Logic Pro 8 Exporting tracks - Clips too short

[Golden Frog]

Hi. I've been exporting all tracks as audio files, and several of the resulting files get cut too short at the end, many measures behind the end locator. I'm using Logic Pro 8.02. Any help? Thanks.

 

[sonnykeyes]

Do you have any signature changes in the music? I've noticed that Logic has a habit of counting everything in 4/4 even if you change, so if your end locator is at 60 bars but you're in 5/4 time you won't get 300 beats, only 240 beats in the arrangement. I think you can work around it by extending the end locator, but it's a PITA sometimes.

 

[Golden Frog]

The project is in 6/8. I changed it to 4/4, and left the tempo the same all the way. It didn't work. I tried to export track by track but it didn't work either.

 

[sonnykeyes]

I wouldn't change it to 4/4, I just meant that's just how Logic counts beats until the end locator. If you keep it in 6/8 and bump the end locator later by a few bars, you may have better luck. I'm not 100% sure what Logic's calculation is, but have noticed that in certain situations it calculates ranges of time as though they're in 4/4 when they're not. You may be able to trick it into exporting the tracks correctly by artificially lengthening the project well beyond where the actual end is, but I can't guess by how much you'll have to move it. You should be able to get a rough idea though, by how many bars are being cut off in the exports you're doing currently. Good luck!

 

[Golden Frog]

Thanks Sonny for your help, but it didn't work. The only thing that works is to set the right and left locators, put them in cycle mode, and bounce each individual track. It's the only way to get files of the same length. Even the bounce function with the start and end locators, doesn't work. This method is so time-consuming. Does anybody has the same problem exporting tracks?

 

[sonnykeyes]

Aha! I think I know what's happening: In the "Bounce" dialogue box, there is a range in the lower left, but it doesn't (as I discovered through painful time-wasting trial and error) default to the locator positions unless you are in cycle mode. Perhaps manually inputting your range here would help? (I just use cycle mode because it's faster, but there may be some advantage for you here - depends on your circumstance)

 

[Golden Frog]

But still, I have to bounce each track, which means reset every fader, panning, plugin, busses, etc, and is a waste of time. The problem with "exporting all tracks as audio files" on the File menu, is that the files are not only short, they have different lengths. The sound gets cut, wherever I set the locators.

Is this a bug? It is a simple function. I have to export the tracks on several projects so they can be mixed somewhere else, but it is taking me so much time bouncing.

 

[Eli]

I think that's a feature, not a bug. When exporting tracks as audio files, the resultant file are bounced only as long as the duration of data on each track. It's not based on the end marker.

Now, if the exported files are truncated and not properly capturing the data on each track, that is obviously a huge problem. But the files not all being the same length is not inherently faulty behavior.

BTW, In v. 9 the export tracks features are now enhanced to optionally include/exclude reverb tails, plug ins, automation, etc.

 

[sonnykeyes]

The sound gets cut, wherever I set the locators.

Forgive me if I'm misunderstanding, but would the simple solution not be to set the start locator at the beginning and the end locator past the end of the song then?