User manual

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The Sample Editor
If you select the Advanced menu item, a dialog opens
where you can manually adjust the three parameters that
govern the sound quality of the time-stretching:
6. If you are satisfied with the result, i.e. the vertical lines
match bars and beats positions, close the Sample Editor
and activate playback.
If your audio file contained an upbeat and you resized the audio event to
a smooth loop with the event handles, you might want to move the audio
event to the beginning of the project:
The loop will now automatically adjust to the project
tempo, and follow any further tempo changes you make! In
the Project window, the audio event will have a note sym-
bol and two arrows in the upper right corner. The note
symbol indicates Straighten Up mode and the arrow indi-
cates that the file is stretched.
About the Straighten Up mode
The Straighten Up mode is one of the key audio warp fea-
tures. It allows you to lock audio clips to the project tempo
by using realtime time-stretching. This is very useful if you
want to use loops in your project and do not want to worry
too much about timing.
Straighten Up mode is automatically activated if the Pre-
view button on the Definition tab is activated and the
tempo of the audio file or loop has been specified either
automatically by clicking the Auto Adjust button or manu-
ally by using the Manual Adjust tool.
When this mode is activated, audio events will adapt to
any tempo changes in Cubase, just like MIDI events. How-
ever, using Straighten Up function should not be confused
with quantizing: the timing, i.e. the rhythmic feeling will be
maintained.
The Straighten Up mode in the Playback tab is automatically activated,
when the audio tempo (time positions) is specified and the internal au-
dio quantization (musical positions) has been defined.
It is also possible to activate/deactivate Straighten Up
mode from within the Pool by clicking the respective
checkbox in the Straighten Up column.
Parameter Description
Grainsize The realtime time-stretching algorithm splits the audio into
small pieces called “grains”. This parameter determines the
size of the grains. For material with many transients you
should use low Grainsize values for best results.
Overlap Overlap is the percentage of the whole grain that will over-
lap with other grains. Use higher values for material with a
stable sound character.
Variance Variance is also a percentage of the whole length of the
grains and sets a variation in positioning so that the overlap-
ping area will sound smooth. A Variance setting of 0 will
produce a sound akin to time-stretching used in early sam-
plers, whereas higher settings will produce more (rhythmic)
“smearing” effects but less audio artefacts.