lowepg Posted December 18, 2012 Share Posted December 18, 2012 LOL...Playing with the software for the first time.... :-)I cant imagine you guys doing this for 128 channels.... I'm doing 16! (actually only 12)Carol of the Bells is kicking my butt!Im sure Ill get a little better at this, but WOW- did I underestimate the time.... and I feel like Im going too fast (not tweaking it enough).Amazingly powerful! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Arteom Posted December 18, 2012 Share Posted December 18, 2012 2 hours on a minute!?! Beats my record. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Push Eject Posted December 18, 2012 Share Posted December 18, 2012 Yes. Yes you did... and that puts you in the 1%. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tim Fischer Posted December 18, 2012 Share Posted December 18, 2012 (edited) You'll get faster, IF you learn the tricks. Things like "the chase tool is your friend". Things like "the beat wizard is your friend". Things like "if you're doing *everything* on a .02-second grid, you're doing it the hard way (hint: Use multiple timing grids, one of them can be .02-second for fine effects, but you usually don't need that level for *everything* - that's where the Beat Wizard comes in).Welcome to the club...EDIT: Oops, I forgot your biggest friend of all - cut and paste (including paste multiple). Notice how most songs are pretty repetitive? Yeah, so did I. And while you can vary things a little, nobody cares if every single thing in each sequence is unique. Edited December 18, 2012 by Tim Fischer 5 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Santas Helper Posted December 18, 2012 Share Posted December 18, 2012 You'll get faster, IF you learn the tricks. Things like "the chase tool is your friend". Things like "the beat wizard is your friend". Things like "if you're doing *everything* on a .02-second grid, you're doing it the hard way (hint: Use multiple timing grids, one of them can be .02-second for fine effects, but you usually don't need that level for *everything* - that's where the Beat Wizard comes in).Welcome to the club...EDIT: Oops, I forgot your biggest friend of all - cut and paste (including paste multiple). Notice how most songs are pretty repetitive? Yeah, so did I. And while you can vary things a little, nobody cares if every single thing in each sequence is unique.+1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
scubado Posted December 18, 2012 Share Posted December 18, 2012 Sounds like I have some reading to do too. Never got around to playing with the beat wizard and have no idea what paste multiple does, but I'll learn. I should have more time this year to work with the software, I hope. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WilliamS Posted December 18, 2012 Share Posted December 18, 2012 Tim hit it right on the head. Those tools are amazing and will save you hours. It takes me roughly 12 hours per minute of music but it all goes with what you want to accomplish. Of those 12 hours, 6 of them are trying something, not liking the result and starting over. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gilrock Posted December 18, 2012 Share Posted December 18, 2012 I think one thing that helped me when I started out last year was I downloaded a free sequence of Jingle Bells from Holdmans website. It will give you a good idea of how to get started. He used a Fixed Grid of 0.05 which is a technique I've continued to use on most songs. Usually you can just place each beat on the nearest block. I also noticed how he puts a dummy channel at the top of his channel list called the Beat Track. That's another thing I started doing. And you make this channel color something different like yellow instead of blue. I just taught my son how to do this last night for a new song. When you first start out with a blank page create a new Timing Grid that is FreeForm so it will have no timing marks. Then open the Beat Wizard and let it detect the songs beats per minute which hopefully is constant throughout the song. You can hit the test button and listen to the music and watch the squares light up to see if they are lighting up on the beats. Once you are happy it's the correct beat I like to click the radio button to use timing marks at 4X the beat. That will give you 4 squares inside each beat. Then at the bottom of the wizard you tell it to automatically populate the "Beat Channel" every 4th beat. Viola....you will now have a timing grid that is subdivided into 16th notes with a yellow square marked inside the Beat Channel at the beginning of every beat. