Here are some more details on using Right Click in Pro Tools. Part 1 is here. Adding modifier keys to right-click Command (Mac) or Control (Windows) and right-clicking on a region brings up a slightly different contextual menu. The reason for this is so that you don’t loose your selection when accessing this version of the contextual menu. The new elements are…. Rename – This brings up the Rename Region dialog box so you can rename the region. Why isn’t this one also in the normal right-click contextual menu? Move Region …. To Selection Start These, along with the Snap To options on the normal right-click menu, are really useful options and saves having to remember a series of complex shortcuts. In the example we can see what will happen to the ‘Vocal’ region when we use the ‘Pad’ region as the Selection. Of course the selection could be the cursor location instead. Make your Selection first and then Command (Mac) or Control (Windows) and right-click on the ‘Vocal’ region, then choose the appropriate selection from the set of three options. This shows Move Region Start To Selection Start.... This shows Move Region Sync To Selection Start and this shows Move Region End To Selection Start. Elastic Audio In Warp view you can Right-click anywhere in the region and select Add Warp Marker from the pop-up.  If there is an Edit selection, Warp markers will be added at the selection start and end. To delete a Warp marker within a selection, Right-click and then select Remove Warp Marker from the pop-up menu.

For along time it was debatable as to whether a two-button mouse was worth having when working with Pro Tools. However since Digidesign introduced v7.2HD and 7.3 LE right-click enhancements have appeared all over the place and now each new feature seems to be making full use of that second button on your mouse or trackball. So in this month’s workshop we are going to look at what you can do with that right hand mouse button. Remember that Control-Click in the Mac Pro Tools world was equivalent to right-clicking. This is now not the case. Control-clicking can do different things to right-clicking now. Edit Window Region Right Clicking on a region now brings up a contextual menu. Most of these options are available to you elsewhere in Pro Tools but the great advantage of these right-click features is that they offer these options right under your fingertips. Cut, Copy, Paste, & Clear – These all duplicate the functions in the Edit menu. Matches - Alternatives After recording multiple takes with loop or punch recording, you can replace the take currently on a track with one of the other takes. This only works if each region has an identical start time. You can select and audition alternate takes from the Matches popup menu whilst the session plays or loops. Matches - Channels When working with audio files imported from a field recorder, you can this feature to replace a mono region on a track with a matching segment of an alternate channel that was recorded simultaneously. Any fades performed on the original region are automatically recalculated against the replacement region, and any pre-existing automation on that track is left unchanged. The details of this feature are complex and if you want more information then I would suggest you start by reading the Field Recorders Workflow guide which you should find the Documentation folder in the Digidesign folder in your Applications folder. Separate - This is the same as Separate Region in the Edit menu usually Command+E (Mac) or Control+E (Windows) Delete Fades – This enables you to delete a fade region and becomes active when you have made a fade selection. Snap to Next & Snap to Previous - These work in a similar way to Shuffle and are very useful especially when you don’t want to use Shuffle edit. Take a look at this screen shot, which shows a vocal track I am editing.  If I right-click on the middle region and select Snap to Next you will see that it has snapped to the next region to the right, something you could never do with Shuffle!  Conversely Snap to Previous will move the middle region to the region to the left, which is what you would expect to happen when moving a single region using Shuffle. Right-Clicking a region with the Selector Tool used to enable you to scrub with the cursor.  To do this now you must Control-click (Mac) or Start-Click (Windows). Spot – This brings up the normal Spot Region dialog box. Group Regions & Ungroup Regions – These enable you to create and undo region groups from a selection and are the same as Group and Ungroup in the Region menu. Loop and Unloop – These enable you to create, remove, or flatten region loops and are the same as Loop and Unloop in the Region menu. Expand to Tracks – This is another feature that comes into its own when you have multi-channel tracks acquired using a field recorder. Again for more info go to the Field Recorder Workflow guide.

Paul says.... I am pleased to announce that SoundCode For Dolby E version 2.0 is now available. Version 2.0 makes Dolby E faster and easier for tape-based and file-based workflows on Mac and Windows. Click here to download and try version 2.0. NEW FEATURES Accelerated Dolby E Encoding - We optimized the encode processing to take advantage of your multi-core processor. Final Cut Plug-In Dolby E Encoder - The encode/export window operates as a Final Cut export plug-in. Just select a sequence and click Export... VST Plug-In Dolby E Decoder - Windows and OS X. Audio Unit Plug-In Dolby E Decoder - OS X. Works with the new N-Mon monitoring utility as well as Nuendo, Soundtrack Pro, and Logic. MXF OP1a File Support - The decoder/player can read and import/decode audio from OP1a files. The encoder/exporter can write to a OP1a file. The decoder/player can import standard definition IMX and DV video for use by Mojo. Improved Multi-Program File Support - The Player/Decoder can choose between programs in a multi-program file for monitoring and decoding. Hot Folder Decode/Import - The standalone decoder/import window supports hot folder processing. N-Mon Utility - Allows many types of Dolby E decode monitoring (see below). Standalone Dolby E Decoder - N-Mon allows the computer to be a standalone Dolby E decoding system using the Audio Unit decoder plug-in. Use a low-cost M-Audio device, for example, to make your Mac a Dolby E decoding system. Final Cut / Quicktime Player Dolby E Decoder - N-Mon lets you insert the Audio Unit Dolby E decoder plug-in with any core audio software. Improved File Decode/Playback - Standalone app features a playback position slider PCM Thru Control - The Dolby E decoder has a "PCM Thru" option so that PCM audio passes through if the Dolby E decoder is enabled. Dolby E Default Decoding - The standalone app decoder has a default Dolby E config so that files with no Dolby E stream at the beginning can be decoded Improved BWF Metadata - BEXT description includes information about configuration, frame rate, track names, and more. Dolby E Metadata Import - The standalone app decoder lets you import Dolby E metadata to an XML file for use by the encoder or archiving. Click here to download and try version 2.0.

