Drawing Resolution for Envelopes - Track vs. Clip

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Infinite5ths
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August 12, 06 8:52 PM (permalink)

Drawing Resolution for Envelopes - Track vs. Clip

Is it just me, or do CLIP envelopes accept drawing resolutions much higher than TRACK envelopes?

In other words:

If I draw a track Volume envelope with lots of quick and/or slight volume adjustments, the result gets smoothed out into more standard curve shapes & flatter lines.

If I draw a clip Gain envelope with lots of quick and/or slight volume adjustments, the result looks much more like what I originally drew; and it has LOTS more nodes (i.e. the density of nodes is MUCH higher) than the track Volume envelope did.



In both cases, I've got SNAP turned OFF, and I'm using the Freehand envelope drawing tool. I can't seem to find anywhere to change the node density or drawing resolution settings. Is this just the way things are designed?
post edited by Infinite5ths - August 12, 06 9:15 PM

Mike
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#1

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    Infinite5ths
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    RE: Drawing Resolution for Envelopes - Track vs. Clip August 17, 06 10:21 AM (permalink)
    BUMP

    Mike
    MichaelDanchi.com
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    #2
    glazfolk
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    RE: Drawing Resolution for Envelopes - Track vs. Clip August 17, 06 10:25 AM (permalink)
    Hello Mike,

    Well since you haven't had any answers, I'll chip in. Nothing exciting to report though. I did read your post and put it to the test. For my part, I haven't noticed any difference in the resolution between clips and tracks.

    Maybe playing with that n52 too much is making you go blind!

    Best,
    Geoff

    Geoff Francis - Huon Delta Studios

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    #3
    Infinite5ths
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    RE: Drawing Resolution for Envelopes - Track vs. Clip August 17, 06 10:30 AM (permalink)
    Wow.....I KNOW it's different. I must have changed some setting somewhere.

    C'mon. I'm not THAT old yet.

    Thanks for the feedback glaz.

    Mike
    MichaelDanchi.com
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    glazfolk
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    RE: Drawing Resolution for Envelopes - Track vs. Clip August 17, 06 10:37 AM (permalink)
    ORIGINAL: Infinite5ths

    Wow.....I KNOW it's different. I must have changed some setting somewhere.



    Mike .. I'm getting out of my depth here, but I suspect it might be a graphics thing rather than a Sonar thing .... does that make sense?

    Best,
    Geoff
    #5
    Infinite5ths
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    RE: Drawing Resolution for Envelopes - Track vs. Clip August 17, 06 10:39 AM (permalink)
    I don't think so.....I'll post a pic with BOTH types of envelopes right next to each other. Hang on.

    Mike
    MichaelDanchi.com
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    #6
    Infinite5ths
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    RE: Drawing Resolution for Envelopes - Track vs. Clip August 17, 06 10:45 AM (permalink)
    OK...here is the screenshot: Clip vs Track Envelope Drawing Resolution

    The blue envelope is a TRACK volume envelope.
    The purple/pink envelope is a CLIP velocity envelope.

    I used the Freehand envelope tool to draw the middle (between the 2nd and 3rd RED midi notes) of both envelopes, and I drew almost exactly the same waveform shapes for each envelope. As you can see, the velocity clip envelope shows my original drawing shape much more accurately than the track envelope. The track envelope (the blue one) got smoothed out quite a bit.

    EDIT: My apologies...the link was broken at first. My FTP client doesn't automatically change file name capitalization to lower case. My web-based upload system does. ...used the FTP client and momentarily forgot this.
    post edited by Infinite5ths - February 02, 07 2:34 PM

    Mike
    MichaelDanchi.com
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    #7
    glazfolk
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    RE: Drawing Resolution for Envelopes - Track vs. Clip August 17, 06 10:59 AM (permalink)
    Ah! That's onteresting ... you're doing it with MIDI tracks ... I almost only ever use AUDIO tracks ... OK, I'll go back and have another check, this time with MIDI. Watch this space ....

