(Editor's Note: Our friends at Berklee Press graciously supplied the following chapter from this just-released resource book, which can be ordered directly from the Berklee site by clicking here. And, stay tuned to sign up for PSW's contest to win your copy of this book!)

DEEPER INSIDE RECORDING AND EDITING

In this chapter:
• Record modes and punching
• Playlists, comping tracks, fades and crossfades
• The importance of buffer settings and latency times
• Digital editing, nudging notes, using the Pencil tool
• Headphones and headphone mixes

Whether working on your music or someone else’s, you probably won’t be satisfied recording just one track at a time into Pro Tools. The most powerful (and fun) parts of using the software involve sessions with multiple musicians and taking advantage of the amazing editing tools.

With the Audiomedia III card you can record four tracks simultaneously using its two analog and two S/PDIF inputs. With the 001 you can record 18 tracks at a time using eight analog inputs, eight optical (lightpipe) inputs, and two S/PDIF inputs. And once you have the raw tracks, you can combine and edit them in just about any way imaginable.

Because I was curious, I maxed out all of the inputs during some recording projects to see if my computer, Digidesign’s hardware and software, and additional hardware could handle the load. To my delight everything worked fine (see chapter 8 for more about advanced setups). But before you max out your Pro Tools system, let’s cover some basic recording and editing concepts.

RECORD MODES

Once you’ve got your initial tracks you might want to fix a few things. There are many ways to capture alternate takes or record over mistakes in Pro Tools:
• Record on an entirely new track.
• Record destructively or non-destructively over the existing track.
• Try another take (or re-record a section) on a different playlist.
• Use loop record and record several takes, one after another.
• Punch in and out at certain times.

By Control-clicking (Mac) or right-clicking (Win) the Record button in the Transport window, you can change between record modes. The Record button changes to indicate the current setting.

Fig. 4.1. The record modes from left to right: Non-Destructive, Destructive, Loop, QuickPunch.

Fig. 4.2. The full Transport window in Non-Destructive Record-Ready mode.

You should familiarize yourself with all of these modes, because you’ll probably use each one sooner or later. I’ll briefly explain them here, but you can get more detail in the Pro Tools Reference Guide.

Non-Destructive Record Mode

Fig. 4.3. Non-destructive recording makes it easy to keep multiple takes and choose the best one later. Here we’re going to drag the fifth take of a guitar solo from the Audio Regions list to the solo guitar track.

You’ll typically record in Non-Destructive mode. In this mode you can record a new audio file over an existing region on a track, but both the new and old regions are saved. Any region can be used simply by selecting it from the Audio Regions list and dragging it into a track. For example, if you like the fifth take of the stereo guitar solo better than the sixth take, select and drag take 5 of the “Gtr Solo” region to the “Gtr Solo” track. (To highlight two regions at once, select one region and Shift-click the second region.)

Regions are placed according to the current edit mode: • In Shuffle mode existing track regions are slid as necessary to make room for the new region.

• In Spot mode you’re prompted by the Spot dialog to enter a location for the dragged region.
• In Grid mode the dragged region snaps to the nearest Grid boundary.
• In Slip mode the regions are placed freely anywhere in the destination track.

Always keep an eye on input levels! I often find that once the Record button is pushed, players play harder and singers sing louder than when you were first checking their levels. You can view large individual track meters by clicking the Star (*) button next to any fader in the Mix window.

When dragging regions from the Regions list, you’ll probably use Shuffle or Slip mode. To switch between edit modes use the F1–F4 function keys: F1 = Shuffle, F2 = Spot, F3 = Slip, and F4 = Grid.

Get to know the differences and best uses for each of the edit modes. Try them all out . . . you’d be surprised how big a difference they can make to the quality and efficiency of your work in Pro Tools. Consult the Pro Tools Reference Guide for more information about their features.