Meyer Sound Documentation

The Meters area of the Wild Tracks window displays the audio playback activity for all chan- nels, as well as global Wild Tracks controls.

Wild Tracks window, Meters Area

This section includes the following controls.

Tablet Controls

The Wild Tracks window has additional channel editing controls, accessible through the Dis- play menu. These controls are particularly useful for tablet/touch screen displays, but can also be used with a regular mouse.

When Display > Show Tablet Controls is enabled, five buttons are displayed across the bot- tom of the window.

Control	Description
Show EQ	When the Show EQ function is active, touching or clicking a meter causes the corresponding channel processing window to open, allowing quick access to EQ, dynamics, and delay con- trols.
Mute	When the Mute function is active, touch or click a meter to mute that channel.
Show Strip	When the Show Strips function is active, touch or click a meter to open the corresponding mixer window, with the selected channel in the first column.
Isolate	When the Isolate function is active, touch or click a meter to isolate that channel.
Select	When the Select function is active, touch or click a meter to select that channel. Several chan- nels can be selected at one time.

The Drive Setup button brings up the Setup Drives window, where you can import audio (“Importing Audio Using Drive Setup” on page 157) and create virtual drives (“Using Wild Tracks Offline” on page 183). The contents of the window depend on which tab is selected.

Setup Drives Window

The title bar of the Drive Setup window now indicates what role (if any) the Wild Tracks module is currently playing (active or backup).

Importing audio using Drive Setup

The Setup Drives dialog makes it easy to import files into the Wild Tracks window:

1. Click the Drive Setup button to open the Setup Drives dialog.

2. Click the Drive Contents tab and navigate to the folder.

3. Drag the audio file(s) from the local directory to the Drive Contents tab.

4. Drag the file(s) to the Wild Tracks window to place it in the Wild Tracks deck.

Drive Setup tab

The Drive Setup tab offers tabular data and buttons, as outlined in the following table.

Button/Column Data	Function/Definition
Mount Point	Refers to the physical location of the Wild Tracks drives; left drive sled or right drive sled.
Drive Status	Status of the Wild Tracks drive: Online or Offline.
FSType	Displays what file system (if any) is installed on the drives. This column is populated even when the drives are not mounted.
Volume Label	Name of the drive. This value is editable, and can be used to set the name of the drive as it should appear in the Drive Setup pane henceforward.
Size	Total size of the drive.
Used	Amount of space currently assigned to files.
Available	Amount of free space.
Comment	Enter text comments here.
Close	Click to close the window.
Mount Drives	Click to search for connected drives that are not listed in the Setup Drive window.
Unmount Drives	Click to stop the drive so it can be safely disconnected (similar to ejecting a flash drive before physical removal).

Button/Column Data	Function/Definition
Verify Subcues	Click to check if the subcues are present on all locally mounted drives.
Create Virtual Drive File	Click to create a virtual drive file.
Backup Drive	Click to back up one selected drive to another.
Format Drive	Click to format the selected drive. (This erases all content on the drive, a confirmation dialog is displayed.)
Repair Drive	Click to attempt repairs to the selected drive. Drive repair is generally used to attempt recovery of a drive’s file system on those rare occasions when the file system structure has become cor- rupt. This function does not recover damaged files, but rather recovers access to files by attempting to repair a drive’s file system.

Drive Contents tab

A row of buttons runs at the top of the tab.

Button	Function
Refresh Directory	Click to refresh the window.
Viewing:	Text box that displays the current directory's file path.
Parent Directory	Click to go up one directory level.
Create New Folder	Click to create a new folder in the current directory.
Copy Selected Files	Click to copy the selected files and/or folders.
Cut Selected Files	Click to cut the selected files and/or folders.
Paste Selected Files	Click to paste the copied/cut files and/or folders.
Delete Selected Files	Click to delete the selected files and/or folders. The Delete function does not move a file to the trash for possible retrieval later; the file is deleted from the drive completely.

Upper Section

The upper section of the Drive Contents tab contains the following controls.