    Geoff
    #8
    Infinite5ths
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    RE: Drawing Resolution for Envelopes - Track vs. Clip August 17, 06 11:01 AM (permalink)
    Here is another screenshot, this time with AUDIO envelopes: Clip vs Track Envelope Drawing Resolution 2

    The TOP envelope is a TRACK volume envelope.
    The BOTTOM envelope is a CLIP gain envelope.


    ...same as before -- both drawn with Freehand. The TRACK envelope is smoothed out significantly from my original (jagged) drawing shape. The CLIP envelope represents my shaky drawing skills much better.

    Note: I am zoomed in pretty tight. The project tempo is Quarter = 100 and I'm zoomed in on my 1600x1200 monitor so that one bar almost fills the screen.
    post edited by Infinite5ths - February 02, 07 2:34 PM

    Mike
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    #9
    glazfolk
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    RE: Drawing Resolution for Envelopes - Track vs. Clip August 17, 06 11:09 AM (permalink)
    Hey Mike (again) -

    Know what? You're right! Get a look at this:



    Top one is Track envelope, bottom is Clip envelope.

    Apologies for having doubted you!

    Best,
    Geoff
    #10
    Infinite5ths
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    RE: Drawing Resolution for Envelopes - Track vs. Clip August 17, 06 11:12 AM (permalink)
    OK....well, as long as it's the same for you, then I'm not too bothered by this quirk.

    ...no apology necessary. I'm used to finding little things that nobody notices, let alone cares about. It's just somethin' about me. WHY ME????????

    Thanks for confirming this glaz. Now I don't have to go hunting around for some setting, bug, or whatnot.
    post edited by Infinite5ths - August 17, 06 11:25 AM

    Mike
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    glazfolk
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    RE: Drawing Resolution for Envelopes - Track vs. Clip August 17, 06 6:03 PM (permalink)
    ORIGINAL: Infinite5ths
    I'm used to finding little things that nobody notices, let alone cares about. It's just somethin' about me. WHY ME????????


    Well, someone has to do it I ssuppose!
    #12
    Infinite5ths
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    RE: Drawing Resolution for Envelopes - Track vs. Clip August 17, 06 6:45 PM (permalink)
    Yeah....but I don't even get PAID!

    Mike
    MichaelDanchi.com
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    #13
    agincourtdb
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    RE: Drawing Resolution for Envelopes - Track vs. Clip August 17, 06 7:19 PM (permalink)
    It appears to the eye as if the track envelopes were nodes and curves added manually and the clip envelopes were recorded automation....


    #14
    glazfolk
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    RE: Drawing Resolution for Envelopes - Track vs. Clip August 17, 06 7:27 PM (permalink)
    ORIGINAL: agincourtdb

    It appears to the eye as if the track envelopes were nodes and curves added manually and the clip envelopes were recorded automation....


    True Dave, but in my example at least, both were in fact added manually, drawn in with what I call the pencil tool (but I think it has another official name).

    Best,
    Geoff
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    Infinite5ths
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    RE: Drawing Resolution for Envelopes - Track vs. Clip August 17, 06 8:05 PM (permalink)
    Yup....ditto here, which is why I raised the question in the first place. They do look very different. However, each was drawn by hand with the Freehand tool; and I promise you that the more jagged version is MUCH closer to what I originally drew. In fact, until I released the mouse button, the "node ouline" (or whatever you want to call the little string of dots that shows up as you draw an envelope with the Freehand tool) looked much more like the CLIP envelope version. But as soon as I release the mouse button, to finalize the draw, the TRACK envelope gets smoothed out and replaced with fewer nodes and longer curves.

    Mike
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    glazfolk
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    RE: Drawing Resolution for Envelopes - Track vs. Clip August 17, 06 9:24 PM (permalink)
    Mike,

    Am I getting too fussy (OK, yes) but do you think it would be useful to be able to have an option to specify the density at which nodes are added when you use this freehand tool, or at least to select from, say, Low, Medium, High, or some such.