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ron Boyd Posted December 18, 2012 Share Posted December 18, 2012 Sounds like I have some reading to do too. Never got around to playing with the beat wizard and have no idea what paste multiple does, but I'll learn. I should have more time this year to work with the software, I hope.Past Multiple Pasting the same effect multiple times including all the way to the end of the track, either vertical or horizontal.For the OP, Remember you can use the same effect for different elements and get a different outcome. Example: a chase for an eight channel Mega tree will look different in the show than the exact same chase on 8 mini trees and different again on an eight channel light/firestick. That's been a major time saver for me too. Also the repeat tool, Looks like a green "refresh" arrow. I found that one earlier this year and it was a major time saver too.Welcome to the addiction and have fun.Merry Christmas,Ron 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jtomason Posted December 18, 2012 Share Posted December 18, 2012 (edited) I did Carol of the Bells for 16 channel and then upped it to 32 channels. If you'd like the sequence, just ask. The music is by Windham Hill Artists: https://itunes.apple.com/us/album/a-winters-solstice-iv/id298325845Here's a video of it.http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KtKBb9osCkA Edited December 18, 2012 by jtomason Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
csimmon5 Posted December 18, 2012 Share Posted December 18, 2012 I feel ya....I spent 6 hrs on one 20sec solo earlier this season Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jem5136 Posted December 18, 2012 Share Posted December 18, 2012 And you don't even have any RGB items yet!!! This year I sequenced 208 channels for Christmas, which wasn't bad because it was the same as last years show. But I was originally going to switch my display to completely RGB, having over 2000 channels, and that was before I added the Mega Tree into the sequences, that takes some time to sequence! Though I have sequence a lot of RGB for other people, and I have to thank LOR for putting in the tools to make sequencing quicker and easier! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Geoff Harvey Posted December 19, 2012 Share Posted December 19, 2012 I run 400+ channels + CCRs. I work on the basis of 10hrs sequencing for each minute of music. Some things are faster, but some are slower. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
George Simmons Posted December 19, 2012 Share Posted December 19, 2012 I'm with Geoff - I run 600+ channels (some are duplicates) + CCR/CCBs and I'm also working on approximately 10 hours per minute. As he says - some faster and some slower. (Probably most are slower but I prefer not to think about that.) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rmturner54 Posted December 19, 2012 Share Posted December 19, 2012 I agree with Tim...tools, tools and did I mentions, tools. One thing that I learned starting out was to keep it simple with trying to match the music. Getting too deep and detailed into the music at first can really be time consuming. As you get better the details will come. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tim Fischer Posted December 19, 2012 Share Posted December 19, 2012 The other thing - just because you *can* blink everything at .1 second intervals doesn't mean you should Sometimes simpler is better, and much easier. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TJ Hvasta Posted December 19, 2012 Share Posted December 19, 2012 Oh, and Paste By Time, not By Cell.. if the grids arent the same timing ( .10 or .05) it's gonna mess up.. chose Paste By Time to get the part you're putting in aligned by the point in the music, not by the boxes.. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PaulXmas Posted December 19, 2012 Share Posted December 19, 2012 Man it takes me about 8 hours to sequence one minute Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
George Simmons Posted December 19, 2012 Share Posted December 19, 2012 (edited) Oh, and Paste By Time, not By Cell.. if the grids arent the same timing ( .10 or .05) it's gonna mess up.. chose Paste By Time to get the part you're putting in aligned by the point in the music, not by the boxes..If you think paste by time is slick, you're gonna go ape$hit over "Stretch to Fit". That allows you to take a particular effect and shrink or expand it to fit into whatever time frame you're working with.If you do a lot of cutting and pasting, or if you just want an easier way, re-map your keyboard. I've taken keys whose commands I don't use and have assigned one button each for cut and paste. No more split-finger keyboard salute, and no more drop-down boxes. Select your range, push a button. Move your cursor, push a button. Done.And Tim's totally correct. Once you wean yourself from fixed timing grids, there's a whole new world waiting for you out there... an easier world, filled with quicker, better sequencing. Edited December 19, 2012 by George Simmons Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lowepg Posted December 20, 2012 Author Share Posted December 20, 2012 Well, I have 2 teenage girls that have been pushing me to do this.... and are pretty music & tech savvy(both are musicians - something i am not) ...Id like to figure out a way to enlist their helpum beat wizzard.... sigh.... I got lots of learning to do :-) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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