Changing studios, common formats

[lbaber]

Is there a standard format one can have an engineer save his/her work in to use in another studio with different software? What is the best way to do this?

 

[distortedrumble]

standard format? they usually have to be in same families of software to open up a bundle from software to software and have it still come out the same but the only standard formats i know of are wav and midi.

 

[lbaber]

So , if we started the recording of our band using SAW, we have no way to switch to another software like pro tools and maintain our tracks?

 

[distortedrumble]

i dont think so with the track position and any effects put on the track. only the audio itself if I'm not mistaken

 

[lbaber]

It would be fine it each individual track was able to be saved seperately from the rest or the tracks for each song. in track position you mean that if each song is saved it will not maintain its seperate tracks? If we saved each individual track could they be synched up through some form of time code ? That way we could put the tracks back together to do the mixing and editing... or am I way off track here?

 

[chessrock]

.wav files are basically the standard, and are commonly used and recognized accross most all platforms.

 

[TexRoadkill]

Most DAWs have an Export or Save As function. If there is an option for Fill Silence then enable that. You want one continuous file per track that starts at the beginning of the song. Then all you have to do is paste them to tracks in the other DAW and they should all sync up properly.

.wav would be the most common format and you can also do .bwv (broadcast wave) which has a timecode stamp on each track. Talk to the other studio and see what format they prefer. Also be sure you are bringing it on a disc format they can open.

One thing you can do to verify sync is past a 4 click count to the beginning of every track before you export. That way you know everything is synced up in the other DAW after you import.