'MX582' posted this question recently on the Digidesign User Conference having experienced some problems when copying Pro Tools sessions from one drive to another... So we did a session the other day on our internal drive in our mac pro running pro tools 8 and some how it saved all but a few of the audio files created during that session into a separate external hard drive that was hooked up to the computer. It created a session folder in that external drive with the session name but the only thing that was in it was the audio files folder with just the new files we recorded. I'm completely puzzled how this would happen. We didn't have round robin allocation set or anything like that as far as i know... 'DigiTechSupt' asked.... Were you using a template or a previously created session that would have used the other drives folder for it's audio? 'johnnyv' added... Digi, we just had the same issue. Here's our situation: Brand new Harpertown 8-core, fresh internal drive, fresh Leopard install, fresh PT8 install. A client brought us a session from another city, we copied that session in its entirety onto our hard drive. It was a 7.4.x session, which we opened in PT8. We worked on the song for several hours. When we finished the session, we put a full copy back onto another hard drive owned by the client. When he got home, he said that many of the audio files were missing. We went into the audio folder on our drive, and many of the files were there (roughly half). We could open the session fine, and we could see all the files, but WHERE WERE THEY? We found them on another hard drive hooked to our computer...just as the guy described above. On that drive, there was a folder with the session name, and inside of that, there was a single "Audio Files" folder which contained JUST THE MISSING FILES. So, IN THE MIDDLE OF A SESSION, for some reason, the location of our recorded files started to be stored on another hard drive! I was totally stumped. 'Rail Jon Rogut' correctly pointed out... Just a heads up - never copy sessions with the Finder when sending out a copy for a client on their drive.. Use Save Copy In... and select to copy all the audio files. 'Howardk' agreed with Rail... You can't go wrong if you follow Rail's advice on this. . . and by the same token, anything someone brings in on a transfer hard drive, open it on the drive, and use Save Copy In to copy it over to your work drive. THere are other ways to do this, safely, but this is simplest. 'johnnyv' responded... Rail - Yes, that is advice well taken. From now on, that's what we'll do.  However --- I can also imagine us keeping backups for clients, and it's troubling to know that PT is somehow switching up hard drive locations without anyone's knowledge, so we should definitely get this sorted out. We also had no round robin allocation selected. 'Rail Jon Rogut' also suggested.... Make sure the drive in the Workspace was a "Record" drive. 'johnnyv' replied... Well, that's the weird thing, Rail. Half the audio files went where they should go...in the Audio Files folder in the ProTools Session Folder. The other files ended up on some random drive we have attached to our system; a drive having absolutely nothing to do with the session, PT8, the client's files, etc. And this all happened within the span of one recording session over the course of about 8 hours. Totally weird. 'Rail Jon Rogut' asked the right question... Can you open the session and check the disk allocation for the tracks which went to the wrong drive? 'DigiTechSupt' then asked... And did you possibly have 'Round Robin' enabled in the Disk Allocation window? 'mixboy' added... I have also experienced this. Disk allocation shows everything going to the correct place and round robin NOT selected. Yet files end up on some other drive - a drive on which that project has never resided before. Internal for me, as I only use externals for transfers/backups and they are powered off before I boot PT. But I have 5 internals in my G5. It's literally like PT randomly decided to change disk allocation yet leaves no bread crumbs for finding out where they went. 'johnnyv' replied.... Digi, no Round Robin selected (checked it when this happened). It's just like Mixboy Bob suggested...it's like ALL OF A SUDDEN PT decides to put audio on some random drive without letting you know. I've never seen anything like it. Rail, will have to get in front of the session again to answer your question 100% accurately. We were checking many things when we found the problem, and I want to answer your question accurately...which I will do later today... 'carlos santana' suggested a possible work round... to not allow the system to have this error again you must set the recording drive to (R) and all of the others to transfer only (T) this way protools will only reccord & work on the one you want it to & not n the others 'audiogeekzine' suggested.... Also get to know the Copy and Relink function in the project browser 'Howardk' followed on.... Yes, the project browser is very handy for this. . . just sort the listing by drive/folder (click on the header way over on the right) and if anything is in a different drive or folder it is easy to see, and then you can right click on the filename to copy and relink. Everyone gets fooled by this and sometimes it can be very serious (when mistakes compound). . . I believe there really should be an indicator on the top of the edit window to goes red whenever there are files outside of the designated audio folder (ProTools really should have a dashboard with key information like this). . . .here is one thread on this topic. DigiTechSupt then stated... Pro Tools has never, in any test I've done, placed files randomly on a drive. I've heard this complaint on several occasions and have even gone to customers studios to witness it, only to find something in their workflow that's causing the problem. I'm not saying it's not possible - well, it really shouldn't be - but I've yet to see concrete evidence that it's putting files randomly on a drive. 