Yet another Take Lanes thread

There is a 'Remove Empty Take Lanes option in the Track view of the track you are working on. Right Click on the track in the clips pane, NOT TAKE LANE, and you will get that option. That should help a little bit.
 
I feel your pain...

1. Right click on the clips in the parent track (the main track where the comp is built up) and select Delete Empty Layers
 
2. I don't think there is a way to make all the non overlapping clips instantly occupy a single lane and remain separated like we used to be able to with Layers BUT it doesn't matter. Again right click the parent track and select Flatten Comp and all the currently active clips will create one continuous clip in a new lane and mute everything else. I THINK at this point you can remove all the scattered clips that created the new comp can be removed by again right clicking the parent track and selecting Delete Muted Clips (but I am not certain).
 
Yes that last bit is not exactly the same as the Consolidate Layers feature but that was buggy as heck anyway and there are other ways to do this type of thing VIA Bounce to Clip(s) and still get the same result but without all the unnecessary gaps.
 
Hopefully that isn't too smug for you.

Aha! See, Flatten Comp (flatten? that's the most intuitive verb they could come up with?) is NOT AVAILABLE if, like me, your track is displaying PRV instead of clips. If, like me, a track is in PRV mode, and you open the Take Lanes feature, there is no way I can tell to "flatten" them. 
 
So why not? Never mind, at least now I know how to "flatten" them. Thanks all!
 
Also, why isn't it called "Flatten Take Lanes"? The button to open them is called Take Lanes. Why when you want to consolidate them, are you expected to know it is now called "Comp"? Wow, terrible UX right there.

Oh and PRV editing isn't really related to Comping. You use comping in the Clips Pane. Then after you Flatten the comp you open the resulting clip in the PRV and provided you have Hide Muted Clips selected in the PRV Views menu only the notes in the resulting comp will be visible. THEN you do your MIDI edits in the PRV. In fact you don't even have to use Flatten to do this because during the comping phase everything except the promoted clips are automatically muted. Still it's less confusing to work with a single clip.
 
So basically do your comping in the Clips Pane.
 
Do your MIDI edits in the PRV.
 
This method of comping does NOT occur in the PRV.
 
I actually used build up my drum tracks in the PRV by lassoing, copying and dragging sections around but that is WAY more work and far more annoying than just putting things together in the Clips pane.
 

Right but Flatten creates a new lane for the flattened comp to live in while retaining the original clips and because the comping tool splits, crops and x-fades any benefits that I can think of where you would require the original splits to appear in one lane/layer are negated. All you have to do is swipe the clip and the sections are there. Drag up/down for X-Fades. Drag edges to crop the splits (on the correct side of course) to create holes if desired.
 
I'm just not seeing the need for having a bunch of scattered clips getting crammed into one lane anymore. Before, yes, because it was more cumbersome to split things back up.
 
You're right though that perhaps I'm not seeing something you are however even though it is radically different from what I can tell everything that could be achieved before by the Consolidate Layers option is covered and then some. It is obsolete at this point.

brian brock
I like the way you've presented it, and I have gotten used to the new behavior and prefer it in some ways.
 
as far as limitations of flatten comp versus rebuild layers, one example is if you're using clip fx, another is if you are actively arranging and rearranging clips for creative improvisational or compositional purposes.
 
flatten comp is great if you're comping, though

Ah, yes. Clip FX would definitely be something that would be screwed up with this. I don't really use those and can think of a few workarounds but definitely if you were used to doing things that way it would be annoying. Still though if you really wanted to work that way you could simply create splits around the desired section on the flattened comp and add the FX. This could be a pain if you have already added and tweaked the effect before flattening (because then it would get bounced directly onto the track... I think and not adjustable anymore) BUT if that scenario came up you could save a temp preset of the effect, flatten the comp, make the splits where necessary and then reload the preset for that clip making it adjustable again.
 
For compositional purposes I think Sound On Sound is the easiest to use and is what I used to create the structure of my current track. However I had not yet learned how the new Comping worked but still I'm not seeing how it would be any easier and in fact I think it would be more difficult. So a simple right click on the Record button to select SoS and then slicing and dicing pretty much works how I expect it to.
 
In comping mode that type of stuff would lead to lots of buried/overlapping clips and technically it WOULD work but seems like it would be far too cluttered and confusing so I'll probably just use Comping for actual comping for now unless my little Beep brain comes up with some strategic advantage to do otherwise.
 
Cheers!

