-<h2>Positioning the Playhead</h2>
+<figure class="right">
+ <img src="/images/the-playhead.png" alt="The playhead">
+ <figcaption>
+ The playhead
+ </figcaption>
+</figure>
<p>
- The <dfn>playhead</dfn> is a vertical line with two arrows at each end
- that indicates the current position of playback.
+ The <dfn>playhead</dfn> is a red vertical line that indicates the current
+ position of playback.
</p>
+<h2>Positioning the Playhead</h2>
+
<h3>Positioning the playhead at the current pointer position</h3>
<p>
Pressing <kbd>P</kbd> will set the playhead to the current position of
- the pointer, if it is within the editor track area.
+ the mouse pointer, if it is within the editor track area.
</p>
<h3>Positioning the playhead on the timeline</h3>
<p>
- A <kbd class="mouse">Left</kbd> click anywhere on the timeline (rulers)
+ A <kbd class="mouse">Left</kbd> click anywhere on the <a href="@@ruler">Ruler</a>
will move the playhead to that position.
</p>
<h3>Positioning the playhead with the transport clocks</h3>
<p>
- Click on either the primary or secondary transport clock and
- <a href="@@editing-clocks">edit their value</a>
- to move the playhead to a specific position.
+ Clicking on either the primary or secondary transport clock and
+ <a href="@@editing-clocks">editing their value</a> moves the playhead to a
+ specific position.
</p>
<h3>Positioning the playhead at a marker</h3>
<p>
- Click <kbd class="mouse">Right</kbd> on the marker and select either
- <kbd class="menu">Locate to here</kbd> or <kbd class="menu">Play from
- here</kbd>.
+ <kbd class="mouse">Right</kbd> clicking on the marker and selecting either
+ <kbd class="menu">Locate to Here</kbd> or <kbd class="menu">Play from
+ Here</kbd> will place the playhead at the marker's position.
</p>
<p>
- Alternatively, place the pointer on the marker and press
- <kbd>P</kbd> to set the playhead.
+ Alternatively, placing the mouse pointer on the marker and pressing
+ <kbd>P</kbd> sets the playhead precisely on the marker location.
</p>
<h2>Looping the Transport</h2>
<p>
- When the <dfn>loop transport</dfn> button is pressed, the playhead will
- jump the start of the loop range, and continue to the end of that range
- before returning to the start and repeating.
- While looping, a light green area is displayed in the time ruler over
- the tracks to show the loop range.
+ When the <a href="@@the-loop-range">loop transport</a> button is pressed, the
+ playhead will jump the start of the loop range, and continue to the end of that
+ range before returning to the start and repeating.
</p>
<p>
- By default, looping is bound to the <kbd>l</kbd> key.
+ While looping, a light green area is displayed in the Ruler over the tracks to
+ show the loop range.
</p>
<p>
- For more information on defining and altering the loop range see
- <a href="@@the-loop-range">Loop Range Markers</a>.
+ By default, looping is bound to the <kbd>l</kbd> key.
</p>
-
recorders have the same feature, but may impart some
<a
href="@@latency-and-latency-compensation"><dfn>latency</dfn></a>
- (delay) between the time you make a noise and the time that you hear it
+ (delay) between the time a noise is made and the time that it will
come back from the recorder.
</p>
<p>
can have approximately 3 ms of latency, due to the time the sound
takes to travel from the instrument to the musician's ears. Latency below
5 ms should be suitable for a professional recording setup. Because
- 2 ms are already used in the A/D/A process, you must use extremely low
- <dfn>buffer sizes</dfn>
in your workstation <abbr title="Input/Output">I/O</abbr>
+ 2 ms are already used in the A/D/A process, extremely low
+ <dfn>buffer sizes</dfn>
must be used in the workstation <abbr title="Input/Output">I/O</abbr>
setup to keep the overall latency below 5ms. Not all
<a href="@@the-right-computer-system-for-digital-audio">computer audio systems</a>
are able to work reliably at such low buffer sizes.
through an external mixing console while recording, an approach taken by
most if not all professional recording studios. Many computer I/O devices
have a hardware mixer built in which can route the monitor signal "around"
- the computer, avoiding the systemlatency.<br>
- In either case, the monitoring hardware may be digital or analog. And in
- the digital case you will still have the A-D-A conversion latency of
+ the computer, avoiding the system latency.
+</p>
+<p>
+ In either case, the monitoring hardware may be digital or analog. And in
+ the digital case there will still be the A-D-A conversion latency of
1–2 ms.
</p>
<p>Ardour has three main settings which affect how
monitoring is performed. The first is
<kbd class="menu">Edit > Preferences > Audio >
- Record monitoring handled by</kbd>. There are two or three
- options here, depending on the capabilities of your hardware.
+ Record monitoring handled by</kbd>. There are two or three
+ options here, depending on the capabilities of the hardware.
