Comp two tracks at once?

I'm recording an acoustic guitar through a mic and at the same time also through it's pickup into two seperate tracks and then want to comp them both with the mute tool from a few takes. So basically I have two tracks with 3 layers each. I searched to see if this was covered before and the only solution I saw was to put the two tracks togeather in a folder. I did that but still don't really see how that address it. The only solution I can think of is to take the tracks into soundforge and create stereo tracks with track 1 layer 1 on the left side and track 2 layer 1 on the right side, etc., for each track and then bring it back in and comp it as stereo (then break them apart later). Not sure if that will even work. The problem is I'm working in a noisy environment so there are lots of little background noises to remove (in addition to my own screwups) so it'll be a lot to do manually. Is there a better way? Am I missing something with the folders approach? Thanks for any info...

ORIGINAL: CJaysMusic

You can do this in sonar, i do it all the time. you can do it with seperate tracks or with track layers(all in one track). On the track that has the layers, right click on the edge of the track ware the DB scale is and select view layers, if the layers are not shown.. After that is done, then jsut use the mute tool and go to town, when your done you can bounce it to one track or leave it how it is, its very easy to do in sonar. folsders are a good way to keep things neat
Cj

Thanks for the quick reply... but I think maybe I didn't explain it well (or I'm misunderstanding your reply). In your example say I do that on track one (mic'ed acoustic track) and comp the three layers (takes) down to into one composit take... how would I get the exact same comp's done on track two (direct acoustic via pickup, same three takes) or can it only be done manually? Thanks again for the reply...

What do you mean by "comp them both with the mute tool"? What are "comps"?

Are you wanting to make 1 track out of multiple layers or what?

You don't have to go into Sound Forge.
just bounce track 1 layer 1 and track 2 layer 1 into a new combined track
then bounce track 1 layer 2 and track 2 layer 2 into a new track
then bounce track 3 layer 3 and track 2 layer 3 into a new track

then take your 3 new clips and put (layer) them into a stereo track. You can mute and pan the 3 clips/ layers to your hearts content from there and you'll have a stereo track.

that is if I'm understanding you correctly.

My way to handle this is as follows:

First, if needed, I slice both tracks in a folder to appopriate clips.
Then I take care of track one: I position an empty track below or above it to which I drag the layerclips I choose using the method CJ described. I loop the portion and on every playback round I choose a new clip by soloing it clicking the icon where the track starts. Earlier I used to immediately delete the clips I did not like, but finishing the task is easier, if you let everything stay (so tracks 1 and 2 remain visually identical).

The point is I don't drag-copy them, but leave an empty "slot" on the original layered track. Now when I want to get an identical comp from track two, I put an empty track beside it and do the dragging picking always the clip that has an empty slot on track one. It's really fast, because the visual info is so clear. You can comp track two in two minutes even if theres close to hundred clips to drag. Then I archive the originals.

I find just muting the clips I don't like (leaving them on the track) uncomfortable, 'cause it's much harder to see what's happening, when the track is very crowded.

But of course, something like "apply edits to multiple tracks" would be fine.

You can put the tracks in a folder and edit the main folder track once to affect all tracks within, or you can highlight the multiple tracks/layers you want to edit, and all will be edited at the same time.

More details here:
http://forum.cakewalk.com/tm.asp?m=1176731&mpage=1&key=edit�

but can you really audition, mute or solo single clips on one folder track (with several layers) without affecting the other track(s).

No, I think you still have to solo the track you want to hear if you are just listening to one track. But I was giving a solution to the OP, who was recording identical tracks, with, I assumed, identical noises. So he could solo one track but edit both at the same time. Make sense? Or maybe I misunderstood what the OP wanted.

Im still confused, by what he wants, but i think someone here has nailed it....
Cj

ORIGINAL: Dave Allison

Im still confused, by what he wants, but i think someone here has nailed it....

Not Yet..
unless I missed it by reading too fast.

