crossfaded edits

dobro

dobro

Well-known member
Hi. I'm learning how to edit better, and working on crossfades. How long are your typical crossfades at edit points when you're sticking together bits for better timing?
 
"It depends" -- But usually as short as possible. Could be 1-2ms, could be 20 or 100ms, could be considerably longer if you're using it as an 'effect' (but you'd better stay sample-accurate...), could be none at all or a gap if it's a timing thing.
 
Massive Master said:
"It depends" -- But usually as short as possible.
Click to expand...

Absolutely.
If I'm comping stuff together it's usually the case that everything sounds, and plays, fine but there's a slight gap that may or may not cause clicks.
The crossfade is usually as short as possible and bridges that gap.
I rarely, if ever, crossfade over the actual content.
 
I've been cloning tracks that I want to edit to a second track, and fading out with a duration of one sample and then on the second track fading in with a duration of one sample. Is there anything stupid about that? Is there another way to do it? What about slicing the original track itself and shifting the mistimed bit left of right?
 
It matters where you put the fade too, not just the length. Drums for example, you are going to want to put the cross fade as close to the right of just before the new hit as possible; however, if the beat from the previous take (the one you are cutting out of) falls before the new beat, you are going to want to slide your cross fade back left to just before the old beat pokes through. Leaving even a millisecond of the previous hit, even in the middle of the fade itself, will result in pops/clicks/weirdness. Conversely, I've had experience with synth sounds where shorter fades resulted in bad edits, and I actually had to make the fades much longer and then bring the fade out and fade in tails all the way up from linear, making more of a 500+ millisecond blend as opposed to a true 10-50 ms cross fade. Sometimes depends.
 
Here's another angle... My timeline is in beats and measures, not time. I keep my crossfades as short as possible, but maybe up to a sixteenth note on either side of the bar. Depends on the song, the track and the edit, of course. But these edits are usually made around a musical take, so the timing should be musical.
 
Yeah, where to put the edit points is one issue, and I'm learning that.

But do you slice and shift the original track, or do you clone the bits you want and put them on a second track?
 
I slice and keep it to as few tracks as possible, for a couple reasons:

Later, when mixing, it's easier to keep track of level, panning, and plug in settings if all of whatever that "part" is supposed to be is on a single track.

My system gets buggy when I get over 36 tracks (yes, I've been there on some pretty layered compositions) so if I were editing a fully mic'd drum part for example, which would be eight separate tracks in my configuration, splitting into multiple tracks for edits would increase my total project in multiples of 8. I'd get 8 tracks closer to my top limit of 36 sooner if I didn't keep each drum to one track.
 
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How do you deal with the gap created by the shift? (See, the reason I'm asking all these questions is cuz this is new to me - in the past the only crossfading I've done is for comping - but now I'm getting into these micro edits of one percussion hit, for example, and I'm not sure about how to deal with joining everything up.)
 
There shouldn't be a gap, perform your drum cuts around kick or snare hits if pissible. Right before the hit occurs on the old track, cut in the new one, and put your cross fade in right before the hit. If this doesn't answer your question, can you explain more about these gaps?
 
Okay, imagine I want to slice out a lazy snare hit and shift it left so that it's in time. When I shift the sliced section left, it'll overlap the track, and that's where the crossfade comes in, but there'll be a gap to the right of the snare clip that's been shifted.
 
Expand the audio on the right, toward to left to cover the gap....crossfade.
If you have an OH track...don't forget to do that one too.

When I edit drum tracks...I tend to (in most cases) cut across all the tracks and make the edit...that way, any ambience/bleed will match....but like Massive said.....it all depends. :)
 
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Here's how I do it, although take note of Miro's point about doing the same edit on all the drums.
Group them before you start.

In the video I've taken a hit and moved it earlier in time.
Then I've gone back and moved the same hit later in time.

I've been lazy with position and duration, but you'll get the idea.
 
miroslav - got it, thanks.

Steenamaroo, that video explains all. Got it - thanks.

Really easy when there's silence on either side of the hit. Way more difficult when there's noise. Or when it's a guitar note. This will require some learning. :)
 
dobro said:
Really easy when there's silence on either side of the hit. Way more difficult when there's noise. Or when it's a guitar note. This will require some learning. :)
Click to expand...

True that.
For a long guitar sustain I might either create a long fade instead of a cross fade.
That way there is a gap but you don't notice it.
Either that or I'll just move my cutting and duplicate the end of the sustain to fill the gap then pull the volume down on the gap-filler slightly until it looks/sounds right. Then I'll do a crossfade as in the vid.
I can do a vid of that too if you like?

Of course, with Protools elastic audio, I really just stretch the thing to fit these days. :p
 
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