Ok, Im really trying RB for the first time having previously done everything in BB and exported wavs to my DAW. Ive got a few RB newby questions and heres my first one.
Q - should it take ages (like 3 minutes) from selecting the sgu via 'open' to it actually playing something? In BB it takes about 30 secs-from scratch. Admitted its not the fastest pc ggekbench 5000 score but why so different?
WendyM
Wendy,
A very reasonable question.
When RealBand first opens a BiaB file, it has to analyze and layout the tracks. This takes some time.
However, after this is done, if you save the song in RealBand native format (a .SEQ file), next time just open that SEQ file and it will load extremely quickly.
Unlike BIAB, RealBand has to fully generate ALL the tracks before you can start playback. BIAB has a means whereby it will start to generate enough of a track to go ahead and start playback while continuing to generate the tracks in the background. RealBand doesn't do that. It needs everything generated before playback starts.
And then, once generated it plays back just fine. As Trevor said, you should go ahead and save the file as a .SEQ format, otherwise and track specific changes you make won't get saved properly.
Thanks Trevor and John. I didnt know that it was another format-I thought the sgu was IT!
The second thing Im trying to do and getting very frustrated(that shouod never be allowed!) is this-In my SGU,(if you can imagine) that is now in RB there is one track-a bolero background guitar-that plays some great phrases but is uber-repetitive. I believe that RB will let me take any bit of a track and re-gen it. Ive tried that by highlighting a bit and sure it does but that takes a while too. Can I speed that up? Am I right there is a way to multi re-gen bits and sort of keep them somewher so I can compile what will be a middle-of-song guitar solo?
If I dont like a re-gen or re-gens can I go back one step or even to where I was to begin with?
Again Ive read somewhere that the "bits" are IN the BB folder somwehere and I can get to them and listen to ALL the phrases. How do I do that please?
Is there perchance a tute that a girly newbie can follow. LMAO!
WendyM
Wendym
CTRL+Z is one of my best friends. It's the shortcut key for 'Undo'. When I regenerate, or generally do something I don't like, I simply hit CTRL+Z and it takes me back to what I had before.
There are tutorials/information at the below links. It's also worth looking through the "New Features" videos for the different years, too.
http://www.pgmusic.com/videos.realband.htmhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5p1mI1fsPm8Regards,
Noel
Hi Wendy ...... there is a bug in the latest version of RB.
The previous version of RB was quick at loading and generating .MGU and .SGU BIAB songs ....now it takes forever.
I am waiting for the next update to BIAB and RB ... not holding my breath though !
I think this problem was addressed earlier this year or late last year .... but it has now come back to haunt us.
Erol
Erol,
I wasn't aware of that. I'm presently running build 4 and after reading your comments, I find myself wondering if maybe this might be quicker than build 7.
I have a fast computer and it takes a standard BIAB song (MGU file) about 30 seconds to load and build the tracks with my PC.
Regards,
Noel
Regarding the loading times.
Still faster then waiting for musicians to show up at the studio. I haven't timed it, but I think under a minute to render the project ready to play. Computer processing power and speed certainly does make a huge difference in this area.
I haven't used the "regen" to redo a section of the RT.
I simply render the track using the same RT multiple times. 3, to 5 times is generally enough. I load them into my DAW stacked together and use envelopes for volume control.
I did this on my song The Best Christmas with the piano fills (3 tracks) and the guitar solo (5 tracks). It took some time to set up the envelopes but the end result was worth the time spent.