Time Signature Marker Chaos

staticmaker · 05-19-2018, 08:05 PM

I'm losing my mind. This isn't the first time I've had this problem (not with my mind but with REAPER).

This has to do with regions, within a song, with different time signature markers, and being moved around within the song and then being placed in song order only to find out the markers caused different regions to go horribly out of time and tempo.

It goes like this...
I initially created a region and placed a marker at the beg of it (120bpm 6/8 time). Then recorded guitars on a bunch of tracks. Then I made another connected region after that one and recorded the next part.
NOW I added another region after that one and made the time 16/8. I recorded the parts no problem.

Now, Along the way there may have been some intentional moving and arrangement testing of regions....I may have created one region far past the end of the song to create a new song part and then move it to within the song (maybe between two of the other regions with different time sigs) and anyone who has done this knows that REAPER needlessly leaves copies of those damn markers all over the place.

The problem was noticed after I went back to the 2nd section and listened. Two of the tracks are different tempo and badly out of time, and then I even noticed that the actual region has been resized and no longer able to match up with the end of the music in order to make a seamless change into the next region that it initially connected to. It seems that some attributes of ONE ts-marker, mysteriously get merged into another region (andit's TS-marker attributes) .

It's like REAPER gets soooo confused with an added time sig marker that it just utterly mangles the structure .... and there is NO repairing this. All I can do is start over and not use those particular time sigs and make sure that the structure is built perfectly the first time. This means no experimenting and moving/copying regions to dif locations for song building.

When I try to go back and fix things, it just gets worse and worse...... I've been using REAPER for maybe more than 10 years and every time this issue came up I just attributed it to something I needed to learn. Well... I'm learning that it may be a problem with REAPER. I love REAPER and I want to find out how to remedy this issue.
Please correct me if I am wrong. I found some online info today saying that this is simply a problem that the REAPER guys have never solved. I am using v4.32 so maybe this is fixed in the updates?

Here is an MP3 of the mangling that has occurred. https://soundcloud.com/prosoundprodu...er-glitch-demo

Man if anyone can shed some light on this, please email me or even call me. All my info is here under my account. Or go to my FB page.
thanks
https://www.facebook.com/rand.burkey.7

foxAsteria · 05-20-2018, 01:09 PM

timebase is a bitch... you'll need to read up on that. go to project preferences to change it on the project level. it can be changed on the project level, track level and item level, so it can get confusing fast.

from the reaper help: "The project timebase controls how media items, track envelopes, and project markers behave when the project tempo changes.

Timebase beats (position, length, rate):
Project elements will keep their position and length constant as measured in beats. Media item playback rate will speed up if the tempo is increased, or slow down if the tempo is decreased. This is the default project timebase.

Timebase beats (position only):
Project elements will keep their position constant as measured in beats, but media item length will remain constant as measured in seconds.

Timebase time:
Project elements will keep their position and length constant as measured in seconds. Positions and media item length will change as measured in beats, if the tempo is changed. This was the default project timebase prior to REAPER version 4.25.

Tempo and time signature change markers have timebase beats by default, regardless of the project timebase. This behavior can also be changed in File/Project Settings.

The timebase for individual tracks and media items can be set independently of the project timebase. MIDI media items always have timebase beats (position, length, rate). The timebase for individual MIDI media items can be locked to a specific tempo regardless of the project tempo, in the media item source properties."

staticmaker · 06-25-2018, 07:13 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by foxAsteria

timebase is a bitch... you'll need to read up on that. go to project preferences to change it on the project level. it can be changed on the project level, track level and item level, so it can get confusing fast.

from the reaper help: "The project timebase controls how media items, track envelopes, and project markers behave when the project tempo changes.

Timebase beats (position, length, rate):
Project elements will keep their position and length constant as measured in beats. Media item playback rate will speed up if the tempo is increased, or slow down if the tempo is decreased. This is the default project timebase.

Timebase beats (position only):
Project elements will keep their position constant as measured in beats, but media item length will remain constant as measured in seconds.

Timebase time:
Project elements will keep their position and length constant as measured in seconds. Positions and media item length will change as measured in beats, if the tempo is changed. This was the default project timebase prior to REAPER version 4.25.

Tempo and time signature change markers have timebase beats by default, regardless of the project timebase. This behavior can also be changed in File/Project Settings.

The timebase for individual tracks and media items can be set independently of the project timebase. MIDI media items always have timebase beats (position, length, rate). The timebase for individual MIDI media items can be locked to a specific tempo regardless of the project tempo, in the media item source properties."

Thanks for your help. So then..... if the time sig marker follows beats regardless of my choice/setting (sec's or beats), then that option is out. lol.
Right now I"m working in 4/4 songs but soon i"ll be back to crazy cool t-sig's and i"ll revisit this conundrum.

FnA · 06-25-2018, 09:09 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by staticmaker

...I am using v4.32 so maybe this is fixed in the updates?
...

No one can help you with that version. There's been big improvements since then. I would say the minefield is not entirely clear, but there's a lot less of them.

foxAsteria · 06-25-2018, 09:31 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by staticmaker

Thanks for your help. So then..... if the time sig marker follows beats regardless of my choice/setting (sec's or beats), then that option is out. lol.

You can still change it, it's just a separate option in project settings.

FnA · 06-25-2018, 10:37 PM

Yo. Listening to Unquestionable Presence. On cassette.

Best of luck. Seriously, there was a lot of work done on regions in v5 cycle. I guess v6 should make alpha appearance soon. Time sig behavior changed too, around time of initial v5 releases. So it is kind of hard for the discussion/advice to go well if you have the old version I think.