    I take your point about you wanting the tightly packed nodes, as shown in the lower (clip) of my two curves. On the other hand, usually when I use this feature I just want a "broad brush" sweep and prefer it the way it is in the first (track) example - easier to edit.

    Best,
    Geoff
    #17
    Infinite5ths
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    RE: Drawing Resolution for Envelopes - Track vs. Clip August 18, 06 0:08 PM (permalink)
    I haven't tested this yet; but I assumed that the node density was set by a combination of zoom depth and cursor movement speed. In other words, at higher zoom levels and slower mouse cursor movement speeds (when drawing), the nodes would be created at a higher density.

    However, I think it WOULD be handy to be able to control this manually. Do the Snap Grid settings have any effect when using the Freehand tool?

    Mike
    MichaelDanchi.com
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    glazfolk
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    RE: Drawing Resolution for Envelopes - Track vs. Clip August 18, 06 0:22 PM (permalink)
    ORIGINAL: Infinite5ths

    I haven't tested this yet; but I assumed that the node density was set by a combination of zoom depth and cursor movement speed. In other words, at higher zoom levels and slower mouse cursor movement speeds (when drawing), the nodes would be created at a higher density.

    However, I think it WOULD be handy to be able to control this manually. Do the Snap Grid settings have any effect when using the Freehand tool?


    Mike,

    In my case, the zoom depth was identical in both cases, and the speed would have been as close to being the same as is humanly possible. It just seems to use more nodes, many more, with clip envelopes than with track envelopes.

    As for snap to grid ... hey! ... here's something I found out while experimenting because of this issue. After all these years I have just discovered this (drum roll .... )

    If within the Snap To Settings Dialog Box you enable the "Snap to audio zero crossings" option, then it will be applied to your selections even when the Snap to Grid button is in the off position. Gee I wish I'd found that out a few years ago!



    Geoff
    #19
    Infinite5ths
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    RE: Drawing Resolution for Envelopes - Track vs. Clip August 18, 06 1:08 AM (permalink)
    Yeah...I discovered that the Snap to Zero Crossings applies even with Snap OFF pretty early because I was frustrated to death that Sonar woudn't let me slip-edit or split at any place I wanted. ...drove me NUTS till I figured it out. ARRRRRGHH! ...glad you found that.

    As for the node density -- I wasn't referring to the Track vs. Clip envelope when I mentioned the zoom & speed factors. The Track envelopes ALWAYS seem to have a lower node density, as we established earlier in this thread.

    I did some more testing. Snap settings seem to have no effect on the Freehand envelope draw tool. Nodes are DEFINITELY created more densely when you draw slower. And zoom depth seems to affect node density only because the VISUAL density of nodes appears to be constant. In other words, if I zoom way out and draw at a specific speed, the nodes will appear at "X" density on my screen. If I zoom in, I'll find that they really aren't that close together. If I zoom way in and draw at the same speed, the nodes will still appear at the same visual density; but because I'm zoomed in, that visual density translates into a much higher effective node density. Make sense?

    The one exception to the zoom based density observation is this: Nodes cannot be closer than one sample from each other. So once you zoom in far enough to view individual samples, the "visual density" will decrease proportionally to the visual width of a sample on screen. Ya?
    post edited by Infinite5ths - August 18, 06 1:27 AM

    Mike
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    glazfolk
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    RE: Drawing Resolution for Envelopes - Track vs. Clip August 18, 06 1:13 AM (permalink)
    Ooh! It's gonna take me a while to take all that in (well it is late Friday afternoon here)

    Thanks!
    Geoff
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    Infinite5ths
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    RE: Drawing Resolution for Envelopes - Track vs. Clip August 18, 06 1:33 AM (permalink)
    I promise that it's not as complex as I made it sound. I hate trying to DESCRIBE something this complex in words. It only makes it seem MORE complex.

    Mike
    MichaelDanchi.com
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