Clip Envelope Anomalies (gain) in Sonar Studio 8.5.3

I have a song I am working on, and on two of the tracks (tracks 3 and 4) I have added two clip envelopes to fade the guitars out at the end of the song. The clips are each one measure long, and those two envelopes are the only ones in the whole project. All the automation read and enable settings are set to "on" and "enabled". I can get one of the two to work, but the bottom one will not fade out and if I save and close the project / song and re-open it, the node at the end of the clip has popped back up to "0" making the line (envelope) straight across. I have also seen it pop back up just by selecting on other items in the project without closing Sonar. Also I cannot add a node to the second envelope by double clicking or right clicking. The top envelope has exhibited strange things as well, but not as often as the bottom one. I created a brand new "from scratch" (no plugins or busses) song and imported to audio clips (one on top of the other) and split them at the end and attempted to create two clip (gain) envelopes on them like the other song and it is doing the same thing in the new "from scratch" song as well. I have also uninstalled and reinstalled Sonar as well with the same result after the reinstall.
 
Has anyone else been having clip envelope issues in 8.5.3?
 
I have been in contact with Cakewalk Tech Support, but so far I have gotten the "it works for me" thing from them when sending them a bundle file. Could it be a screen resolution thing?

I have observed automation node strangeness, too. The symptoms are similar to a bug in 8.0 that was fixed in 8.3, which is that you cannot move an existing node nor insert a new node by double-clicking on the envelope. Even right-clicking a node and selecting Properties from the context menu doesn't work. As with the earlier bug, closing and restarting SONAR alleviates the problem.

Unlike the 8.0 bug, though, I have not been able to reproduce this particular behavior at will.

The clip envelops still suck in Sonar PE 8.5.3.
If Cakewalk doesn't fix this in the next update I'll be buying from a competitor come fall.
Automation is rather important to my workflow where as more plugins and synths do nothing for me.

So please Cakewalk could you get some of your more basic stuff working because I am kind of used to Sonar but I have been learning another platform getting ready to make the switch.

Mike 

ba_midi

sjandrews


I have a song I am working on, and on two of the tracks (tracks 3 and 4) I have added two clip envelopes to fade the guitars out at the end of the song. The clips are each one measure long, and those two envelopes are the only ones in the whole project. All the automation read and enable settings are set to "on" and "enabled". I can get one of the two to work, but the bottom one will not fade out and if I save and close the project / song and re-open it, the node at the end of the clip has popped back up to "0" making the line (envelope) straight across. I have also seen it pop back up just by selecting on other items in the project without closing Sonar. Also I cannot add a node to the second envelope by double clicking or right clicking. The top envelope has exhibited strange things as well, but not as often as the bottom one. I created a brand new "from scratch" (no plugins or busses) song and imported to audio clips (one on top of the other) and split them at the end and attempted to create two clip (gain) envelopes on them like the other song and it is doing the same thing in the new "from scratch" song as well. I have also uninstalled and reinstalled Sonar as well with the same result after the reinstall.
 
Has anyone else been having clip envelope issues in 8.5.3?
 
I have been in contact with Cakewalk Tech Support, but so far I have gotten the "it works for me" thing from them when sending them a bundle file. Could it be a screen resolution thing?

What kind of envelopes exactly?  ie, are they MIDI volume envelopes, or Audio envelopes?   How did you insert them?
 
My thinking, based on what you said, is that they are MIDI envelopes and might be getting reset if, for example, you have "Reset All Contollers"  (I think that's the wording) checked in your Global MIDI options.   That would explain it getting reset when you reload.
 
So what type of envelope did you use, and how exactly did you create it?  It might help to know this in order to help you debug it.
 
 

It is an audio clip and I am right-clicking on it and choosing insert-clip-gain..

bitflipper


I have observed automation node strangeness, too. The symptoms are similar to a bug in 8.0 that was fixed in 8.3, which is that you cannot move an existing node nor insert a new node by double-clicking on the envelope. Even right-clicking a node and selecting Properties from the context menu doesn't work. As with the earlier bug, closing and restarting SONAR alleviates the problem.

Unlike the 8.0 bug, though, I have not been able to reproduce this particular behavior at will.

I can reproduce it EVERY time I try to use a clip envelope on 2 separate tracks.. I have an Athlon 4000+ processor and an Nvidia chipset.. That should have nothing to do with it though.. I may try a different screen resolution just to see what that does.. Oh as a side note, it does the same type of thing with track envelopes too..

bitflipper


Though slightly OT, John's point deserves repetition: the slip-fade feature, when appropriate, is much more convenient than using volume envelopes for fades. I only use automation for fades when it's a bus (like a song fadeout) or if the fade isn't a straightforward logarithmic curve. If nothing else, this might alleviate your immediate need.

Ok, the slip fade thing works. The clip envelopes do not work correctly and also the track envelopes are buggy as well.. One thing I did notice is that envelopes do not make the sliders move up and down like they used to.. The Cakewalk guy said it was not supposed to work that way.. I did notice that when I moved a track envelope up or down, the computer still thinks it is where it was before I moved it.. The hover indicator was showing a volume level where it used to be, and was not giving a hover indicator in the new spot where I had just moved it to.. Also node would not add, but it may have been adding them to the ghost line where it had been and not showing them.. Perhaps they should change it back to where the sliders and indicators on the track move with the envelope and there would be no differential.. But, apparently no one else is having the problem, so maybe it is something about my system itself..

I've never had much luck with clip envelopes.

I find track enevelopes a lot easier to use (not that they're pefect - far from it - I can think of about a dozen enhancements to make them work a lot better)

I've also got into the habit of using lock position/lock data on a track before mucking around with nodes.