Can I slow down playback of an audio clip to identify/mark edit points?

[TH]

Can I slow down playback of an audio clip to identify/mark exact locations to edit without processing the clip.  I'm just diving into CW to edit old clips captured from tape - so I clearly need advice on best practices here. I need to locate specific spots in the clip to edit. It's easy when I edit video, where I simply scrub the video to an exact frame spot to mark edit points - but when I try to scrub audio clips in CW, I don't have the skill manually scrub audio content and hear a spot since the scrub speed is too variable - especially when there are no visible transients on the clip waveform to estimate the edit point.  So my hope was to sloooow down the playback (without processing / stretching the clip) to make it easier to follow the audio by ear (and sight) - so I can follow tempo and then mark exact points where audio events/elements happen.

Just to clarify my use case (based on feedback from another forum) My clips often have variable tempos and may also contain a mix of music and other audio elements - so mapping tempos and using snap is not an option. Also transients are often impossible to visually spot - so visually marking locations in the clip based on a waveform is not possible. Hence my need to slow the audio playback down so I can hear the exact location where I want to make an edit.

Edited June 4, 2023 by TH
clarification

[OutrageProductions]

Without processing the clip or applying <Groove Clip> looping and changing tempo, solutions are few.

You could try this; 

[From the manual]

Scrub tool

The Scrub tool lets you audition all displayed tracks as you drag the mouse cursor forward or backward at the desired speed. You can scrub a single track by dragging over the track, or all displayed tracks by dragging in the Time Ruler.

Note: The Scrub tool does not work on automation.

To scrub a single track Hold down the J key to temporarily enable Scrub mode and drag over the track.

To scrub all displayed tracks Hold down the J key to temporarily enable Scrub mode and drag in the Time Ruler.

Note: The Scrub tool is invoked by pressing the J key. There is no Scrub tool button in the Control Bar or Tools HUD.

Just like we've done with tape machines since the beginning of time.

Edited June 4, 2023 by OutrageProductions

[TH]

Right! I figured there wasn't a good option.  Per my post "but when I try to scrub audio clips in CW, I don't have the skill manually scrub audio content and hear a spot since the speed i scrub is too variable" - meaning I drag the cursor (pressing J) and it either plays back at the normal speed (when I drag fast) or the playback is too slow and elements are unrecognisable when I slowly click/drag.  Also, when I scrub a few times - the audio drops out completely at random times. Perhaps that's a bug.  Thanks again for the input. 

[John Vere]

Reading this I wonder if a wave editor would be a better tool for the job. There’s lots of Wave editors and a few free ones. Wave lab is what I use and I think they have a demo version you could try. Gold Wave and Audacity are free Sound Forge is very good too and they also have a demo. 

[TH]

57 minutes ago, John Vere said:

Reading this I wonder if a wave editor would be a better tool for the job. There’s lots of Wave editors and a few free ones. Wave lab is what I use and I think they have a demo version you could try. Gold Wave and Audacity are free Sound Forge is very good too and they also have a demo. 

Great suggestions. Thanks!

[John Vere]

There’s also a way to use tool copy to open an audio clip in a wave editor directly from Cakewalk.  

 

Edited June 4, 2023 by John Vere
Add link

[mettelus]

3 hours ago, TH said:

Also transients are often impossible to visually spot - so visually marking locations in the clip based on a waveform is not possible.

+1 to the wave editor. It is a bit unclear what you are trying to do and why transients are so hard to spot. For long tape pulls I have done, a wave editor trumps a DAW for a few reasons. I will often normalize the entire track to -3dB (note this will also bump up the noise floor) and do a noise reduction pass (destructive edit... be sure to keep the original file intact just in case). That should make transients much more obvious, but also allows wave editors that are script capable (e.g., Adobe Audition or similar) to be set to volume thresholds (with lead/lag times included) to do any combination of splits, silence removal (dead track), and even save split clips as their own files. I pulled a friend's TD-9 kit years ago and it took me 10 times longer to rename the samples than for Audition to chum up the track (there is some trial and error with running such scripts to be sure it is delivering what you actually want out of it... take any pre-coded scripts with a grain of salt).

[TH]

1 hour ago, mettelus said:

+1 to the wave editor. It is a bit unclear what you are trying to do and why transients are so hard to spot.

Wave editor seems like the best approach. The reason transients are hard to spot because some of the material is a mix of sounds, noise, music, speech, and all kinds of other clutter that makes for a very messy clip.

[John Vere]

https://www.steinberg.net/promotion/
 

This is a heck of a good deal for Wave Lab Elements that’s the version I’ve always used. Solid as a rock for over 20 years for me. And once installed it never asks me anything about updating. I’m still on version 7 and I’m going to upgrade which is only $36 sort of a no brainer for software I definitely need and use almost daily. 
My workflow is 10x faster than if I use Cakewalk or anything else because it’s just a better design for working with audio files. 
 

[Jeremy Oakes]

21 hours ago, JohnnyV said:

https://www.steinberg.net/promotion/
 

This is a heck of a good deal for Wave Lab Elements that’s the version I’ve always used. Solid as a rock for over 20 years for me. And once installed it never asks me anything about updating. I’m still on version 7 and I’m going to upgrade which is only $36 sort of a no brainer for software I definitely need and use almost daily. 
My workflow is 10x faster than if I use Cakewalk or anything else because it’s just a better design for working with audio files. 
 

I use Goldwave, i also have Soundforge, but don.t forget, everyone has their own preference…..

J.

[57Gregy]

On 6/4/2023 at 3:19 PM, TH said:

Can I slow down playback of an audio clip to identify/mark exact locations to edit without processing the clip.  I'm just diving into CW to edit old clips captured from tape - so I clearly need advice on best practices here. I need to locate specific spots in the clip to edit. It's easy when I edit video, where I simply scrub the video to an exact frame spot to mark edit points - but when I try to scrub audio clips in CW, I don't have the skill manually scrub audio content and hear a spot since the scrub speed is too variable - especially when there are no visible transients on the clip waveform to estimate the edit point.  So my hope was to sloooow down the playback (without processing / stretching the clip) to make it easier to follow the audio by ear (and sight) - so I can follow tempo and then mark exact points where audio events/elements happen.

Just to clarify my use case (based on feedback from another forum) My clips often have variable tempos and may also contain a mix of music and other audio elements - so mapping tempos and using snap is not an option. Also transients are often impossible to visually spot - so visually marking locations in the clip based on a waveform is not possible. Hence my need to slow the audio playback down so I can hear the exact location where I want to make an edit.

I just did it using Process>Length.
I imported an audio clip, Lengthened it 200%, Zoomed way in, added a Clip Gain envelope to lower the volume in a few places, Bounced to Track, then did Process>Length to 50% and it worked.
Your ears are undoubtedly better than mine, but I didn't hear any artifacts once I was finished.