Skip to main content Advanced Recording & Playback TouchMix Training : Adv. Recording & Playback
Collapse all Expand all Close Search Results CERTIFICATION STEPS COMPLETED
Certification Steps Completed 1 ) TouchMix Introduction
2m 3s - Touchmix Introduction 2m 3s
2 ) Mixer Navigation
3m 16s 3 ) Simple vs. Advanced Mode
2m 37s - Simple vs. Advanced Mode 2m 37s
4 ) Preset Libraries
5m 39s 5 ) FX Wizard
5m 59s 6 ) Advanced Effects
4m 16s 7 ) Gain Wizard
3m 8s 8 ) Recording Functions
7m 15s - Recording Functions 7m 15s
9 ) Adv. Recording & Playback
7m 15s - Advanced Recording & Playback 7m 15s
10 ) Updating Firmware
4m 20s 11 ) TouchMix 8/16 Firmware v3.0
4m 25s - TouchMix 8/16 Firmware v3.0 4m 25s
12 ) RTAs
5m 46s 13 ) Connecting to Wi-Fi
3m 34s - Connecting a Wi-Fi router 3m 34s
14 ) Feedback Wizard
5m 11s 15 ) Copy & Paste
3m 0s 16 ) TM-30 Pro: Overview
5m 42s 17 ) TM-30 Pro: DAW
4m 44s 18 ) TM-30 Pro: Patch Matrix
5m 37s 19 ) TM-30 Pro: Custom Fader Banks
1m 58s - Custom Fader Banks 1m 58s
20 ) TM-30 Pro: External Control
7m 31s - External Control Surface Operation 7m 31s
21 ) TM-30 Pro: Auto Mixer
9m 2s - Auto Mixer Part 1 5m 9s
- Auto Mixer Part 2 3m 53s
22 ) TouchMix-30 Pro: Scenes, Snapshots and Cue Lists
14m 23s - Scenes 1m 41s
- Snapshots 5m 56s
- Cue Lists 6m 46s
23 ) TouchMix-30 Pro Control App: Offline Editing
6m 37s 24 ) Assessment
- Video Transcript
- Lesson Description
- Downloads and Links
Video Transcript
Advanced Recording & Playback 7m 15s 0:07 Welcome back. In the previous video we showed you how to record tracks using the TouchMix and an external hard drive. 0:14 Now that you have the recorded tracks, let's show you the different things you can do with them. 0:18 Let’s start with Playback. Once you’ve recorded a session, you can playback any number of the recorded tracks. 0:24 Just go to the Record/Play screen, deselect arm, and turn on “Track" for each track you want to hear. 0:31 This will override the channel’s XLR or Line Input with the channel’s recorded track from the hard drive. 0:37 A Playback indicator will appear for any fader that’s in Track mode. 0:40 Take a look at the Transport and Control bar at the bottom of the screen. 0:44 You can see the total duration of the session on the right, 0:47 and you can adjust your location on the Timeline by moving the Play indicator. 0:52 The Locate indicator lets you mark a point that you can return to later. 0:56 If you tap the Set button, the Locate indicator will move to your current Play point. 1:00 You can adjust either of these indicators by dragging it on the screen, or by using the Master Wheel. 1:06 If you want to move the Play indicator to the Locate point, simply tap “Go To." Overdubbing 1:11 Now is a good time to talk about overdubbing. 1:13 Let’s say that you have an additional track that you’d like to add to a live recording. 1:16 Let’s say that your band has a recording of a song with an electric guitar, 1:21 and you’d like to layer in an acoustic backup on one of the available channels. 1:26 Well, let’s do an overdub. First, find a point in the session just before the song starts 1:31 and set the Locate point. Next, make sure that all the channels are set to Track as their source. 1:39 Arm the acoustic guitar channel, and set up the headphone mix for the guitarist. 1:46 Once the guitarist is comfortable with the mix, return to the beginning of the song by tapping “Go To," 1:52 and touch the Record button. The TouchMix will play the recorded tracks, 1:56 and record your new tracks at the same time. 1:59 When you’re done with that take, touch Stop. And that’s it. You’ve done an overdub. 2:04 You could also use overdubbing to replace a portion of an existing track, 2:08 rather than adding a new channel. 2:10 Let’s say your guitar player messed up a couple of bars in an otherwise awesome performance. 2:15 You want to fix those mistakes. 2:17 Plug the guitar into the same channel it was originally recorded on, 2:21 and locate a point before the section you want to replace. 2:28 Tap the Record button. When the section arrives, arm the channel and play the part better this time. 2:38 When the passage is over, you can disarm the channel or just touch Stop. 2:42 When you overdub a channel, TouchMix works like tape. 2:45 Tape was this stuff that people used to record audio on, 2:49 it came on big reels and got loaded onto big machines. 2:51 Oh, I think my grandpa told me about that once. Exactly. If you playback the track now, 2:55 the section you overdubbed will completely replace the old audio on that part of the track. 3:00 Basically, only the last take can be played back on the TouchMix. 3:04 But don’t worry, those other takes are still in there if you need them. 3:08 In fact, let’s take a moment to look at how files are saved on the hard drive. 