1) I think you may be better off using two separate tracks for your left/right hand stuff (not that your way wouldn't work but it might get weird due to overlaps and new lanes being created). That way your left and right hand parts will always be separate IF you make sure to record into the correct lane (which would mean disabling Auto Arm I think and arming manually). The reason I say this is because when you open the PRV you can see the notes of ANY track in the project within the PRV and filter them in the Tracks section in the right hand pane of the PRV. So you want to look at your left hand make only that track active in PRV. If something is missing that you KNOW you recorded then you can break open the take lanes in the other track and your clip will likely be there at which point you just create a new lane in the correct track and drag the clip there. Now it should be visible under the correct PRV filter. This also makes it easier to choose different sounds/synths for left and right hands if you so choose or EQ them based on the frequency range of the notes (which can be helpful but not really necessary if it's a well designed synth).
 
But to answer your question about keeping two lanes and recording straight into them for each hand... in THEORY this SHOULD work but I think might be problematic. Now this may not be the case in X3 but it sure was in X2... the Take Lane Arm buttons were unreliable and many times simply did not work. I have not messed with in X3 so go ahead and try but I thought it was worth mentioning in case you encounter trouble. Still I'm not really seeing much benefit to you by doing this. What I think would be easier is: Create your two main lanes, Record or input a couple notes into each at the start before where the music would start (like you could do a count in or something). This way each of the two lanes contains a clip. Then with Sound On Sound enabled start recording your parts. They will appear in a NEW lane (you want this for now). Once you have a good take selct the clip then Ctrl select the destination clip (Right hand part click the permanent right hand clip, etc) and then use Bounce to Clips and that new clip will become part of the permanent clip. If you do this as you work and pay attention to which permanent clip you are bouncing to (make a note in the lanes Notes section for a quick visual reminder) then you will have no clutter (because the bounce will remove the freshly recorded clip) and you'll know what is going where as you work. A MIDI clip bounce takes less than a second and if you make a mistake you can Ctrl + Z to undo the bounce.
 
That is just one of many possible ways to approach this but if I am understanding HOW you want to work that may be the quickest, most organized and reliable way to do the two lane method and keep you left/right hand parts separate. Another thing you could do if you wanted to keep alternate takes but not have them cluttering up your working take is create a second MIDI track to drag those clips into and keep it muted. That way they are out of your way but if you wanted to try something different you can always go back to them. Create a take lane in the new track each time you do this to drag these clips into and put a note in the notes section of the lane for later reference so you don't necessarily have to listen to every single clip to find what you want.
 
I'll try to look at the other stuff you mentioned but I think I need some tea (just woke up).

if it's true that it's possible after all to have overlapping clips in a lane (I assume only in a MIDI track), this is a compelling and widely appreciable argument for returning "rebuild layers", since one of its functions was always to fix cases where clips were overlapped.

Keith Albright [Cakewalk]
 We lock the clip to prevent accidental swiping as a swipe there would incorrectly edit the other takes.

Hi, Keith. Could you possibly elaborate on this a bit? I assumed after unlocking it would simply be treated like just another take. I may want to use a flattened comp in this manner.
 
Example:
 
I comp together a MIDI drum part so that I have the best performance of the general beats for each section then flatten it to one clip/lane.
 
Then from there I want to use that foundation but comp in fills I like from the outtakes.
 
Is this not recommended/going to cause problems?
 
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The question above is more important and probably easier to answer then the question below so ignore this next part unless you are so inclined to read my ramblings. However a clarification on the above subject would be awesome and I'll pass it along if I see anyone having troubles in relation to it because if there IS a problem I'm sure it is bound to cause some confusion.
 
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Second... I have not yet employed that method but I did have something odd occur while creating my first comp (with MIDI drums).
 
I divided up the first take into song sections as shown in the Getting Started video (and I'll mention this now I was swiping in ONE lane as opposed to swipe one in lane 1, swipe two in lane 2 so maybe that has something to do with it and it was an error on my part).
 
Then I adjusted the split points as shown in the vid to land at more accurate points (like the start of a measure or to allow for early starts to a section).
 
Once I went into audition mode and started moving around some of the splits were in different places. Like a split in the first take where I had made the original splits was off from the splits in the rest of the takes. I thought all takes would follow the splits as I moved them and most of them did but some didn't.
 
I know that's weird and I probably just screwed something up but wondered if you had some insight into that behavior.

Extremely helpful, Mr. Albright and I thank you for taking the time to explain. I very likely did have my cursor over the wrong section and was not aware of the dedicated comping tool (which I should have been but I've only been using the feature for a couple days).
 
As far as extra data I'd just have to make sure I am accurate with my swipes which I usually am. When working with live stuff I either set snap to an extremely fine resolution or disengage it altogether to get in tight to stuff but I see what you mean if someone is using a broader snap res or not zooming way in for precise edits.
 
Thanks again. Now run like hell before the others realize there is a developer logged in! ;-p

Yup! And the term swipe for comping.  Glad I popped in again.