'johnnyv' replied.... I'd be THRILLED to know that we have something set "wrong". We haven't been using PT8 for very long, so I hold it entirely possible that it is, in some fashion, "operator error". BUT, in this case, I DON'T THINK THAT'S THE PROBLEM. Rail, Digi and others, check this out...when I go to the session in question, the Disk Allocation shows NORMAL, it points all tracks to the proper Audio Files folder within the Session Folder. YET, only half the audio files (well, actually less than half) are actually there...the others are on a random drive ON WHICH WE HAVE NEVER EVER RECORDED AUDIO in a folder with the proper session name and inside of that, a single folder named "Audio Files" which contains the other files that we recorded ALL ON THE SAME DAY. So, SOMEWHERE DURING OUR 8-HOUR SESSION, somehow the files were directed elsewhere. I must say, having used PT for years now after starting on Sound Tools back in the 1990's, and owning a D-Control, HD5 Accel, Waves Mercury, etc etc, this is a weird one, and I have no explanation for it. I totally appreciate everyone's suggestions, and as Rail pointed out, I'll never copy via the Finder ever again. And I'm going to learn about the things others have suggested upthread. But still, something had to make this happen, and I have NO idea what it is/was. 'DigiTechSupt' then asked.... If you drag and drop an audio file from a different drive and do not have 'automatically copy on import' preference enabled, it will keep the audio file at it's original location and play it from there. Were all these files recorded in the session or were some imported? Now, is it possible that round robin was enabled at any point? What is the nature of this other drive - how do you know for certain that audio was never recorded to it? Was the drive ever used to move a session from one place to another, possibly to another computer? If you go to the Regions bin and 'show full path names' - do the audio files path indicate anything about how the audio might have ended up on that drive? Was the drive name ever changed?  Was there a session template used and, if so, does the template possibly have incorrect drive allocation? 'johnnyv' replied... Digi, thanks for taking an interest. Let me check into your questions and try to answer them accurately (can't do it right now, as I'm working at the moment). To be honest about Round Robin, I never even knew about that until this issue popped up and one of my assistants looked at the setting (it was not checked). We only installed PT8 about two weeks prior to that session, and perhaps you can answer whether or not RR is "ON" by default when installing PT8 fresh for the first time on a fresh drive with fresh system, etc. I can say that the drive that this went on is a backup drive which only holds my BFD (drum software) files, and some weeks back, I copied my entire PT7 system drive onto that drive just so I had a backup in case anything ever went wrong. But, as far as I know (and I'm the main one in that room), we have NEVER ON A SINGLE OCCASION used that drive as any sort of a PT recording drive...that's just another weird element to this. I have a Mac 8-core Harpertown with 4 internals...we record PT onto two of those internals...this drive was an external drive which happened to be hooked to the system in case we needed BFD files. I'll report more later... 'smlworld' suggested... I cannot recommend these 'videos' highly enough. Browser relinking is covered and all prefs are discussed in detail. As a long time PT user (back to SD2) I really appreciate Kenny's command of Pro Tools. 'DigiTechSupt' asked.... If there's some way we can get a concrete example of this occurring outside of user error, obviously we'd want to get it fixed. I've tried personally to make this occur on several occasions, replicating customer setups as closely as possible, but without success. If you see this occur, please note everything about the current state of your system, plus anything prior to the incident that you can recall, even if it seems irrelevant. 'studiojimi' posted their experiences.... I had an issue like this over the weekend and I thought I had lost my guitarist's overdubs because they weren't on the drive Ii was using and i had not noticed that my back up drive was online during the session and some of my templates tracks were still allocated to the BU drive because it used to be my internal. I recently purchased a terra drive and now that's inside I was lucky that the session at least put the new info in fresh rogue folders-- probably because the old backup sessions were in a project folder of their own...otherwise i would have been hosed because I had dragged and dropped to the BU drive in that project folder when backing up.  I usually manually back up the files by date and the fade files and the old sessions and backup sessions as well as the audio but as you guys know sometimes when you are tired or distracted...you do a walk away and .... hmmmm that could have been a disaster. I feel very lucky cuz I had already called the client to tell him I had lost the files...then...miraculously I found them in those new rogue folders....and I named that a blessing immediately. 