Live Loops cell gets more and more out of sync the more often it repeats

[alexe]

I have a simple Live Loops grid with a few software instrument cells that contain 4-bar regions and one audio cell. The audio cell contains an audio region that is slightly less than 4 bars long. Now if I play back all of these cells with the cycle range set to 4 bars, all the software instrument cells play back fine, but the audio cell is only in sync with the other cells for the very first play back. After that, the more often it repeats, the more out of sync it gets with the other cells. I'm confused for multiple reasons:

1. Even if the audio region has an "odd" length, meaning it doesn't divide the cycle range, shouldn't it always stay in sync on repetitions, just as it would if the simply looped the same regions over 4 bars in the Tracks area instead?

2. Since the audio region being slightly shorter than 4 bars was my only guess for why that cell might get out of sync with the others on repeated playback, I selected that cell and extended the audio region to a full 4 bars in the Track editor at the bottom. This, however, did not solve the issue. The cell still gets out of sync from the others.

I appreciate any suggestions regarding what the problem might be. Also happy to provide more information if needed.

[David Nahmani]

Can you share the Logic project file? Either directly here or, if it's too large, use something like Google drive or WeTransfer. 

[alexe]

1 hour ago, David Nahmani said:

Can you share the Logic project file? Either directly here or, if it's too large, use something like Google drive or WeTransfer. 

Will do! But can by any chance explain what the expected behavior is regarding Live Loops quantization and the length of the regions within cells?

I mean, I get that a cell doesn't have an inherent playback length, but if the Quantize Start value is set to any multiple of bars, e.g. 2 bars, and a cell contains a region that is just under 4 bars long, isn't Logic smart enough to know that when the playback of that cell repeats, the region is obviously supposed to start playing back on the beat?

In other words, is it required that I make sure that all regions in cells have the proper length (e.g. exactly 2, 3, 4, etc. bars) in order for the cells to loop in a rhythmically meaningful way?

If the quantization is set to e.g. 4 bars, I thought it would make sense that Logic treats a region that is 3.8 bars long as a 4-bar region, or a region that is 4.1 bars long as a 5-bar region, such that things stay in sync as the cells loop. But that doesn't seem to be the case. Or can I configure that somehow?

Edited April 25 by alexe

[David Nahmani]

13 hours ago, alexe said:

I get that a cell doesn't have an inherent playback length, but if the Quantize Start value is set to any multiple of bars, e.g. 2 bars, and a cell contains a region that is just under 4 bars long, isn't Logic smart enough to know that when the playback of that cell repeats, the region is obviously supposed to start playing back on the beat?

As long as the loop length is set correctly in the Cell inspector, then the loop plays 4 bars: 

[alexe]

Ah, the loop length in the cell inspector was the issue!

In case anybody runs into the same issue: I learned that changing the length of the region in the cell editor (in my case from a little shorter than 4 bars to exactly 4 bars) is not the same as changing the cell length / loop length. Cell length / loop length and region length are different concepts, which of course makes total sense now that I think about it, but it's something that people might trip over when first using Live Loops.

Edited April 26 by alexe

[David Nahmani]

6 minutes ago, alexe said:

Cell length / loop length and region length are different concepts

Yes, exactly! This allows you to make sure the cell repeats every 4 bars even if the region isn't a full 4 bar long. Or for example to repeat every 2 bars even if the region is 8 bar long.