection > Contains: drop-down menu in BD for the section you are working on... and make sure you selection does not have both triplet and non-triplet rhythms... select only one type of rhythm at a time.

finally, make sure you do step 1 of the Audit process i outlined in one of my earlier posts in this thread. Step 2 is exactly what you're doing when you run into the issue... editing the trigger locations. if you've tried everything else, sometimes you simply need to jump ahead to the next trigger and fine-tune it's location (step 3 from my other post about auditing), moving it more onto the transient, and thus a bit further away from the previous trigger... also make sure it's location is correct. If it's not, try editing that first... either or both of those two things may allow you to go back and successfully edit the previous one, the one that was giving you trouble.

these steps will cut down drastically on the instances of "uneditable triggers"... but you'll sometimes still run into the issue.... at that point you have to be able to improvise and come up with a work-around that works for you. i often just delete the problem trigger and carry on.... going back after the BD process and manually editing that hit.... which is the same thing i do for when it sometimes won't allow you to place a trigger at all at a certain point.... but taking the above steps will greatly minimize these instances.

 

[::XeS::]

Thank you very much James. Very clear

 

[James Murphy]

no problem, hope it helped.

 

[Andy Sneap]

here's the thing about why you cannot make your selection based on the grid... it should be very clear, just as in Joshua's example... that if you choose your selection in Grid mode you get some performance in your selection that you don't want if the drummer has rushed, and not all of it you need if he has been dragging. If by choosing your selection on the grid you would end up with only the part of the performance you actually wanted to edit... well then you may not really need to BD that section at all. So again... choose your selection based on the audio that you want to conform to a specific set of bars, in slip mode. do not use the grid to make this selection. select from the spot that you want conformed to x/1/000 through to the spot you want to be the x/1/000 of the very next section, but not including it.

Actually I always make my selection based on the grid. I always keep the original drum version behind what I'm doing on a different playlist. I'll work probably 3 to 4 bars at a time, consolidating as I go. I alway apple + E and separate the region before I work on it too so it doesn't effect the region after it. Also if a drummers tending to push I'll usually manually move all the drums so they a touch behind the beat before BDing as its easier to sort.

 

[::XeS::]

Sometime I noticed that when I edit a selection and I conform it, something before this selection is chopped away (the final part of the previous bar, but it depends by the movement of my actual selection's consolidation).
Anyway I think it's good to work with grid selection but If some beat is before x|1|000 with grid it's not included in my selection/editing.

 

[James Murphy]

Actually I always make my selection based on the grid. I always keep the original drum version behind what I'm doing on a different playlist. I'll work probably 3 to 4 bars at a time, consolidating as I go. I alway apple + E and separate the region before I work on it too so it doesn't effect the region after it. Also if a drummers tending to push I'll usually manually move all the drums so they a touch behind the beat before BDing as its easier to sort.

*shrugs*... different strokes i s'pose. certainly works for you... no one could disagree on that. i learned to do it the way i do it from two different BD tutorials that i studied right after i got HD... and though i use "B" rather than "Apple+E" because i work 99% of the time in Keyboard Focus, i learned to separate the section i'm working on from you, ... and that little tip saved me loads of grief!

 

[James Murphy]

I think it's good to work with grid selection but If some beat is before x|1|000 with grid it's not included in my selection/editing.

which is why i don't make my selection in grid mode, and ostensibly why the authors of the tutorials i studied back when i got serious with BD advised not to... but i think it's also the reason, or part of it, why Andy nudges the drums behind the beat a bit before he starts. in the end, whatever works, works.

 

[::XeS::]

James, you spoke about tutorials...do you have some title to share with us?

 

[James Murphy]

i found them both online, and the only thing i remember is that one of the guys was apparently a known rock engineer (though i had never heard of him) and the other was a digidesign certified guy. it's been some years so i don't recall exactly where i found them or either guy's name, sorry.

they both said the same thing regarding making selections though... to do it in slip mode, and to choose from the exact spot that you want to be moved to x/1/000 on the grid through to what would be x/1/000 of the next section after it.

Andy's way obviously works for him though... so there's always more than one way to skin a cat.

 

[::XeS::]

No problem

 

[greyskull]

cmd e? You are old school andy! Not a fan of key command focus then?

 

[C_F_H_13]

Also if a drummers tending to push I'll usually manually move all the drums so they a touch behind the beat before BDing as its easier to sort.

This saves me a ton of time. I usually makes BD work so much better.