'soundboy35' asked.... So any ideas? I'm curious about this as well. While we're on the topic of templates being the possible culprit, if I open a template and create a new session from drive A, then save it to drive B, and change the disk allocation to drive B, is this problem going to happen? 'rinky' added... This weirdness also happened to me. I noticed that my sessions were gradually taking longer to process fades and audiosuite edits. Come to find out, my main system drive had some of the fade/audio files on it. I checked the disk allocation and sure enough, some files were being written on my system drive and some on my original 7200 rpm external drive! No idea when it started to do that since I hadn't made any changes to prefs or to external drives... just snuck up on me! But ever since this problem my edits have been to a grind claiming that my my hard drive isn't fast enough, etc. even after correcting the disk allocation issue. So guys, you are not alone on this. 'DigiTechSupt' asked... For us to make any kind of real traction on this, we're going to need details about the history of a session Which drive it was created on? How was the session created (File>New Session, from a template, etc) Are you using the File>New Session>From a Template function, or opening a Pro Tools Session file (by double clicking or otherwise) as your template? Did you use any custom disk allocation at any point Was round robin ever enabled? If you moved the session at any point how did you do it (drag and drop, backup utility, etc)? Did you ever use Save Copy In to make a copy of the session and, if so, did you copy all audio files? Which drive did you save it to? Is the preference to automatically import audio to the audio files folder enabled or disabled? The more detail you can give, the easier it will be to determine what may be going wrong. 'timragnur' responded... I've been talking with 3 colleagues of mine who has, like me, experienced this very problem. To be excact, it have occured with sessions that were made in one place, then moved (Finder, drag-and-drop) to another computer. Then, what you record/consolidate/audiosuite from this place will be put in another available harddiscs, sometimes the internal, sometimes the external. A session folder will be made in the root with the new audio files and fade files only. Obviously when you move the session, files will be missing. They were all originally made in PT HD 7.3 (new, not templates), but problems occured long after it was opened/saved with PT HD 8.0 No changes was made in the Disc Allocation, and all links appeared fine refering to the right folder. It doesn't necessarily occur again within a troubled session. Save Copy In was not used. I know this might create a confusion, but like one wrote earlier in this thread, in the last 2-3 years using PT HD 7.3 i've had this problem maybe 5 times (with same kind of random choice harddisc allocation). Knowing the system very well, I think we are talking about a bug getting bigger with version 8.0. 'Sean Russell' also suggested this possible work round.... Change every drive you don't need in the session to 'T'. That solves the Disk Allocatin weirdness. 'TimNielsen' added.... I just want to chime in here too and say I have had this problem before as well. I have also had on many occassions, fade files that will regenerate in their 'original' location where they were first built, even though I have all my tracks set properly in Disk Allocation. Like, if I delete all my fades, then relaunch the session, a bunch of the fades will still redraw on the wrong drive. The only solution I found in those cases was to quit PT, take that drive off-line, delete all fades and open the session. When PT can't find that drive it wants, then it would seem to follow disk allocation properly. I have also had the very wonky issue with PT8 where upon importing session data, tracks, and telling PT to 'copy' the audio, that PT will get some random part of the way through, and then just 'reference' the rest of them. If you aren't watching the progress bar, and don't see it 'jump' to the end, you would have never known. As far as I know, this is still present in PT8.03cs2. I now have to check upon every import that PT copied the audio. About 1 in 5 times, it will copy 'some' and reference the rest. It's a disastrous bug that really screwed me several times until I realized what was going on. Save Copy In does seem to work, I haven't had it miss any files so far. But importing session data seems still buggy. Just posting because maybe these are all somehow related. Well I must agree that I have experienced situations when folders with some audio files or fade files folders have started to appear on other drives, but I have always found it to be due to Disk Allocation to be set to 'the other drive' Even for fade files. I completely agree with 'DigiTechSupt' that you must be very careful when moving sessions from one drive to another especially when using the Finder. The safest way to move sessions is to use the Save Session Copy, but who wants to boot up Pro Tools to move a session from one drive to another when you can drag and drop from the Finder? The workround that 'Sean Russell' and 'carlos santana' should work but I would find it very difficult to keep switching drives from R to T in the Workspace Browser depending on what session I was working on. The suggestion from 'audiogeekzine' to get to know the Copy and Relink feature is very well made and one that I have posted about here too. I agree with 'smlworld' and cannot recommend Kenny's videos highly enough.

