The Grid

[mk3]

What if the grid were a bit more useful?

I often find myself cutting up audio regions and moving bits around to play with the timing of a performance (liquid audio features would make this much more pleasant, a la Ableton Live). The grid in the Arrange window is often inadequate for this.

The grid only shows in tracks with no regions! So if there are regions in the tracks above and below the track of current editing focus, one has no grid reference points! Instead, the grid should show faintly through the regions themselves (again, this could be an option, or one could set the level of transparency).

Also, the grid resolution should increase as one zooms in. Currently, the grid essentially disappears when zoomed in finely. We need "smart grid", just like "smart snap" (which is, incidentally, not so smart at this point).

 

[alienimplant]

Great idea!

 

[ozinga]

I don't want it if it's going to be like smart snap : )
i don't remember how many times i have to zoom in all the way to correct some movement smart snapped did for me : )
I try to move a region to the start of a bar and sometimes it is almost impossible. it's either early or late and i hate zooming in and at the same time losing where i am and scroll left to right to find the region but instead lose it completely, zoom out again zoom in correct the cursor etc.big hassle.

 

[alienimplant]

I think you can drag while holding down Control key and look and see a numerical representation of the position while you drag. The control key allows the drag movement to ignore any snap that might be active. I'm not on my studio computer right now, so I'm sorry this isn't more instructional and detailed. Perhaps someone can elaborate. I'm sure you also know you can turn off smart snap in the arrange window.

 

[Sascha Franck]

I totally agree that there could be several grid improvements. For me, especially the grid in the piano roll could be improved (let alone that "smart" is really not all that smart in the piano roll...). For instance, once you quantized something, the grid could (optionally) display the quantize value. This is possible e.g. in Cubase and it's really marvellous when dealing with swing quantize.
Talking about grids: You may have noticed that in earlier versions of Logic, it was possible to have different grid resolutions in your arrange and the piano roll. In Logic 8 this has been taken away. Why oh why? That was such a highly useful thing - I fail to even imagine what the engineers at Apple must've thought when they dumbed Logic down in that aspect.

Regards
Sascha

 

[mk3]

Also, the grids in the Sample Editor and Piano Roll views could deal with the same improvements.

I like Sascha's idea of an optional grid which reflects the quantize/snap value as well. That's how Live works, and will even show a triplet grid if you wish.

mk3

 

[Sascha Franck]

That's how Live works, and will even show a triplet grid if you wish.

Well, you can have a triplet grid in Logic. Just use /12 or /24 for 8th or 16th triplets.

- Sascha

 

[mk3]

That's how Live works, and will even show a triplet grid if you wish.

Well, you can have a triplet grid in Logic. Just use /12 or /24 for 8th or 16th triplets.

- Sascha

Dear Sascha -

I assume you mean by changing the time signature of the piece?
I know that one can also quantize to triplets by those values, although the grid will not reflect this.

What I would like is to be able to turn on the triplet grid temporarily even in a piece in straight 2/4 or 4/4 time, without changing the time signature.

Cheers,
mk3

 

[Sascha Franck]

I assume you mean by changing the time signature of the piece?
I know that one can also quantize to triplets by those values, although the grid will not reflect this.

The grid *will* reflect this.
A grid setting like this:

results in the ruler (or piano roll grid) to look like posted above, completely regardless of the used quantization or time signature settings.

- Sascha

 

[Sascha Franck]

results in the ruler (or piano roll grid) to look like posted above, completely regardless of the used quantization or time signature settings.

To be more precise: The grid and quantization settings do have nothing to do with each other at all (as said, I wish the grid could optionally display the q-settings, too).

- Sascha

 

[mk3]

Dear Sascha -

Thank you for clarification. That is indeed changing the grid as you specified. So one can manually increase the grid resolution in this way.

I would still like the option that the grid resolution automatically increases as one zooms in, though.

..>mk3

 

[mk3]

To be more precise: The grid and quantization settings do have nothing to do with each other at all (as said, I wish the grid could optionally display the q-settings, too).

- Sascha

Good idea. Perhaps the quantize grid could be in a different colour to distinguish from the view grid.

...mk3