3:13 If you prefer to do your post-production editing with a DAW, 3:16 then it’s helpful to understand the TouchMix file structure works. 3:20 Each session will be in its own directory labeled [its name].tmRecord. 3:26 If you’re doing a lot of recording, we recommend labelling your sessions starting with the date, 3:30 so that you can quickly find your session chronologically. 3:34 Inside each session folder are 22 subfolders, or 14 for the TouchMix-8, one for each channel. 3:41 Every time you stop and restart recording, 3:44 a new WAV file will be created in each folder that represents an armed channel. 3:49 The WAV files will be named “Region-1", “Region-2", etc., 3:53 so you can find your previous takes for overdubs in these files. 3:57 There will also be a document named “DIRECProject" that contains the header data for the session. 4:02 This will be useful when importing your tracks to edit in a DAW. 4:06 Different DAWS handle multiple takes in different ways, 4:09 so you’ll need to check the documentation for your software. 4:12 Follow the procedure your DAW uses to import digital audio files, and you’re set. 4:17 To make it easier to move files back and forth between your DAW and your TouchMix, 4:21 QSC provides a free DAW utility program that runs on both Windows and Mac computers. 4:26 You can download this for free from our website. When going from TouchMix to DAW, 4:31 the DAW utility consolidates all the tracks into a single folder, 4:35 which makes it more convenient to import into most DAW software. 4:39 And, if you’ve got a DAW that doesn’t handle the TouchMix 32-bit floating point WAV files, 4:44 this program will convert from 24 or 32-bit integer format. 4:39 But what if you’ve got some tracks that you made on your DAW, 4:52 maybe some backing vocals with a click track, and you’d like to use them in your live show? 4:58 Well, you can’t just drag and drop these files onto the hard drive 5:01 and expect them to play back properly on the TouchMix. 5:04 Once again, these files must be in 32-bit floating point format, 5:08 and they must be saved with the right XML header files, in the correct file structure. 5:14 Well, the new DAW utility takes care of that too. 5:17 Just change to “DAW to TouchMix," and you can easily export them to use on your TouchMix. 5:23 All you have to do is select the tracks that you want, 5:26 and then choose which TouchMix channels you want to play them. 5:30 Once again, you can download the free DAW utility from the TouchMix page on qsc.com 5:35 Did we mention it’s free? 5:38 Here’s a workflow tip: after the gig, it’s a good idea to log your session. 5:42 A simple spreadsheet with one column with a start time, and another for the song title, 5:47 and then maybe one more column for your notes or a rating system. 5:51 So now, let’s finally talk about what to do with these recorded tracks. 5:55 Your session tracks can be really useful when it’s time to teach someone how to use your sound system. 6:00 Let’s say the TouchMix is in a house of worship, 6:02 and you need to teach a volunteer how to operate your rig. 6:06 Well, rather than bring in the whole band for the sake of one training session, 6:09 you can use the recorded tracks to play back and then show the volunteer how to mix them. 6:14 You can also use the tracks for a virtual sound check. 6:17 But remember, the mix of the playback track is going to be different than the mix 6:21 of actual instruments making noise on stage. 6:24 Plus, tracks won’t feedback the way live microphones can. 6:27 Another thing you might want to do is get your session mixed down to a single stereo track 6:31 with each song as a separate file. 6:33 One way to do this is to simply connect the analog stereo output of the mixer 6:38 to the analog inputs of a recording device, for example, your favorite DAW. 6:42 The TouchMix has all the processing for a fine mix, 6:45 and your DAW can deal with all the cutting and saving to MP3s or WAV files. 6:49 Our last bit of advice is actually a serious disclaimer. Mixing on your TouchMix recording is highly addictive. 6:57 You may start off with just wanting to do a quick mix of last Saturday’s gig, 7:01 but before you know it, you get wrapped up with experimenting and perfecting 7:06 and fine-tuning your mix for hours. 7:08 So don’t say we didn’t warn you. Thanks for watching, and we’ll see you next time. Lesson Description
Advanced Recording & Playback 7m 15s Learn advanced methods of recording audio, dubbing, playback and manipulating files created on the TouchMix.
Downloads and Links
Advanced Recording & Playback 7m 15s Click here to download the video: "Advanced Recording and Playback" (720p)
Visit the TouchMix product page!
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