Pro Tools HD 7.2 introduced so many new automation features that they almost deserve a name all of there own, ala SSL or Euphonix or Neve automation systems. In this blog I want to concentrate on one of those many features, a button called “AutoJoin” – you can see this mode when you open your Automation Enable window, down the bottom above AutoMatch.
How many of you reading this feel you know Pro Tools automation inside out? On the flip side, how many are comfortable with Touch mode and leave it at that? Hopefully this post will encourage the touch mode ops out there to experiment with Latch mode…
So, you are using Latch mode, writing automation from the point when you grab a fader or pot, writing it at the level last touched as the transport continues forwards, until you have potentially engaged up to a hundred different parameters, all latched and writing automation, a MIX moving forwards down the timeline…
THEN, it happens… you miss a cue. Maybe you should have grabbed the BVox and pulled them up earlier to prepare for the chorus, or maybe the FX buss came in too loud, either way, it just happened, you’re in the zone, and you can fix it. Hit the “Back and Play” button above your transport controls on the DCommand or DControl.
The transport drops back in time (by the Back/Forward amount in your preferences) and you get a second shot at the cue, and you nail it. Transport hasn’t stopped but a disaster has happened – when you dropped back, all your 100 parameters dropped out of auto record and now you have hard breakpoints and you’ve lost your mix – you would need to touch all the 100 parameters during the back amount to get back to where you were!! Impossible!
This is where AutoJoin comes to the rescue – with Autojoin enabled, when you hit Back and Play, a red line appears on screen clearly showing where you hit it, and you are now approaching it from your back amount. You can fix your cue, but when you pass the red line, ALL your previously engaged automation re-latches and you continue with the mix, as if nothing ever went wrong!
You can go back and play as many times as you like, the trick is to always let it pass the red line before hitting back a second time or you will lose your record enabled cache.
Ive seen music guys using this to great effect, mixing all their BVox or drums in a single (sort of!) pass or post guys doing a doco, cranking through a mix on the first pass – only needing a little bit of trim at the end to tidy it up for broadcast.
There’s a video below showing the behaviour WITHOUT autojoin and WITH autojoin enabled. Hopefully this is a pretty clear description of the workflow and you can see the power of AutoJoin and add it to your quiver for those times when you need to mix super fast on your ICON.
Next Blog: We’ll be looking at a quick way to edit music tracks when they weren’t recorded by you and aren’t locked to your bars and beats ruler…
