Inaccurate transient detecting

[bluepaper]

Hello,

 

Is there a way to help Logic detect transients more accurately? I chop my percussion hits ( I make sure the regions are short enough) in two ways: either by Slice by transient or find silence(or whatever it is called). After this I zoom in and notice that Logic has either cut before or after the transient. I then select all the little regions and try the key command 'Trim region start to next transient', but the bad results persist.

 

I end up having to trim each (100+ regions) manually, which renders these batch editing key commands pretty much useless.

 

Help would be very very appreciated.

 

Thanks!

[David Nahmani]

I would first go into Transient editing mode in the Audio File editor and adjust whatever transient are mispositioned before moving on: Logic Pro X: Use transient markers to edit

[bluepaper]

Hi David,

 

thanks for your reply. That still means I'd need to go through them one by one and as there can be over 300 regions to check, which is currently taking me hours to do.

If there's anything else one could do to avoid going though the cut points one by one that would be helpful. I'm sure I'm just missing something here, otherwise these functions wouldn't really make any sense?

 

Thanks.

[David Nahmani]

Is 300 regions the result of splitting by transient, or are you intending to split 300 regions by transient, each region containing multiple transients?

 

In any case can you share a screenshot of a region and the detected transients?

 

In my experience Logic mostly gets it right so double-checking the position of multiple transients, even 300 of them, is generally quick enough, just the extra transient to delete, missing transient to add here and there.

[bluepaper]

It's a result of chopping short regions that contains 4 percussion hits each.

 

I've attached two screen shots.

 

Thank for your help.

[David Nahmani]

So what is wrong here?

[deafperception]

Bringing this back from the dead because I have the same question. I’ve included the same visual with some annotation.

 

 

I guess my question is why Logic chops the transient at point A as opposed to point B where the audio file seems to begin? My obvious concern being that I’m losing details in the recording at the beginning.

[David Nahmani]

Because that's where the transient was detected. You can move the transient marker in the Audio File editor if you want to position it at point A.

[drakepeterdrake]

Adding to this question: is there a way to adjust the "threshold/sensitivity" of Logic's detection of transients? That might help the O/P

Thanks.

P

[David Nahmani]

Adding to this question: is there a way to adjust the "threshold/sensitivity" of Logic's detection of transients?

In the Audio File editor there are + and - buttons in Transient detection mode in the menu bar.

[Zachchapel]

Hey have to weigh in on this because I was looking to see if logic had updated or improved this aspect of the DAW.  Look, I have used logic since 2010 so I'll just come right out and say it.  Logic's transient detection is just...not...good.  I've been fighting with this for years and now I just do all my drum editing in protools.  Logic is good for a lot of things, but that isn't one of them.  That being transient detection starts for marker placements and tab-to-transient-type aspects (like placing the playhead at the  beginning of a transient or taking a region start to the beginning of a transient).

On 5/12/2019 at 2:34 PM, David Nahmani said:

So what is wrong here?

David, I truly do respect you and your input at all times.  You are a wealth of knowledge and I've solved a lot of issues on here because of you and this forum.  However, when it comes to drum editing and that transient detection is off, it causes all kinds of issues down the road with triggering, midi, slicing, any type of flex editing, etc...all sorts of things.  And having to go into the transient editor and move almost every single transient by hand just isn't conducive to a great work flow.  The only thing you can really rely on is slip editing and even then, it would be a lot more helpful to properly detect all the starts of transients on, lets say, kick, snare, and toms, to then use those markers to split the remainder of the drum set regions along with the kick snare and toms.  Again, therein lies another problem.  If the kick or snare transients start in the wrong place, you're back at square one and doing everything by hand.  

It honestly gets to the point where it's audible (especially with kick drums for some reason) when bad transient detection happens and you start moving things around using something like slicing on a kick drum you'll hear audible pops and clicks...it also cause triggering and midi detection to be off because it splits the beginning of the transient in half.  If this only happened a few time here in there, sure...no software is perfect.  That happens in any DAW and you just have to rely on your eyes and ears sometimes...but this ain't that.

