• The first type moves the Events to desired positions, without affecting the actual audio file.
• The second type processes and changes the audio recording permanently.
There is one big difference between quantizing Audio Event positions, compared to MIDI Events: It is not the “start point” of each Event that is used to decide what the new position should be, but the “Q-point”. Note that quantizing moves the whole Event; it does not affect the timing of the recording within the file (for ways of quantizing the actual material in a recording file, see page 378 and the chapter “Matching Audio and Tempo”). Quantizing the start of a long Audio Event might therefore be pretty pointless. To make quantization affect positions within the recording, split it into several shorter Events before you perform the quantization. There are two principal ways to do this:
• Use the Scissors tool to manually split the Audio Event in suitable places. This may work fine if the Audio Event contains several phrases or sounds, and you only want to quantize the beginning of these individual phrases/sounds.
• Create Match Points (see page 373) and select Snip at M-Points from the Do pop-up menu.
This will split the Event at each Match Point. Use this method if you have audio material with short, well separated sounds, like a clean drum loop. You may for example want to tighten up an inexactly played hi-hat pattern by quantizing the beats to 16th notes.
P If you try the above methods with a less than satisfying result, check out page 378 and the chapter “Matching Audio and Tempo” for information about permanent quantization of the actual audio file.
There are two Event position quantization methods that can be applied to audio:Over Quantize (without processing)
This moves the Events in the selected Parts, so that their Q-points line up with the selected Quantize value. See page 362.
Over Quantizing an Audio Part
Groove Quantize
This moves the Events so that the Q-points line up with the “timing map” in the selected Groove. For more information about Groove Quantize, see the Getting Started book and the chapter “More about Quantizing and Grooves”.
The Undo Quantize item on the Functions menu does not apply to Audio. However, you can Undo the last Quantize operation, as with any other operation, by using Undo on the Edit menu.
As described in the chapter “Matching Audio and Tempo” there are very advanced ways of processing an audio file, to make it fit with other material. However, you may also permanently quantize an audio file without leaving the Audio editor.
P Since this process permanently alters your audio files, you may want to make a copy of the file before proceeding! See the Audio Pool chapter for instructions on how to duplicate files.
Performing the Quantize1. Select the Event to be quantized, and insert Match Points using the Get M-Points function on the Do pop-up menu.
This creates Match Points on the musically “important” positions in the Audio Event, as described on page 374 in this chapter. You may also add or edit Match Points manually using the Pencil tool.
P If there are great differences between the spacing of the M-Points and the Quantize value, this gives rise to very large Time Stretch factors. Since this may cause undesired results, try to use a Quantize value that matches the spacing of the M-Points fairly well.
3. With the Event selected, pull down the Do pop-up menu and select “Quantize at MPoints”.
This instructs the program to move each M-Point in the Audio Event to the closest Quantize position, and timestretch the material in between.
Cubase VST works through the audio file, and each section of the file is time processed to fit between the corresponding Match Points. Depending on the length of the audio file, the processing may take a while, during which a progress box is shown.
4. When this is done, your Audio Event will play a new segment, quantized according to the set value.