'Mark 66' asked recently on the Digidesign User Conference.... I am looking to make an LtRt from a 5.1, is there a plugin that will do this? 'TimNielsen' replied with.... This will encode, but I'm not sure it will go directly from a 5.1, normally you feed the LtRt input L, C, R, and a mono Surround channel to make the LtRt.  It would be fairly easy to take your 5.1 tracks and bus them appropriately to the input. If you just want to make a stereo from the 5.1, and not a true LtRt, then you normally bus your 5.1 tracks to a stereo bus, and then drop the center channel -3dB, drop the surrounds -6 and pan the Ls to L, and the Rs to R, and either drop the Subwoofer -10 or lose it altogether. I usually then run all those through an aux track, and take the oveall level of the stereo down a couple of dB before recording too, since adding in the center and surrounds to the L and R, even dropped as they are, can and will probably still overload the channels at times. But for doing a true LtRt, the Dolby Surround Tools is the only thing I know of, since it's a Dolby matrix that needs to be created, not sure anything else can make you one. 'strangeLoop' added..... Here is the one from Neyrinck Audio. 'JFreak' agreed... Neyrinck is the one to choose, even though Dolby is Dolby, it is not that good. 'bad jitter' added.... Hmm... I have Dolby and the GUI is PITA, agreed. But are you saying that Neyrinck sounds better? 'Frank Kruse' pointed out... The neyrink doesn´t have a decoder so you won´t be able to hear what you're doing. 'JFreak' suggested.... Maybe it's just me, but I get better end results using Neyricnk's. That said, I don't own either, I just trash an extra iLok key when I need those plugs :) IMO encoder is enough, I always use a hardware decoder (home theater consumer stuff) to listen to the mix as that is what the customer is also using. 'dr sound' commented about Neyrinck's lack of a decoder.... I talked with Paul Neyrink at NAB and he told me he is very close to releasing the decoder with the PLII . I will purchase one as soon as that happens. 'laki' suggested a different route... SRS Labs make a plug too. It's decent but I prefer the Neyrinck. Not that it sounds better, but it is adjustable. My only gripe with the Neyrinck is that every instance eats up a whole DSP chip! If you're doing an involved 5.1 mix and need to do multiple fold-downs for stems etc, you may run out of DSP. The SRS plug is less DSP hungry. But 'Stylin' Audio' pointed out.... SRS left us owners for dead - they are not supporting/developing their plug anymore. 'Postman' said... Please, let's not confuse the terms LtRt and LoRo. In PT you can route the surround mix to LoRo, a.k.a. good old stereo. Yes, Dolby decoder will play it just like any other stereo recording can be played, but what emerges from the surround speakers is not the same as when the surround mix is encoded into an LtRt by an actual encoder. LtRt and LoRo/stereo are not the same thing. 'TimNielsen' apologised... Yes, sorry if I confused anyone, the method I listed will NOT make an LtRt, which is a Dolby Specific 'encoded' system of merging L, C, R and a Mono Surround channel into a stereo stream. I was simply listing a fold-down method to make an LoRo, as was noted, which is simply a normal stereo stream that won't lose information, like would happen if you just took the L and R of a 5.1, obviously you'd lose your center and anything in the surrounds. So what I was listing was a crash-down, just in case the person posting wasn't talking about a true LtRt. Sometimes I hear people refer to a stereo mix as an LtRt, when in fact they're simple talking about a crashdown, which as was noted. So I didn't mean to imply I was listing a formula to make an LtRt without a plugin or hardware encoder, it can't be done. You have to use either the Dolby or the other one (which I didn't even know existed). 'Postman' replied... Hi Yes, that was my main point. Thank you for clarifying. I'm seeing regular intermingling of the terms because some people (not you, but some others) do not know any better. It is a regular mistake in the Post forum too. 'gsilbers' commented... we do the "crashdown" (foldown) to make LTRT and we go through a dolby E encoder to layback 5.1+LTRT. it passes QC fine but maybe its different than ltrt for a dvd. Although we send tons of foldown ltrt to dvd houses/blueray and never have had any problems.so maybe they do something else to it. so now im a bit curious on the plugin route and why would it be different.  btw we do this we many many movies and tv shows for fox , univ, disney etc. TimNielsen came back... Please be clear on the terminology here. If you say you are using 'crashdown' method to make your LtRt, then you are NOT making an LtRt, you are making an LoRo! There is a HUGE difference. All you are doing is making a stereo version of your mix. It has no information for the center channel, or surround channel. Now the dolby DECODER might still stear some information to those channels when you play it back, but what you have made is mostly certainly not an LtRt. The term LtRt (Left Total, Right Total) only applies to a 4 channel stream (L, C, R, S) that has been specifically encoded through the Dolby Matrixing scheme, to embed the C and S information into the L and R channels, so that a decoder can properly find them, extract them, and steer them to the C and S channels. Hence it is, and must be a two part process. You must specifically encode, and decode an LtRt. You absolutely cannot make a true LtRt any other way. What you are making is fine, we make them all the times as well, a simple stereo version, for instance for the editors to drop into their Avid. But it is NOT an LtRt, which is a very specific thing for a film print or DVD. The nice thing about an LtRt is that it can play just fine as stereo, it doesn't need to be decoded, if you don't decode, you just hear stereo. So this is used on the stereo track on a DVD. Then if a person at home has a Dolby Surround decoder in their receiver, it will extract the channels and give surround. Of course nowadays, I can't imagine there are many left using Dolby Surround decoders, everything is Dolby Digital and now moving towards Dolby True HD, but anyway...  