He wants to be able to define a group of tracks, then work on one track and have the edits automatically applied to all tracks in the group.

In Sonar, as people have described already, this works for some clip based tools like slip edits and fades, but not for all tools.

If you're a user of the mute tool for comping multiple track layers into one take, then group editing (Pro-Tools name for it) would allow you to use the same proceedure to comp multi-track drum takes, or in this case an acoustic guitar which has been recorded onto two tracks with Mic and DI.

Yes, you can work around the guitar by combining the takes onto a stereo track, but you can't do that for 16 tracks of a drum kit.

If you're not a user of the mute tool for comping, then I guess this doesn't make much sense.
We're trying to work with multiple tracks, which all consist of multiple takes in layers.

am I on target chrisby ?

Wow, hardly any replies yesterday and a ton today... thanks for all the replies! Anyway, Dave, yes you are on target. In short you just can't use the mute tool that way, at least as it is now in ver 7. I just wanted to get that out there 'cause there have been several threads regarding this before but, and they had a lot of posts, but never with a bottom line "can I do it or not" answer. Yes there are work arounds and other methods that don't involve the mute tool but if you want to use the mute tool you can't mute across tracks. Fair enough. Just from reading the old posts it wasn't really clear... so again this is just for anyone else searching this topic down the road.

Someone above mentioned that you can bounce 2 mono clips to stereo in Sonar... I haven't tried this, and maybe it works fine, but the Soundforge method will get you a stereo file that consistes of truely unaltered l/r channels. No panning/mixing involved. Again, just for future reference (I had to google how to do that too)...

PS - and as Dave mentioned the stereo file method only works for two tracks... if you have more then two you'll need to use one of the alternative approaches.

ORIGINAL: brundlefly

but if you want to use the mute tool you can't mute across tracks.

As I wrote in my last post, you can mute across tracks, if the tracks are adjacent, by starting the drag in one track and ending it in the other. Maybe I didn't describe it clearly. It's actually not even necessary to have them in a folder together, but I thought that would help you keep the paired takes organized, and allow you to use some other tools on the composite folder track.

You're right... I didn't get it though in your first post. But... unless there's something wrong on my machine or there's a bug in 7.02 the implementation doesn't really work as you'd hope (or expect). With three layers per track if you use the Solo/Mute function (ie mute w/ ctrl key) it will solo all tracks between your selection, not just the ones you start and end in. So if the layers are top to bottom Track 1-1,2,3 and Track 2-1,2,3 and you start your select in Track 1 Layer 2 and end your select in Track 2 Layer 2, only Track 1 Layer 1 and Track 3 Layer 3 get muted. So you end up solo'ing 4 tracks instead of the two you wanted. Close, but basically for my situation (which judging from the old posts that I found is one of the most common) it doesn't really work. But at least they must be thinking about it and seem to be really close to having it implemented. It could also be that there's a way to make it work the way I need it but if there is it isn't documented anywhere I could find.

So if the layers are top to bottom Track 1-1,2,3 and Track 2-1,2,3 and you start your select in Track 1 Layer 2 and end your select in Track 2 Layer 2, only Track 1 Layer 1 and Track 3 Layer 3 get muted. So you end up solo'ing 4 tracks instead of the two you wanted.

Hence my suggestion to move all the layers to separate tracks and pair the first, second and third layers from each track together. Helloooo, McFlyyyy?!

Hey, I know it's not as elegant as simply being able to group tracks and edit one to edit them all, but it seems to me it will work okay in this particular case.

Well... I do see how it would work (though I haven't tried it yet) by putting all the layers into one track with each layer from the same take being adjacent

I havent read thru this thread, but you can do this in sonar. After you drag and drop each clip into a single track, just right click at the edge of the track in the track view to view layers. you can also jsut do this at the recording stage and record into one track over and over and then select view layers and you can also select mute previous takes also.
Cj