Hi,
I've finished tracking an album and am hiring a pro engineer to mix it properly - he works in Pro Tools, so I'm looking to export the project to OMF to share with him.  When trying to export to OMF, Sonar scrolls through several 'mixing down audio' and 'copying WAV...' lines, then when it gets to 'exporting OMF', it crashes.    I'll start by saying I've never exported to OMF before, so apologies if I'm doing something dopey.
 
At first, the crash message indicated a BFD3.dll was the module that crashed, so I removed the BFD plugin from the project (I still have the drum MIDI pattern in the file, just removed the plugin was present), unfortunately the OMF export still crashed, although it now says SonarPLT.exe is the module crashing instead of BFD3.dll. 
 
The project consists of about 40 audio tracks and 1 MIDI track.  I've removed all effects (except prochannel modules) to minimize potential for those contributing to the issue, but it still crashes during OMF export.  I've tried selecting all tracks before exporting to OMF and selecting NO tracks before exporting to OMF and the same results.   I haven't frozen or bounced any tracks - not sure what that would do in this case, since I'm not running any soft synths, etc, but let me know if I'm mistaken.
 
Really in a bind here - the engineer is awaiting my OMF, so would appreciate any assistance.  I'm also dropping the dump file to cakewalk support as well.
 
Thanks
Russ
 
 
 
 

I've done this a few times and found OMF support to be, let's say "sketchy". I think there's a size limit of 2GB (for the complete file) and possibly also an event limit. The only way I got it working was by making sure I comped everything down and had only a single take lane per track. Also, I removed all plugins.

Still more reliable is simply exporting stems, if that's an option for you.

Thanks.
 
My files aren't anything special and shouldn't be huge compared to most people's projects - so I can't imagine I'm hitting some kind of inherent limit, otherwise nobody would be able to use OMF anywhere.
 
I'll take a look at the take lanes to see if that does the trick. 
 
If I did go the stems route, wouldn't that limit the mixing engineer that I'm sending these to?  Apologies for the naïve question, but mixing down to stems, means I'd be bouncing individual WAV files down into groups, right?  So the mixing engineer wouldn't be able to edit individual files, but only the resulting group WAVs, right?
 

You might be better off just exporting the raw tracks to a folder along with a detailed text file on track contents.
If im correct, your sending this to another producer to mix down, so exporting any automation is not really a factor.
Your basically sending him raw tracks of the project that line up/in synch.
 
I do this quite a bit and created a thread in the techniques section of this forum
http://forum.cakewalk.com/Orginizing-Labeling-Audio-and-Midi-Tracks-m3448904.aspx
On how label everything to send it out. I uploaded a Word template as well.
 
Stems are groups of tracks IE- Sub mixes, Bus mixes, Drum mixes,exc.
If your producer wants individual tracks and not groups, export the tracks.
 
Im not sure why OMF is crashing I really cant give you any insight on that to be honest.
But like I said if your producer is going to mix the project for you I wouldn't worry much about OMF.
(I could be wrong but I believe you'll only be missing tempo changes, markers and automation)
 
In my travels, I have found it is best to make sure everything lines up correctly
(bounce all your clips together to create one whole track VS. 20 clips on track 10).
Place a dummy note at 101:00 on your midi tracks so they also line up from project start, this way everything is totally in synch.
Send him a detailed report of tracks (he will love you for it).
And do as much house cleaning (what I call pre production): Melodyne fixes, Autosnap/synch corrections before you send it. This not only saves your producer from headaches but will also save you a few bucks.

Thanks for the suggestions guys - really appreciate the assistance here.
 
Sanderxpander - FWIW, I removed all take lanes except one (by 'removing silence) and unfortunately, no change - still crashes upon exporting to OMF.
 
Chuck - Thanks for the WAV file export recommendation.  I took a quick look at your doc and it's VERY helpful - thanks! 
 
Would all MIDI tracks need to be bounced down to audio to be included in the WAV export?  I have a single MIDI drum track, so would need to split that out to individual BFD3 outputs per drum, so each drum kid piece had an individual WAV, correct?  Frankly, I was hoping the producer would do that, as I've struggled with it - is there a way for me to export just the existing MIDI track along with the WAVs?
 
Thanks again so much for the help.
Russ
 

if you want to send only audio tracks to the mix engineer, without any bus/sends things etc....and without doing an export out of Sonar.
you could bounce the clips in the track view (bounce to clips), to include any automation (gain, pan etc), then extend those clips (tracks) to the beginning and end, so all clips/tracks are same length and start at 0.
then bounce the clips again. (and name the clips/tracks if you want).
then if you save the project to a new folder and tick 'copy all audio', in the new 'audio' folder are all your tracks, that you could send to the engineer.
it's not a quick workaround though... and not sure if you get the good render algorithms (izotope Pow)...

karma1959
 
Would all MIDI tracks need to be bounced down to audio to be included in the WAV export?  

It all depends on if your Producer owns BFD 3 and the kit preset you have.
Myself, I choose work with the midi tracks (as long as I own the soft synths). but some producer like to work with the audio tracks as well.
 
They are easy enough to bounce down if needed.
I typically do this when backing up projects because you never know when your going to have to send it out to someone who doesn't have those VST-I's.
Or if in 10 years from now the Soft synth is not available anymore

OMF does not support MIDI.
 
http://www.soundonsound.c...f-transfer-sonar-files

...but it should show an error message, not crash.

You can still export your MIDi tracks so they can be brought into PT.
Or render to audio is the best, as there's no guarantee that your producer has the same Instruments you have and the same settings etc. better you render the them.