Checkbox/Column Data	Function/Definition
Upload to both Drives	When selected, any file you upload to one drive is automatically copied to the other drive as well.
Upload to both Modules	On a system configured with redundant Wild Tracks modules, CueStation presents an Upload to both Modules checkbox. When this checkbox is selected, CueStation directs uploaded files to both the primary and redundant Wild Tracks modules. This checkbox can be used in conjunc- tion with the Upload to both Drives checkbox to simultaneously upload to four different destination drives (two drives on each module).
File Name	The name of the file.
File Size	The size of the file in MB.
Audio Length	How long the file plays in hours, minutes, seconds, frames, subframes.
Chans	The number of channels within the audio file.
Last Modified	The last date the file was modified.

Lower Section:

The lower section of the Drive Contents tab contains the following controls.

Button/Column Data	Function/Definition
Status	The percentage completed of a file download or upload.
Xfer Speed	Transfer rate in megabytes per second.
Xfer Information	What files or folders are being downloaded or uploaded. If multiple files are being downloaded or uploaded simultaneously, the information for all the file transfers appears on a single line, which is updated as the trans- actions progress. For example, for a download of six files, the information line reads 1/6 for the first of the six files, 2/6 for the second, and so on.

Button/Column Data	Function/Definition
Import Files	Imports audio files from any connected directory.
Import Folder	Imports folders and their contents from any connected directory.
Remove Selected File Transfers	Click to stop an exporting file in mid-transfer. File transfer is an incremental process. If stopped in the middle of a trans- fer, an incomplete file of whatever percentage had finished downloading remains on the destination drive(s).

The deck graphic display shows the relative position of the Wild Tracks entries included in that deck.

Wind Tracks Window, Deck Graphic Display

The controls for this area are as follows:

Right-click an element in the timeline to display a context menu with the following options.

TIP: Use Command+[arrow keys] (Mac) or Ctrl+[arrow keys] (Windows) when a file is selected in the timeline to snap it to the nearest edge of another file, the top

of the deck, or the cursor.

Changing the Height of Tracks in Timeline

The deck timeline can be zoomed vertically as well as horizontally. Use the following Display menu commands to change the vertical zoom.

Command	Function
Make Bars Shorter	Zoom out vertically.
Make Bars Taller	Zoom in vertically.
Reset to Default Bar Height	Reset to the default zoom level.

Wild Tracks Envelopes

In the Wild Tracks window, you can draw volume envelopes in the Deck timeline, and capture them as part of the Wild Tracks Deck subcue. This allows greater control over level adjustments between tracks and reduces the number of additional cues required to make level changes.

Right-click a track in the timeline to access the following options.

Option	Function
Adjust Envelope Levels in Selected Range	This will adjust all selected points by the same amount. This is only enabled when a region of the entry is selected.
Convert Envelope to 'Simple/ Loop-Aware' Envelope Type	There are two types of envelope types: Simple and Loop-Aware. Loop- Aware envelope points will repeat with looped regions, whereas Simple ones will not.
Clear Envelope Points in Selected Range	Clears all of the envelope points in the selection.
Display File Format Information	Displays the file format type (WAV, AIFF, etc.).

Tip

When editing envelope points in the Wild Tracks window, you can hold Shift when dragging to only affect the time (horizontal movement). Hold Option (Mac) or Alt (Windows) to only affect the level (vertical movement). Hold Command (Mac) or Ctrl (Windows) for fine control of point movement when zoomed out.

The Deck Info area consists of two sections: Deck Controls and Wild Tracks Elements.

Deck Controls

The Deck Controls section has options and controls that relate to the entire deck.

Wild Tracks Window, Deck Controls

The following table contains a list of deck controls accessible from the Wild Tracks window.

Option/Control	Function
Deck ID number	Click to select a deck for capturing subcue information.
Deck Label	Displays the ID number of the subcue recalled for that deck, the name of the file assigned to that deck, and the Wild Tracks and Deck ID numbers.
Deck Playback Position	Shows the current cursor position within the timeline of that deck.
Transport buttons	Play, Pause, Stop, and Record.