</p>
<p> The other two settings are more complex. One is
<kbd class="menu">Tape machine mode</kbd>, found in the
</p>
<p>
Monitoring also depends on the state of the track's record-enable button,
-the session record-enable button, and on whether or not the transport is
-rolling.
+ the session record-enable button, and on whether or not the transport is
+ rolling.
</p>
<h3>Software or Hardware Monitoring Modes</h3>
<p>
-If Ardour is set to <dfn>external monitoring</dfn>, the explanation of
-Ardour's monitoring behaviour is simple: it does not do any.
+ If Ardour is set to <dfn>external monitoring</dfn>, Ardour does not do any
+ monitoring.
</p>
<h2>Monitoring in Non-Tape-Machine Mode</h2>
<p>
- When <dfn>Tape-Machine mode is off</dfn>, and a track is armed,
- Ardour <em>always</em> monitors the live input, except in one case:
- the transport is rolling, the session is not recording, and
- <dfn>auto-input</dfn>
- is active. In this case only, you will hear playback from an armed track.
+ When <dfn>Tape-Machine mode is off</dfn>, and a track is armed, Ardour
+ <em>always</em> monitors the live input, except in one case: if the transport is
+ rolling, the session is not recording, and <dfn>auto-input</dfn> is active,
+ the playback from an armed track will be heard.
</p>
<p>
Unarmed tracks will play back their contents from disc, unless the
<h2>Monitoring in Tape-Machine Mode</h2>
<p>
- In <dfn>Tape-Machine mode</dfn>, things are slightly simpler: when a
- track is armed, its behaviour is the same as in non-tape-machine mode.
+ In <dfn>Tape-Machine mode</dfn>, when a track is armed, its behaviour is
+ the same as in non-tape-machine mode.
</p>
<p>
Unarmed tracks however will always just play back their contents from
disk; the live input will never be monitored.
</p>
-
<p>
- When recording, it is important that performers hear themselves, and to
- hear any pre-recorded tracks they are performing with.
- Audio recorders typically let you <dfn>monitor</dfn> (i.e. listen to)
+ When recording, it is important that performers hear themselves, and any
+ pre-recorded tracks they are performing with.
+</p>
+<p>
+ Audio recorders typically allow <dfn>monitoring</dfn> (i.e. listening to)
the input signal of all tracks that are armed for recording, and playing
back the unarmed tracks.
</p>
-
+++ /dev/null
-
-<p>
- The <dfn>Recording mode</dfn> is a per-track property (applies to audio
- tracks only) that affects the way that recording new material on top of
- existing material ("overdubbing") operates <em>in that track</em>.
-</p>
-<p>
- See <a href="@@track-types#trackmodes">Track modes</a>
- for a detailed explanation.
-</p>
-
<tr><th>Toggle Record</th><td>Global switch button to activate/deactivate recording.
While active, the button blinks red. The button doesn't start recording by
itself: if one or more tracks are marked as record-enabled, pressing the
- "Play from Playhead" starts recording on those tracks. See
- <a href="@@record-setup">Recording</a>.</td></tr>
+ "Play from Playhead" starts recording on those tracks.</td></tr>
</table>
<p class="note">
<p>
Ardour has many available commands for playback control that can be bound
- to keys. Many of them have default bindings, some do not, so the list below
- shows both the default bindings and internal command names.
+ to keys. Many of them have <a href="@@keyboard-and-mouse-shortcuts">default
+ bindings</a>, Some of the most used are found below.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+ Those keybindings are shown in the corresponding menus. Memorizing at least
+ the most frequently used can be a great time saver.
</p>
<table class="dl">
<tr><th><kbd>End</kbd></th>
<td>Move playhead to session end marker</td></tr>
<tr><th><kbd>→</kbd></th>
- <td></td></tr>
+ <td>Playhead to Next Grid</td></tr>
<tr><th><kbd>←</kbd></th>
- <td></td></tr>
+ <td>Playhead to Previous Grid</td></tr>
<tr><th><kbd>0</kbd></th>
<td>Move playhead to start of the timeline</td></tr>
+ <tr><th><kbd class="mod3">space</kbd></th>
+ <td>Start recording</td></tr>
+ <tr><th><kbd class="mod1">space</kbd></th>
+ <td>Stop and forget capture</td></tr>
</table>
-
-<p>Commands without default bindings include:</p>
-
-<p class="fixme">Add content</p>
-
part: subchapter
---
----
-title: Record Setup
-include: record-setup.html
-link: record-setup
-part: chapter
----
-
----
-title: Track Recording Modes
-include: track-recording-modes.html
-link: track-recording-modes
-uri: recording/track-recording-modes
-part: subchapter
----
-
---
title: Audio Recording
include: audio-recording.html
projects / ardour-manual / commitdiff