So really, what you are doing, you should call it an LoRo (Left Only, Right Only), and not an LtRt. Hope that clears up any confusion. If you're not encoding it via a hardware of plugin, you are not making an LtRt. 'CCash' agreed... Right. That is not an LtRt, even if you label it that way. You are getting away with it because it is usually very difficult to determine if someone has given you stereo or an encoded LtRt, even when decoding it to LCRS. That's because the decoders do a pretty good job of steering things to the correct speakers... but you will be at the mercy of the decoder's speaker steering, and it will not retain any of the rear-front panning decisions you made in the 5.1. 'MixMonster' chipped in... I use SurCode by Minnetonka Audio. It's both encoder and decoder, easy to use and I've never had any problems with it. 'The Missile Silo' added.... Having worked in DVD/Audio Restoration for a number of years we used Neyrinck (specifically the Sound.Code for Dolby Digital version for our AC3's.). I did a shootout once between or Dolby plug-in encoder and the Neyrinck, hands down Neyrinck was the obvious choice. 'TimNielsen' mussed... Curious, obviously the decoding matrix will usually steer dialog to the center correctly, since it's perfectly in phase on the L and R. But will a decoder street 'anything' the surround channel from an LoRo? Never tried, but that's the part I assume would just go missing, and instead you'd get a usable LCR out of it. Which, as you said, is what makes it hard to know from listening to a file if you have a real LtRt or not. 'Postman' replied... Absolutely! The less phase coherent is left-right, the more it will be drawn to the surround channel(s). With Pro Logic 1 and 2, stereo reverb gravitates toward surround always. With Pro Logic 2, there are different modes that alter its behaviors, but it tends to "bend" hard left and hard right toward the surrounds. Some music modes make the effect really great, but at the same time do not give the center channel a firm anchor, which can really screw with dialog. I've taken a liberty to turn your remark into a question. Sound that is out of phase between left and right will head into the surrounds, so if you hear some things like ambiences and specific panning stuff like fly overs or pass-bys sounding very out of phase ,between left and right, you are likely hearing an LtRt. But, as you point out, there is no simple way to tell for certain. Anyone can make out of phase information. The trick with true LtRt is there is a 90 degree "all pass" type of phase shift on all the surround material. THAT is not as easy to do as simple routing and 180 degree phase shift. But that is what allows a mixer to pan a mono sound partially front to back without it being pulled toward left or right. Sorry, I'm talking geek speek. 'TimNielsen' came back... No, it's good. I'm learning stuff. LtRt's have always been a bit of a mystery to me. We always make them, but the mixers monitor it coming back from the magic device, and make adjustments based on what they hear, mostly capping volume and maybe riding the dialog a bit! So it's good to get a better understanding of what is happening. It's another one of those technologies that was genius in it's day, but I wish we didn't have now, like Dolby Digital. The most exciting thing for me about Digital Cinema, is 16 available tracks of 24, 48k uncompressed audio!

'CEM3387' asked recently on the Digidesign User Conference about a problem with BlackMagic Intesity and ProTools 8.0.1 LE..... Whatever codec and resolution, data rate I have tried on the B.M. Intencity card it looks totally terrible when I play the video files back in ProTools thourgh the B.M HDMI out, the files are so pixelated and harsh. If I play the same files in their own Media Express software it looks decent not good. Better resolution but still harsh. What kind of codecs do you guys run? Is there any adjustments I can do apart from the ProTools menu for quick time which does not affect the quality at all at this stage. It looks like a very low rate QT file for a Cellphone played at 1920 x1080. MacPro 8core 3.0GHz, 6GB RAM, 10.5.8 ProTools LE 8.0.1 QT 7.6.6 Black Magic 3.6.1 'JeromeOD' replied... I use prores with the same kit and software as you and all is great. I'm not certain about the quicktime version though, is that definitely what it should be? Gary Nattrass added... I am running virtually the same system but with QT V10. Like Jerome Pro res full HD files are no problem. Have a look at the BM card settings in system preferences there may be something adrift there. CEM3387 responded... Thanks for the replies. First of all it the harshness was a "AV MODE" setting on the display I am running. As soon I found that bastard and disable it, it looks more natural. "I am running virtually the same system but with QT V10" Do you run OS 10.6.x or 10.5.8? "Like Jerome Pro res full HD files are no problem." OK I´ll see if they can prep that for me. What version HQ, regular or LT? "Have a look at the BM card settings in system preferences there may be something adrift there." I un-checked the "Remove field jitter when video is paused" that was recomended somewhere else. Other that that I do not know what could affect output. Output is set to HDMI NTSC/PAL and output processing it Off. Also I cannot get the display the whole picture frame regardless of setting on the monitor setting. The monitor is native 1920x1080 and I have tried with movies at native 1920x1080 and still the picture is a bit cropped. 'Newpostguy' suggested... Open quicktime pro and convert it. You dont wait for picture department that way and dont look like "oops I forgot I can only run this type of codec" guy. Convert to apple pro res 442 (mpeg streamclip or QTsync will do this for free almost as good) Make sure the video is 720p or 1080i if HD (BMI does not do 1080p) It would be wise to learn about various codecs and why they are used at different times. CEM3387 replied... "Newpostguy" THANKS! Im am now tempted to change the the subject of this post to "NO Problem with BlackMagic Intesity and ProTools 8.0.1 LE" Mpeg Streamclip For the win! It can batch convert too! "Make sure the video is 720p or 1080i if HD" (BMI does not do 1080p) Ahhh, did not know that I love progressive so 720p it is then. Thanks a lot for solving my problems!