Option/Control	Function
Total Play Length	Shows total play length.
Hold button	Acts similar to a pause button, but does not affect the playing/stopped status of the deck.
Isolate button	When the Isolate button is active (yellow), the deck will not be affected by cue automation.
Add Entry	Allows you to add a Wild Tracks element to the deck. This can include a file for playback, a tone or noise generator, or a few other types; see “Wild Tracks Entries” on page 169.
Choose Files	Opens a dialog box to add audio files to the deck. You can also add files by dragging them into the Deck Info area from a directory listing.
Replace File Names	Allows you to switch out the selected file for a different one.
Delete Selected	Removes the selected element from the list.
Set/Recall Rehearsal Point but- tons	These allow you to place or go to rehearsal points in the deck, which means you can start a Wild Track at any point in its playback sequence. For more information on setting and recalling rehearsal points, see “Set/ Recall Rehearsal Points” on page 168.
Deck Play Offset	Indicates the point on the deck timeline where playback will start. The default is the beginning of the deck.
Lock to Timecode checkbox	Locks the deck transport to external timecode.
Timecode field	Used to lock the deck playback to timecode. Playback will stop when the Timecode stops, or the deck reaches the end of the playback range.
Deck Enabled	Normally selected, activating the subcue. When this box is unchecked, the subcue will not play back when recalled. If you are programming a sequence of overlapping Wild Tracks Deck cues, this allows you to listen to only the subcues you are working on.
Any Deck checkbox	If checked, signifies that the Wild Tracks subcue does not explicitly spec- ify which deck should be used for that subcue. In this case, when the subcue is recalled, CueStation assigns it to a deck that is currently not in use, starting with the highest number available. If Any Deck is NOT checked, then every time the subcue is recalled, it will use the same deck.
Deck Key text box	To set a key for the deck. More information about using deck keys can be found in “Advanced Techniques” on page 181.

Option/Control	Function
On Recall drop-down menu	To select which state the deck should be in when recalled by a subcue.
On Complete drop-down menu	To select the desired action when the deck cursor reaches the end of the last entry in the timeline.
Action text box (beside On Complete drop-down menu)	Provides the option of assigning any valid text command, as described in Appendix C, “D-Mitri Text Commands.”

TIP: When using multiple decks, it can be difficult to keep track of which decks are playing. To create a compact Wild Tracks display, choose Windows > Clone

Window command, and turn off all display options. This creates a second Wild Tracks window that displays only the deck label, deck playback position, and transport but- tons.

Compact Wild Tracks Display

Wild Tracks Elements

The next area within the Deck Info section is a list of all the elements included within the Wild Tracks Deck subcue.

Wild Tracks Window, Elements Section

Click a column heading to sort the elements alphabetically by the contents of that column. Click it again to sort them in reverse order.

Element	Function
Type	Shows the type of element, and also determines what kind of information is listed in the File Name column. Right-click in the Type column to change the type of element. See “Wild Tracks Entries” on page 169 for a full description of these types.
File Name	Identifies the name of the file, if the entry is a Playback type. If it is a Record entry, File Name indicates the name of the file that will be written to.
Sends	Specifies a list of Wild Tracks sends to which the audio should be routed.
Loops	Allows you to replay the file or file region repeatedly. Set this value to -1 to loop indefinitely.
Level	Specifies the volume level (in dB) of the file or tone generator.
Play Length (hh:mm:ss:fr:sf)	Specifies the duration of playback. Note that this can be set to a value shorter than the actual length of the file to play back a region of the file.
Loop Start	Sets the start time of the region to be looped. The default is the start of the file, but you can create smaller regions within the file to be looped.
Loop End	Sets the end time of the region to be looped.
Cross Fade	Sets the amount of cross fading you want Wild Tracks to use for loop-iter- ation discontinuities. The default cross fade time is 30ms. For no cross fade, set it to 0ms. There is no maximum cross fade time, although values greater than half of a loop iteration will be treated as if they were equal to half of a loop iteration.

