How to UNIsolate Clips?

Using track layers I have 6 stacked clips on a track. I right-click one of them an choose Isolate. All other clips are muted.

I cannot find a simple way to unisolate the clip, to return to the prior state. I have to either use the mute tool to manually un-mute all of the clips or select all the clips and choose Isolate again. Either way it is tedious.

Am I missing something obvious? I expected the "isolate clip" function to work like a true solo function, giving me a quick way to un-mute all of the other clips.

Thanks, I did read through the help, but I was hoping there was a better way. It is very tedious to have to unmute the clips one by one.

For example say I have 20 clips scattered throughout a track and I want to isolate one of them. When I isolate it, the other 19 are muted. To de-isolate it, I need to unmute each of those other 19 clips. Worse yet, it can't be done by selecting the entire track; I must click on each of those 19 clips individually.

If this is a true solo feature, there should be a way to quickly un-solo. Imagine if when we solo'd a track, the only way to un-solo it is to un-mute all of the other tracks.

Personally I think track layers is not ready for prime time. It has great potential for enhancing productivity, but the implementation is half baked. I'm back to my old way of working on multiple tracks.

Track layers are awesome and not only ready-for-prime time, but way overdue IMO.

But I agree with DaveR. Something as simple as soloing and unsoloing a clip should be well, SIMPLE, or maybe I'm missing something too.

Why is there this need to select a default or alternative style, mute time ranges and change click + drag behaviour?? I just want a quick and easy way to toggle on and off soloing the clip! You can mute and unmute a clip as easily as you can an entire track or bus; why not an easy way to toggle on/off soloing?

DaveR, the easiest way I've found around this is just to select the other clips in the other layers (you can grab them all at once with the lasso) and isolate all of them too, then they're all isolated.

I'll soon try danhazer's suggestion to use the audition function rather than isolating. Thanks for that one, Dan.

The problem with using Audition is that you only hear the selection you're auditioning, as opposed to the Isolate Clips in Track, where you also hear other tracks playing back.

Ture - that is how audition works. But false - it's not a problem. That is how it is designed to work.

If you want to mute a clip, click on it and press the 'q' key. If you want to unmute it, do the same.

Isolate is a different thing. There is not a way to UnIsolate, I wish there was. I rarely use Isolate, but it can come in handy for some things.

ORIGINAL: Susan G

Hi Dan-

You're right, I should have phrased that differently. I realize that's how Audition is designed to work, I just meant it's not really a substitute for Isolate (otherwise there'd be no reason for both!)

I really do like the new Mute/Unmute clips feature. It seems to me that the lack of an "UnIsolate" command is such an obvious omission that I wouldn't be surprised to see it in the next patch release. All digits crossed!

-Susan

Susan,

I think the UnIsolate will be something the bakers look into, also.

As a work around, what I like to do if I'm wanting to Isolate and UnIsolate is use the mute tool (k key) and drag over the section I want isolated while holding the Ctrl key (the cursor becomes a '!'). Then when I want to bring back the other tracks in the layer, I drag the cursor over all the layered tracks in the isolated area while holding the Ctrl key. This, in esence isolates all of the tracks and brings them back (it will not unmute clips that have been fully muted).

Also, if the Isolate is the last command you did and the next thing you want to do is UnIsolate it, you can use undo and it will act the same way.

I hope you can use these work arounds until the desired "UnIsolate" enhancement is offered.

Thanks,

Hi Dan-

Yep, you describe exactly the way I've been working until Un-Isolate comes along!

BTW - Does anyone know of a way to re-assign the Mute Tool from "K" to something else? I want to use a key on the left of the keyboard so I can get to it easily with my left hand, but I don't see this in Key Bindings (not "Q" to mute/un-mute clips, but "K" to activate the Mute Tool).

TIA-

-Susan

Bumping this 4-year-old thread wondering if anyone has discovered an "un-isolate button".

I unintentionally clicked "Isolate clips in layer" (it's right below "Mute clip" which I meant to hit). Not realizing what I'd done, I recorded some new stuff. So I can't ctrl-Z undo the clip isolation. Like the OP, I have tons of clips scattered throughout the track, and it would be tedious to do them all.

Every one-click feature should have its corresponding one-click un feature, am I right?

Maybe I'm missing what the issue is - But with track layers on, you don't need to mute and un-mute layers.  When you click one layer to be soloed, the project's other tracks play, but all layers in that track except the one soloed layer are muted.  Click the solo button (in the track layer view) again and all of the layers are un-muted.  It's a one click operation.--

Randy B.

treemike


thanks, but I'm talking about auditioning alternate takes of "smaller segments" of the same track. I would want to be able to hear what came immediately before and after the alternate take for that segment. You can't do that without using the "isolate " method. (although there may be one other way). Say you were trying to correct a guitar fill in a track and did that by doing alternate take's in layers. You would certainly want to hear (in the same track) what came before and after that fill so you could see how it fits in

Ah, I see - Thanks for the new post, Treemike. - For what you're talking about, I'll tell you exactly what I do:

--With Layer View on in a track, if I need to hear what's before and after a take that I'm auditioning, I hold Shift and simply drag clip(s) to the soloed track.  Holding Shift while dragging assures that the clip gets plopped down exactly in the right position. 

That's quick and easy - You can drag clips around all day like that.  You're not stuck having clips in the layer they show up in.

Randy B.

treemike


Thanks but I actually found, if you right click on the layer you want to hear and choose isolate clip  in layer it does the same thing and mutes that section only of the original clip. Now the problem was un-isolating and you cannot simply unclick the selection in the menus. The only thing I found that works as a workaround is to  can the mute button (drag-option) on the track view toolbar and drag over the part of the original layer/ track that has become isolated and muted it will un-mute and un-isolate.

Hi, Treemike - I feel that you're doing this routine in a more complicated way than it needs to be.  There's no problem with "un-isolating" a clip if you instead use the little Solo buttons in the layer view - drag bits with Shift/drag if you need them to be in the same soloed layer.  The mute drag thing seems to be glitched out, in my experience anyway.  When I've tried to use it, sometimes it mutes what I want, but often I have to try it several times for the bits to be muted.

I work in layers a lot, auditioning takes etc - basically do it as I've described.  Maybe I'm still missing something important to your needs, but from what I understand, I do think you're over-complicating the process.

Randy B.