This update will be of use to those of us you haven't or can't upgrade to 8.0.3 because the various bugs that I have blogged about here. This is what Digidesign have said... Introducing Pro Tools 8.0.1cs2 for users of PowerPC Macintosh, original Mbox, and Expansion|HD chassis In August 2009 we announced that Pro Tools 8.0.1 would be the last full Pro Tools release to support PowerPC-based Macs, the original Mbox, and Expansion|HD chassis. We have continued to monitor the performance of 8.0.1 and now, based on user feedback, we are pleased to offer you one final Pro Tools software update—Pro Tools 8.0.1cs2—to address your most requested fixes. Pro Tools 8.0.1cs2 updates for Pro Tools 8.0.1 HD, LE, and M-Powered are available for download from the Pro Tools CS Updates page in the Knowledge Base. Pro Tools 8.0.1 CS Updates Previous installation of Pro Tools 8.0.1 for Mac OS X or Windows is required. Released May 12, 2010: Pro Tools HD 8.0.1cs2 Update for Mac Pro Tools HD 8.0.1cs2 Update for Windows Pro Tools LE 8.0.1cs2 Update for Mac Pro Tools LE 8.0.1cs2 Update for Windows Pro Tools M-Powered 8.0.1cs2 Update for Mac Pro Tools M-Powered 8.0.1cs2 Update for Windows Pro Tools 8.0.1cs2 for Mac OS X contains fixes in the following areas: Relinking Solo Locked Region Groups, Conforming MIDI Scoring Playlists Launch, Open Directory CD Importing ICON D-Command (HD only) Pro Tools 8.0.1cs2 for Windows contains fixes in the following areas: Relinking Solo Locked Region Groups, Conforming MIDI Scoring ICON D-Command (HD only) Pro Tools 8.0.1cs2 includes all previous fixes from Pro Tools 8.0.1cs1 For a list of all fixes included with each update, please see the release notes on the individual pages listed above. Lets hope this doesn't break anything else!

'D'Animation' asked on the Digidesign User Conference if anyone else was having problems with automating SpeakerPhone, he wrote... Just a quick check to see if anyone else is having issues with Speakerphone 2 losing its automation presets/snapshots? I have about 6 different effects loaded into the first 6 preset slots so I just automate the preset index to switch between fx but every so often it loses all the preset settings within the plugin (the actual 'automation preset index' automation lane in protools keeps its data within the track though) and resets to the default 'bakelite phone' setting on all presets? Plugin is on a aux on its own being fed via prefader sends from VO tracks Pt's HD 8.01cs1, HD2 system, Mac OS 10.5.8, Mac Pro, 8 core Harpertown, D-command, Speakerphone 2 v. 2.0.3. 'minister' replied... Oh yeah. Got bit by that when I did some nice automation for some source music moving within a scene. Opened the file the next day to review with client and it was all ferkakta. All subsequent scenes were all a shambles as well. Ended up taking the time in the review session to reset and print the filters. Now, I always do it. 'PT Lover' chipped in with... I don't use Speakerphone myself, but have you guys read this? 'D'Animation' came back to say... Have to say I generally don't have everything write enabled and none of the presets use the sample bay so not sure if its just something funny going on - it is random and infrequent is the only blessing. I wish printing was an option (at the moment) but still lots of ADR and PU's coming in so I'd only end up redoing work. Its so obvious but I will admit to not thinking of it - Once everything is in printing is the safest bet alright ! 'PT Lover' later asked... Did you get this sorted out? Have you discussed it with Audioease? I'm considering this plug-in but I'm tired of workarounds. 'D'Animation' replied saying... No solid answer yet as its totally random and not repeatable to test but it is a great plug for 95% of the time. The current series I'm working on has lots of radio/speaker situations for vo and at times its replaced up to 4 plugins in a chain to do the same fx, kinda wish it was TDM though as, the way i use it, it lives on an aux! Luckily I've never lost any settings as i've managed to import the correct plugin data from a back-up session 'PT Lover' replied... Ok. Thanks. It sure does look and sound like a sweet plug-in. 'Pirate Post' added to confirm... Love the Plug-in but the automation just doesn't work. I always print it. 'PT Lover' asked... Are you using 2.0.3? 'Pirate Post' replied... Just checked, I'm on 2.0.2. I'll load up 2.0.3 and report my findings. PT Lover replied... Thank you. Pirate Post then confirmed.... That would be a big NO on the automation working correctly in version 2.0.3 PT Lover acknowledged... I see. Thanks for checking. So it seems as if Audio Ease have a little work to do on this one. As of today it still isn't fixed.