Element	Function
File Offset	Specifies the point within the file where playback should begin. This, combined with Play Length, allows you to play back a region of the file.
Play At (hh:mm:ss:fr:sf)	Specifies the point in the deck timeline where the file will start playing.
File Format	Displays the format of the file, for recording entries.
ID	Sets a unique ID for the file entry.
Enabled	Displays whether the track is enabled or disabled.

The File Search Path is the default directory that Wild Tracks searches for audio files on the Wild Tracks drives. Recording path is the default directory where Wild Tracks will record audio.

Wild Tracks Window, Paths Section

The Set Rehearsal Point and Recall Rehearsal Point buttons allow you to place or go to rehearsal points in the deck timeline.

Points Rehearsal

Set and Recall Rehearsal Point buttons

Wild Tracks Window, Rehearsal Point Controls

To set and recall rehearsal points:

Rehearsal Point Selection Dialog

The rehearsal point will be placed at that point in the Wild Tracks deck. To start the cue at a rehearsal point, click Recall Rehearsal Point and select the point's letter from the context win- dow.

For cues with the Command Type, right-clicking in the File Name area activates a new context menu containing descriptions of commonly used D-Mitri Text Commands. You can leave the command as-is or edit it to suit the parameters.

Command Cue Context Menu

Example: after selecting Go Next from the context menu, the text Go on Player 1 appears in the cell. This command presses the GO button in the Transport Window for Cue List Player #1 when the command track is played.

The context menu only provides examples of commands that are likely to be useful when being executed from a Wild Tracks deck. For more information on D-Mitri text commands, see Appendix C, “D-Mitri Text Commands.”

Also, for cues with the Command Type, the file name of any cue or subcue now includes its reference name (such as Recall Cue 0).

Select a Cue Window

To assign a cue to a Command entry, right-click the File Name field to display the available command types. The Select a Cue window is displayed when choosing Recall Cue, Recall Subcue, Update Cue, or Update Subcue. The Select a Cue window contains a list of current cues or subcues, along with their ID numbers and names.

Select a Cue Window

When a cue or subcue is selected, the effect depends on whether you previously selected Recall or Update.

Command	Function
Recall Cue/Subcue	Selected cues or subcues will recall when triggered.
Update Cue/Subcue	Allows modification of the selected cue or subcue so that its control points match the values of those control points currently set in CueSta- tion.

This is the quickest way to create Wild Tracks subcues.

directory.

CueStation will automatically create a cue that contains one Wild Tracks deck subcue with the following information:

At this point, you can edit the subcue directly within the Cue List window. If you want to change the deck number, for instance, that can only be done by editing the Name field in the subcue.

Or, if you recall the cue, you can then set the input levels, pans, and other settings appropri- ately, and then use Capture Differences to add these control points into the same cue.

When the subcue is recalled, the Deck Label in the Wild Tracks window is automatically set to the name of the subcue, as shown.

This method of creating a Wild Tracks deck subcue is useful for creating more complex multi-track sequences.

As files are added, they appear in the timeline view as green bars. Drag the green bars to move them forwards or backwards in time within the deck.

Wild Tracks parameters captured by CueStation can be directly edited in the subcue window.

Subcue Library Window, Details for a Wild Tracks Subcue Displayed

Wild Tracks subcues can also be created entirely within the Subcue Library. Use Subcues > New Subcue > Wild Tracks Deck to create a new subcue. Controls are similar to those described in “Wild Tracks Window” on page 153, with several additional options. The following values constrain the operation of the entire deck.

Track assignments are made in the order listed in the Sends column. The first track of a multi-track file is mapped to the first send listed, the second track to the second send listed, and so on.

For example you could specify 8,1,6,2–4, so that the file's first track will play on channel 8, the second on channel 1, the third track on channel 6, the fourth on channel 2, the fifth on channel 3, and the sixth track on channel 4.

Descending ranges are also permitted. For example, a multi-track audio file can be mapped to sends 16–1. The first track of the audio file is routed to the 16th channel, the second track is routed to the 15th channel, and so on.

