Jump to content
Light-O-Rama Forums

Play at Speed: Not at 'normal' = strange corruption


Guest guest

Recommended Posts

Whenever I tell my songs to play at 1/2 or 1/4 speed, it is like it gets the speed of the sound correct, but it is massively skipping forward throughout the entire song. Maybe at speed 1/2, in 10 seconds, I'll be 20 seconds into a massively misplayed song.

I put the speed on 2x and, about 10 seconds later, at 1:10 (according to the display), some vocals start. If I play it normally, the vocals start at about :35 after.

It just seems totally hosed if it isn't at 1x? (v1.5.0)

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I had the same problem but someone here suggested that I convert the file from an MP3 to a WAV format. The file is much bigger but it seemed to allow the sequence editor to keep the visual cues and the audio in sync - even when I play at 1/2 or 1/4 speed.

How to convert from a MP3 to WAV? There are lots of opinions here and utilities on the internet but I use Adobe Audition to edit the music files and it has an option of outputing the final product in a WAV format so I use that.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

You should convet your file to wav (as suggested by rsinglatory).. You can us Audacity (free download) to do the conversion. Many MP3s seem to have a problem with the speed settings.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

LightORama wrote:

You should convet your file to wav (as suggested by rsinglatory).. You can us Audacity (free download) to do the conversion. Many MP3s seem to have a problem with the speed settings.

Dan,

I assume the MP3 - director cannot handle .WAV files. Is that the case?

If so, how would one use the director unit if the sequence was made using a .WAV?

Martin
Link to comment
Share on other sites

UPDATE: I converted the MP3s to WAVs. Easily just plugged them into my existing program with Edit->Audio File. It sync'd perfectly.

So now I'm in here playing at 1/2 or 1/4 speed to fine tune my points to match the music. Unfortunately, I'm seeing what looks like a related bug. As I am playing, it'll mysteriously jump forward about 1 second (both in sound and on the graphics). This will happen semi-randomly about once every four or five seconds (song time).

So I might have to play a segment two or more times in order to hear all the points to make the adjustment that I need. Really a pain. Happens if I have it set to play Full Sequence, Visible Screen, or Selection.

As another experiment, I set the speed to 2x and play the full sequence. Seems okay, no problem, except that the current selection bar is stuck at just before 0:46 (the end of the song) and it is still in play mode. The red [sTOP] button is lit and I can hit it to return to normal play mode. But it doesn't stop on its own like it should. Odd. I turned it down to normal speed. It still has that bug.

I haven't had sound problems before, but I can collect data via whatever tool you like. I also tried quitting all other programs, even using another windows tool to bump up the priority of the Sequence Editor to Real-Time.

EDIT: Add'l info, CPU is Athlon XP 3000+, 1GB RAM. Windows XP. Tried reinstalling the software, but this time answering "No To All" regarding my existing shared files that are at a newer version. No effect. Disabled virus scanner and all other background processes that I could.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

[bump]

Anything for this? How the software skips forward on .WAV files when played at 1/2 or 1/4 speed?

I'm trying to make sure I have everything sync'd up correctly, but it is an incredible pain as, while I'm playing a song at 1/4 or 1/2 speed, it randomly decides to skip forward now and then. So I have to go back and play it again (and sometimes again and again) until it does it right and I can listen to all the pieces.

EDIT: I can create a video of this, if useful.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Am I alone in this?

My sense of frustration is growing as I'm sitting here, over and over and over (mis)playing the same piece of music trying to get it right. It is making it far far more difficult than it should ever be. (Really, more frustrating than anything.)

Any work arounds?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

this is known issue, it is because the animation window is CPU intensive (if I recall the term correctly) I thought I could overcome that, with a 2.8 MHZ processor, and 2 gigs of RAM, and a 256 ram Video card, it still popped and jumped. I watched and tried to figure out where the issue was, but it didn't make sense except for IO interupts timing Video, DISK drive, Serial Port, I would suppose. I am just guessing , as the processor reach 90% occasionally when then POPs started.

besides the fact that a PC can't show the fading correctly (it isn't capable) like reducing brightness by 1 percent. Although I didn't get a meter out to check it looks fine in production.

I read to turn as much visual as I could off, the song still shows it skips and pops along the time windows when played. It doesn't act anywhere near that crazy in production, in fact once I had it done and tested in the mode it was to be used. The show ran great from my little 300 Mhz box and 256 Meg of memory. It ran flawlessly, and beautifully.

The medley I was working was twenty minutes long and 160 channels deep. So it wasn't your normal work load, but once you get threw it, it will work fine in show mode.

Now that I know better I wont spend a whole lot of time on it in the animation screen. You will definately do some adjusting when the show is actually running in real mode but it really wont be that bad time wise.

I found that getting the rough work done with the animation screen and all the toys running, then close the animation window, and dropping some of the other functions, like the time bar and or the Channel View (depends on what you like to work with) I just look at the channels view, then finish it up that way.

it may be karma or something *SMILE*

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I had a similar problem beginning at 46 seconds, but playing at normal speed with MP3. I just turn the Animation off and everything works fine -- no skipping and jumping. It's as Bill said, the CPU just can't seem to keep up with it.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Ah. No preview window going. Playing WAV and not MP3, as suggested above.


EDIT: To summarize, while playing a WAV at 1/4 or 1/2 speed (not normal speed), it will randomly skip forward from time to time. No preview. Turning down other graphical features doesn't seem to help. Box is an Athlon XP 3000+. All other programs exited.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Guest
This topic is now closed to further replies.
×
×
  • Create New...