If you're having trouble with the first note when bouncing..

[motionpicture]

Just move your song start time one tick earlier.

 

For literally months I'd been struggling with a way to get Battery 3 to play on the first beat of bar 1 both in playback and bouncing down a final mix. Some people say to start your song at bar 2 so things have a chance to lock up, but I make dance music - when I press play on the cd I want instant sound, not have it be a bar later.

 

Today I tried just moving the song start block one clock tick earlier and it seems to have solved that problem, plus it *sounds* like it's starting instantly.

 

I've gotten lots of handy tips from this forum, so I figured I'd give a little back, even if it's not by any means revolutionary.

 

enjoy!

Matthew

[ski]

Thanks for sharing your idea. However, it's not recommended that you move the Song Start time. Doing this can corrupt your song, particularly if you have any automation in it.

[motionpicture]

Really? Logic can't handle that?

 

I just noticed you have to adjust the bounce times anyways (they default to 1 1 1 1) so you could always just leave the Song Start at 1 1 1 1, if you don't mind playback missing that note.

 

What kind of problems have people had from moving the Song Start?

[Eriksimon]

What kind of problems have people had from moving the Song Start?

 

1. You have to constantly recalculate positions. Some events only refer to the beginning as 1 1 1 1, even if you set the start point at -3 1 1 1. You have to constantly evaluate whteher indicated positions are correct, or if you need to add 4 bars to it. Confusing, and a bit silly. I must admit I haven't checked if that is still true for 9.1.3, I haven't yet worked in any project with a start point before 1 1 1 1 with 913

2. This confusion can throw off timing of automation too.

3. Also, project corruption seems to occur much more frequently in projects with pre-1111 starting points.

4. There are some problems specific to scoring to picture. About this I know very little, Ski is one of the resident Masters, he can enlighten you about that, I think.

5. If you just creating songs as a tracks or albums (as opposed to scoring to picture), AND you have no tempo, time signature and other Global track events BEFORE 1111 (no MIDI events either, no audio, no regions), then things might be OK. In fact, I do it more often than not, and keeping in mind the above precautions and apprehensions, I haven't encountered any problems the last six months or so.

 

So, mixed advice, it seems. My bottom line:

You can use it, but at your own risk, see my 4 points.

[ski]

Really? Logic can't handle that?

 

Not to discount any of what Erik had to say, but for me, his # 2, 3, and 4 are the explanations I would have offered (had Erik not beat me to the punch).

 

Logic can't handle lots of things that it actually lets you do by way of its feature set. Just like you found out... Logic lets you put music at 1 1 1 1 but it doesn't mean it's going to play it back correctly. Heck, Logic can't even play back its own metronome correctly from 1 1 1 1. Similarly, when it comes to moving the song start, sure, you can do it, but it introduces "unexpected behavior", shall we say.

 

I know you said that you want your music to start instantly, and from bar 1, and no one can fault you for expecting something so obviously musical, if not critical. But alas, this is the state of Logic. You might think that because of these problems that the Logic developers would fix them, but they haven't. They've left them just as they are, for years.

 

Fortunately there are workarounds.

 

Not to justify the program's behavior, but... if you think about it, starting music from bar 1 is about as arbitrary as starting it from bar 2. The upshot of starting from bar 2 is that your music will play back correctly. The downside is that you have to alter your math.

 

If you set your left locator to bar 2 (or just before) and do a "play from left locator" then your music starts from its first bar, even though the bar count is off by +1. You can also use Cycle mode, setting your left locator to 2 (or just before) and your right locator to someplace past the end of the song. That way, hitting play/stop/play/stop always starts from the very top.

 

So those are some of the workarounds. Not the prettiest picture, but better than risking song corruption.

[ski]

If you set your left locator to bar 2 (or just before) and do a "play from left locator" then your music starts from its first bar, even though the bar count is off by +1.

 

Now that I think about what I wrote, you might try setting your Left Locator to one tick before bar 1 (leaving the Song Start at 1 1 1 1) and use "play from left locator" to initiate playback. Or, set up cycle mode with the L. Locator set one tick back and the R. Locator set to somewhere past the end of the song.

[Rev. Juda Sleaze]

Unless scoring a movie, I always leave the 1st 1 or 2 bars silent. Seems the easiest solution to avoid any problems...

[motionpicture]

Ok, gentlemen (and possibly ladies as well)...

 

[taps microphone]

 

First of all, thanks for all the above info!

 

If I can summarize:

 

To escape the problems associated with 1 1 1 1, I have to work at a later point in time. I can't just move the song start to a later point (i.e. bar 3), and in fact I can't move the song start at all without incurring potential problems. For the record I use automation on probably a third of my tracks, though I rarely go past 16 tracks.

 

Now, when you folks are recording at the start of your song (let's say at bar 3), do you always take the play head back to Bar 1 and let it roll up to 3, where it punches in?

[Rev. Juda Sleaze]

I can't just move the song start to a later point (i.e. bar 3), and in fact I can't move the song start at all without incurring potential problems.

 

Insert bars, or move automation with selected regions?

 

Now, when you folks are recording at the start of your song (let's say at bar 3), do you always take the play head back to Bar 1 and let it roll up to 3, where it punches in?

 

Create marker at song start.

 

Though sometimes a little silence at the start can solve any issues with residual "tails" from reverbs et al.

[motionpicture]

I can't just move the song start to a later point (i.e. bar 3), and in fact I can't move the song start at all without incurring potential problems.

 

Insert bars, or move automation with selected regions?

 

I was talking in generalities, assuming that I would be starting a new track. So what I meant was: when starting from scratch, it would be unwise to move the song start and just work from the new start, which would be, say, bar 3.

 

Right now I rely heavily on the keyboard shortcut to take me back to song start - I guess I could change that to take me back to another start, like Bar 3.

 

While we're on a similar topic, do you all know of any reason why I wouldn't want to bounce down from before Bar 1? Has that been problematic for people in any way?

[Rev. Juda Sleaze]

Right now I rely heavily on the keyboard shortcut to take me back to song start - I guess I could change that to take me back to another start, like Bar 3.

 

Markers are your friend! Use markers.

[ski]

It's not a matter of how much automation you use. Even one track's worth of automation will potentially become corrupt if you alter the song start mark from 1 1 1 1.

 

So what I meant was: when starting from scratch, it would be unwise to move the song start and just work from the new start, which would be, say, bar 3.

 

If you have any plans to use automation at all, I'd say "probably not a good idea". In the same vein that automation doesn't like to have its first event before bar 1, I don't know how Logic would behave if it's first event started at bar 3 or any other non-1 bar. In other words, whenever you write automation, Logic automatically inserts a "first event" at bar 1 even if you started writing automation from any other point in the song; and if it gets written anywhere else, things can go haywire.

 

And it's not just automation that we're (collectively) warning about. Other kinds of weird song corruption can occur with non-1 Song Starts. So if you can find a way of working from bar 2 or later while your Song Start is left alone, you can at least know that you're not tempting fate.