Playing individual tracks

You can extract tracks out of a multi-track file by making a null assignment of the unwanted tracks. If 0 (zero) is used as a send value, the track will not be played.

For example, to play only the right-hand stream of a stereo file, specify the send as 0,1.

To send only the right channel of a stereo file to several different input channels, you could specify 0,1,0,2,0,3. For the left channel only, it would be 1,0,2,0,3,0.

To do the normal round-robin assignment mapping with the right channel only, prepend a zero to the sends. For example, 0,1–16 would cause channel 1 to play the right-hand stream, chan- nel 2 to play the left-hand stream, channel 3 the right-hand stream, and so on.

When traversing through a cue list, CueStation will look ahead and preload Wild Tracks deck subcues into a buffer. When the cue is recalled, the playback of audio files will begin as soon as the subcue is recalled.

Wild Tracks supports many different formats of audio files (see “Supported Audio File Types” on page 216 for a complete list). All files must have a 96kHz sample rate.

For a Wild Tracks deck subcue, the length time between when the subcue is recalled and when the deck starts playing can be longer than desired, especially if there are many audio files to be loaded. Therefore, it can be very beneficial to load the deck (without playback) at a time before playback is required.

When recalling cues in a cue list, CueStation will look ahead at the next cue and automatically preload Wild Tracks deck subcues. These subcues will not be visible in the Wild Tracks window; they are loaded in the background. This can reduce time-until-playback by up to 98%.

It is possible also to manually control when decks are loaded, rather than relying on the preloader algorithm to perform preloading. This technique is useful in circumstances such as when a loaded deck is going to be played by means of a remote cue recall. To manually control deck loading, you will need two cues per Wild Tracks playback: one cue to load the deck, and another cue to start playback.

At this point, the cue list will have a sequence of two cues to initiate Wild Tracks playback. The first cue loads the files into a deck, and the second cue triggers playback. This can significantly reduce the trigger time when recalling the second cue. If the second cue is recalled without first recalling the loading cue, playback will not work as desired. For instance, if there are other files loaded into that deck, then those files will be played instead of the ones you were expecting.

Wild Tracks can loop an entire file, or a region within a file. To loop an entire file:

To create a loop for a region within a file:

Vamping is used to loop a region of an audio file continuously until it is triggered to continue, at which point it will finish playing the current region and then continue on to the next region.

To accomplish this in Wild Tracks, use the following procedure:

The Start Vamp cue will begin Wild Tracks playback, and loop indefinitely until End Vamp is recalled.

Mixer Settings subcues can be used to control transport actions on a deck or set of decks. Mixer Settings subcues can be created for any control point in CueStation by right-clicking the control and dragging it into the cue or subcue library. For example:

A new cue will be created, containing a Mixer Settings subcue.

If you click the subcue, you will see Wild Tracks 1 Deck 1 Status in the Control Points col- umn. You can change the value of the deck. For example, you might enter a value of Deck 1–5 to stop a range of decks at the same time.

In the Value column, you will see the word Stop. This can be changed to Play, Pause, etc. The Wait and Fade times are not valid for this type of control point, and the Enabled col- umn shows whether or not the control point(s) are enabled.

Mixer Settings subcues can only control decks if you know which decks will be in use. For subcues assigned to Any Deck, the deck number depends on which other decks are in use. However, it is still possible to automate control of these decks, using deck keys. There is a Wild Tracks external subcue, Control Decks by Key, which allows you to control a set of Wild Tracks Decks that share the same pre-assigned key. To use this feature:

You can even change the deck number in the subcue, and the Pause subcue will still work. If you create more Wild Tracks Deck subcues with the same key, then the Pause subcue will pause all of those decks, if they have been loaded when the subcue is recalled.

CueStation allows you to edit Wild Tracks deck subcues while connected to VirtualD-Mitri.