If you're doing a rock band that's all 4 on the floor beats, you'd think it would be pretty easy...but disregarding you that you would still have to move a lot of the transient start markers around by hand...so ok, whatever at that point...but then we get into extreme metal and blast beats or straight 16th's of double kick and my friend, after YEARS trying to find proper work around's in Logic for that, it just is what it is.  I will never edit drums in Logic again until they (hopefully) address this issue.  

Much love and this is all said with no malicious intent towards David or Logic.  

 

 

Edited August 11, 2023 by Zachchapel

[des99]

I think we're all comfortable with people documenting their frustrations at aspects of Logic's behaviour here - no one's going to get offended, don't worry!

I would say that if you have reproducible behaviour that you think is off, take some example cases, showing where Logic is detecting the transients, and where you think the transients *should* be detected, and submit it, with a sample project to Apple via their feedback. The more specific you can be, the more chance you have of Apple looking at it and going "Hmm, yeah, maybe we can do this better", and having the behaviour being improved.

[Zachchapel]

1 hour ago, des99 said:

I think we're all comfortable with people documenting their frustrations at aspects of Logic's behaviour here - no one's going to get offended, don't worry!

I would say that if you have reproducible behaviour that you think is off, take some example cases, showing where Logic is detecting the transients, and where you think the transients *should* be detected, and submit it, with a sample project to Apple via their feedback. The more specific you can be, the more chance you have of Apple looking at it and going "Hmm, yeah, maybe we can do this better", and having the behaviour being improved.

Thanks Des...you are a god amongst humanity as well.

[des99]

Nah - I'm only a god on the internet. In my regular meat guise, I'm just another guy...

🙂

[David Nahmani]

16 hours ago, Zachchapel said:

David, I truly do respect you and your input at all times.  You are a wealth of knowledge and I've solved a lot of issues on here because of you and this forum.  However, when it comes to drum editing and that transient detection is off, it causes all kinds of issues down the road with triggering, midi, slicing, any type of flex editing, etc...all sorts of things

I do agree that the transient detection doesn't always work as expected, however in the specific case illustrated in bluepaper's screenshot I don't see the transient detection as being necessarily wrong. The transient isn't necessarily at the beginning of the waveform. For example in the following screenshot, the transient position was detected correctly: 

[Rick T]

I've been dealing with this a lot lately and may have to use pro tools for drum editing. the transient detection in the file editor, prior to flex timing, cuts a tiny part of the beginning off and that really does cause weird things to happen, specifically in the overhead/room mic tracks. weird artifacty/phasy sounds during fills. the performance is very tight too.

 

I use a quantize, then go through and fix any mistakes type of method. either way, is there an easier way to adjust the position of all the transient detections at once so that when I quantize it in Flex Time, it places everything correctly?

[Zachchapel]

8 hours ago, Rick T said:

I've been dealing with this a lot lately and may have to use pro tools for drum editing. the transient detection in the file editor, prior to flex timing, cuts a tiny part of the beginning off and that really does cause weird things to happen, specifically in the overhead/room mic tracks. weird artifacty/phasy sounds during fills. the performance is very tight too.

I use a quantize, then go through and fix any mistakes type of method. either way, is there an easier way to adjust the position of all the transient detections at once so that when I quantize it in Flex Time, it places everything correctly?

Man, I have searched high and low...and tried everything I know.  Other than Logic fixing this on their end, I'd say you just have to edit in protools to avoid this issue.  Unless someone has a solution that I'm not aware of, of course.  

[Sir Hannes]

As a long protools user I feel you @Zachchapel 

I dislike this in logic, it feels odd and not useful at all. Using TAP (TAB?) in ProTools together with transient detection makes it so easy to edit and move regions exactly to the same spot in a huge crowded session, they are aligned over 100 tracks.

This isnt' so in Logic. Regarding to your screenshots, if I use detection and let Logic cut, it sets an anchor so still if I move it around, that anchor snaps onto my grid. I have to force myself to trust Logic and not my eyes like in ProTools, where I can see that they are all aligned. That's why for film I do not touch LogicPro because a huge crew relies on your work.

But Logic aligns them too, plus weird meat at the beginning.

Wish you good vibes and energy 🙂