Punch-In

[paidin]

Hi everyone:

I searched the forums but found only one post addressing this topic from 10 years ago. Here's my issue: I'm a musician with a lot of professional studio experience. I downloaded Mixpad to give me a space in which to record ideas and demos. Some of it is well done and intuitive -- much more so than Audacity, for example -- but I can't for the life of me find out how to punch-in. This is one of the very basic functions of any multi-track recorder and I can't believe that this company could possibly leave it out. I just need to punch in to fix a small error on a track. Can anyone help?

Sincerely appreciate any guidance anyone can offer!

PC

[Fred28]

Hello,

Could you provide more detail about what you need to do exactly, sorry I´m not familiar with the term ¨punch in¨ could you elaborate. 

Mixpad has very few editing tools, you can check this link and see if you find what you need:

http://help.nchsoftware.com/help/en/mixpad/win/editing_clip.html

You can also contact NCH tech support and see what they say: https://www.nch.com.au/support/index.html 

[paidin]

Hi Fred28,

When musicians are recording in the studio, they often make mistakes or simply don't like a brief moment in an otherwise great take. Instead of re-recording the whole track, which would waste time and also lose the brilliant moments on the take, the engineer sets up a "punch-in." Actually, its full name is "punch and roll." Don't get too distracted by the name, because it dates back to when tape was still used in the studio. That said, every engineer I've worked with over the past 15 years -- young or old -- in fully digital studios still calls it a punch in (I'm in the U.S.; my recording experience is primarily on the East Coast and Texas). So the engineer will identify the spot to fix, then start the track a little before it -- you, as the musician, start playing along. When you get to the problem area, the engineer "punches in" (starts recording over the mistake); when you finish, he or she "punches out" (ends recording). You have now recorded a new bit on top of the existing track, and the old mistake is gone.

This is literally on every song you've ever heard (well, at least those recorded since the 1960s). It's as basic an operation as "play," "fast forward," and "record." In other words, an essential part of recording.

I've moved on to different software, so no more replies are necessary -- just wanted to thank you for at least trying to help.

[JsGeare]

But for the benefit of others, "punching in," by whatever name, may be accomplished on MPad, or pretty close.

Methods vary, but one way is to "mix down" everything to an mp3, or wav or whatever, then import it as a "clip."

Set up a separate track to record the fix. Place the cursor at a point close enough to the offending material to avoid redoing the entire track, but far enough away to give everyone time to get in sync with the mix-down. Then record the fix.

Play everything back. The timing will (hopefully) be right. But of course, you'll have BOTH good and bad playing back at the same time, where they over-lap. Use fade points to kill output of the bad just before it begins, and just after it ends. As Duke Ellington said, "If it sounds good, it IS good." When you're happy with the playback, mix down everything to a new file.

Hope that helps.