Wild Tracks supports the use of batch files, or scripts to be executed. Here are the contents of an example batch file:

# This batch file appears in WTRX window like any other audio file file=makehaste.wav # Play this first

file=BirdOwl.wav # Then this

file=Congo.wav loops=5 # then play this one in a loop 5 times file=PalindromicMessage.aiff backwards # Play the palindromic message backwards source=tone pitch=440 length=1s # generate 440Hz tone for 1 second file=Romeo.wav loops=10 offset=1m length=2m # play 1–minute segment, 10 times file=another_batch_file.bat loops=3 # you can even do "subroutines" file=yet_another_batch_file.bat random # execute batch file in random order(!)

When the user specifies a batch file in the Wild Tracks window, it works like an audio file that is the group of all the items specified in the batch script. The following is an example batch file that spans across drives:

# This is a batch file that lets us span drives file=/mnt/wtdrives/left/wtrxaudio/FirstPartOfReallyLongFile.wav file=/mnt/wtdrives/right/wtrxaudio/SecondPartOfReallyLongFile.wav

If each filename is unique, it is not necessary to specify full file paths. Instead, the files can be identified by name and extension only:

# Same as above, but works with any IDs file=FirstPartOfReallyLongFile.wav file=SecondPartOfReallyLongFile.wav file=ThirdPartOfReallyLongFile.wav

Wildcard operators can also be used when specifying file names in batch files:

# Using wildcards file=First* file=Second* file=Third*

The file search path defines where Wild Tracks will look for its files.

The default path is: /tmp/supportfiles:/mnt/wtdrives/*/wtrxaudio:~/wtrxau- dio

There are four sections, each separated by a colon (:). Each section represents a search path. A search path is a list of directories each separated by a slash (/).

Media Path Subcue

It is possible to create a subcue to change the File Search Path in the Wild Tracks window. Create a new Commands subcue, change the Type to Wild Tracks, and set the Command to Adjust Wild Tracks Media Path. There are several options for this command:

• From the Path to Modify drop-down menu, choose either File Search Path or File Record Path.

• From the Action drop-down menu, choose Set Path Clauses, Add Path Clauses, or Remove Path Clauses.

• In the Path Clauses text box, type in the paths to be added or removed.

Understudy Voice Over

Since you can use the Commands subcue to change the File Search Path, it is possible to have a setup cue that changes what version of a file will be used for a show without having to create duplicate Wild Tracks subcues with different file versions.

For example, if you had offstage voice-overs that were delivered by a principal character, and there were two understudies for that part, then you need to match the actor for the perfor- mance to the specific voice-over files. Since understudies often go in with short notice, it would be good to automate the selection so that a change was not missed in a voice over cue.

The simple way to do this is to put the voice over files for each actor in a separate directory. These directories need to be located on the Wild Tracks drives at the same level as the /wtrx- audio directory and not inside the wtrxaudio directory where you would typically put files.

For example, audio pertaining to voiceover for one principal and two understudies would require three directories, VO_Principal, VO_Understudy1, and VO_Understudy2.

So for the drive example in the preceding section on file search path, you would see a list of directories for the drive that would include:

• wtrxaudio

• VO_Principal

• VO_Understudy1

• VO_Understudy2

In each directory we put the voice over files for that actor. These might be named with the voice over number and the actors name. Perhaps VO1-Principal.wav, VO1-Understudy1.wav, and VO1-Understudy2.wav.

In order to make it possible to use the same Wild Tracks cue work for any of the actors we need to duplicate each of the actors files and use the same name for the duplicate. For our example we could name each of the duplicates VO1.wav. To do this, you can use the drag- and-drop method of creating a Wild Tracks subcue file entry without having to edit the file name.

For this process to work, add a file search path that includes the directory for the chosen actor. If Understudy1 is going on, we add a file search path to the VO_Understudy1 directory. This can be added as another entry to the path:

1. In the Adjust Wild Tracks Media Path command, set the Path to Modify to File Search Path.

2. Set the Action to Add Path Clauses.

3. For Path Clauses:, type /mnt/*/VO_Understudy1.

At the end of the system check-out cue list we could insert three cues that set the path for each of the three actors: Principal, Understudy1, and Understudy2. When you know which actor will be going on, the cue for that actor can be executed and the file search path will be set to use that actor's files for all voice overs.