iZotope have released this announcement regarding a potential problems with iZotope software causing problems with Mac OS 10.6... Attention Mac OS X Users: We've recently learned that under rare circumstances, installing an iZotope product or demo and then applying any Mac OS X 10.6 update can cause some computers to experience problems booting. We have identified the cause of this issue and have provided a simple fix below. Please download and install this patch immediately, even if you have not experienced any issues at this time. Also, make sure you delete and re-download the latest iZotope installers for Mac OS X. Please note that as of today (May 7, 2010), all of the Mac OS X installers on the iZotope website have been updated so that they no longer cause this issue to occur. iZotope Mac OS X 10.6 Patch If you suspect your computer has already been affected by this issue and you are unable to boot your computer, please follow the steps to fix in the iZotope Knowledge Base. We apologize for any difficulty this has caused. Unfortunately, this issue was unpredictable and related to a rare interaction between the install process and security measures that Apple recently introduced in Mac OS X 10.6. We appreciate your understanding, and please don't hesitate to contact us directly with any questions or concerns at support@izotope.com. Sincerely, The iZotope Team

Following my posts on the problems with Canopus boxes and Pro Tools 8.0.3 here, here and here as well as the jerky video problems I have posted on and the video compendium I posted about here and here, there has been another interesting post on the Pro Tools 8.0.3 Big Bug thread on the Digidesign User Conference.  'zoing123' has posted.... Gentlemen. Fear Not. It _is_ a known BUG. The work around is to take the video to internal before closing. I went nuts figuring this out, but thats it. Spoke to a real Digi teck and they are working to fix this. I have been flawless after I found this. 8.02cs2 /10.6.3 on an  002 box. So hopefully this will provide folk with a viable work round until Digidesign can fix it.

Ian Palmer asked about this on the Digidesign User Conference recently. He asked... I've been exporting mixes for review as a QT for years now. We've just upgraded my mix studio to PT8 HD. Before you would export the QT, set the audio settings and it would stitch the audio onto whichever QT was online in the session. Easy and quick. Now it's taking a bloody age as PT is re-encoding the H264 QT into another H264 QT instead of simply copying it. Am I missing something here? The new options window is identical to QTPro (which I have QTPro7 installed). I'm not using the H264 QT in my session, other than to export to as it's then uploaded via FTP. Can't be doing that with a 5Gb DVPAL version. 'FajitaTone' replied suggesting the flowing alternative workflow.... bounce to .wav close Pro Tools Session open QuickTime with QT Pro open .wav with QuickTime select all, and copy to clipboard (from the .wav file) switch to movie, type (cmd-J) to open the movie properties window select the audio track and delete it. then press opt-cmd-V to past the bounced .wav into the movie cmd-shift-S to save as self contained. this will save the QT you used in your PT session with bounced audio from the session. Bounce to QuickTime takes too long. I hope that was clear. Audio_Vision added... +1 to the method explained above. Fast and easy. Only issue is when picture has a leader or slate. I usually trim the picture first so the FFOA is the same for picture and exported/bounced .wav files. 'nucelar' responded... Hmm, in my case bounce to QuickTime takes just as long as bounce to wav, real time that is. It just replaces the audio in the movie without reencoding. UNLESS you choose Bounce to QuickTime with cmd-alt-ctrl pressed. Then you can specify the codec. Fajita's workflow is also very useful, specially when you only need to consolidate rather than bounce. The only thing I may add is that you must make sure that the consolidated or bounced audio is the exact same length as the movie, or at least starts at the same point. mikevarela added... Yes, bounce to QT is a BOUNCE (real time), benefits of course are that the audio chain runs through your automation and plug-ins. But, if you've already bounced the audio, then the tip above will work fine. Keep in mind though that it's not always sync accurate, as you're matching audio to video via command, not by eyes. If the video AND audio are EXACT same length, then you're good. (read).. there is also a way to nudge audio in the tip above, but it's not as easy and accurate as in PT

Our Mike Thornton writes the Pro Tools Notes, Techniques and Workshop articles for Sound on Sound as well as reviewing many of the new Pro Tools related products. Note that you will need to be a subscriber to view the recent articles or you can choose to Click & Buy individual ones.   Breaking Links -  The point of Pro Tools’ option to unlink the timeline and edit selections isn’t obvious, but there are situations in which it can be a life-saver.

Our Mike Thornton writes the Pro Tools Notes, Techniques and Workshop articles for Sound on Sound as well as reviewing many of the new Pro Tools related products. Note that you will need to be a subscriber to view the recent articles or you can choose to Click & Buy individual ones.   Elastic Audio Q & A -  Why won’t Elastic Audio recognise the tempo of my loop?