Audio, Mixer and Audio timeline

The Audio workspace puts the Mixer on the left, the Audio panel on the right and the Audio timeline across the bottom. All three show the active composition.

Audio panel

The Audio panel has three sections down a column.

Levels

Two bars meter the composition’s output, left and right. Each draws its loudness, its peak behind it, and a hold line that rests on the loudest peak for 3 seconds. The number beside a bar is its peak in dB.

The Clip lamp lights when the limiter has held the mix back. Clicking it puts it out.

Beats

The Beats section places a beat marker on each beat it finds.

Source: This comp listens to the composition’s mix. The list also names each layer that makes a sound.
Sensitivity: from 0 to 100, 50 by default. Higher finds more beats.
Range: Whole comp, or Work area for only the beats inside the work area.
Min spacing: a beat closer than this to a louder one is dropped, in milliseconds. 120 by default; 0 keeps every beat.
BPM: the tempo the beats are snapped to. At 0 the detection estimates it and the well reads Auto; any other value reads Grid on. After a run the well shows the tempo used.
Tap: each press is a beat. The tempo is the median gap of the last nine presses, held between 30 and 300 BPM. A pause of two seconds starts the count again.
‹ and ›: move the markers the next run places 10 ms earlier or later. The total shows beside them.
Generate beat markers: replaces the composition’s beat markers with a new set.
Clear generated: removes the beat markers and keeps the ones placed by hand.

The status line says how many markers were placed, and the tempo when there is one. A run with nothing sounding in the source is refused, and the status line says so.

Selected layer

The section shows the first selected layer, by name.

Volume: from −60 to +12 dB, with a stopwatch.
Pan: from −100 (left) to 100 (right), with a stopwatch, a dial and a readout of C, L or R.
Fade in and Fade out: the length of the fade at each end, in seconds, and its shape: Ease, Lin or Exp. A fade is two Volume keyframes. A length of 0 removes it.
Drive with audio…: lists the free number parameters on the layer’s effects. Picking one wires Audio level, Remap and Smooth into it, in the node graph, as one undo step.
Lower behind…: lists the composition’s other layers. Picking one wires the same chain, turned upside down, into this layer’s Volume, so the picked layer’s sound lowers this one by up to 18 dB.

Drive with audio… with no free parameter says No free number parameters on this layer’s effects. Lower behind… with no other layer says No other layer to lower this one behind. A chain the layer refuses says The audio chain could not be built on this layer.

A layer with no sound reads This layer makes no sound. and keeps only the two buttons.

Mixer

The Mixer has a strip for each layer of the composition that makes a sound, in layer order, and a Master strip at the right. Pressing anywhere on a strip selects its layer. With no layer that makes a sound the panel says so. The mouse wheel scrolls the strips sideways.

Each layer strip carries, top to bottom:

Part	What it does
Name	Underlined in the layer’s label colour.
FX chip	The number of audio effects switched on in the layer’s stack.
Pan dial	Drag up or down to pan. Double-click centres it. Its tooltip reads C, L or R.
Fader	Drag up or down to set Volume. Double-click returns it to 0 dB.
Meters	Left and right, on the fader’s scale.
dB well	The fader’s value.
Mute, S	The layer’s audible and solo switches.

The fader’s scale runs from silence at the bottom to +6 dB at the top, with 0 dB three quarters of the way up. Values up to +12 dB are typed in the Audio panel. A fader or dial on an animated Volume or Pan sets the keyframe at the playhead.

The Master strip’s fader sets the gain of the whole mix. Its LIM lamp lights when the limiter has held the mix back, and clicking it puts it out.

Audio timeline

The Audio timeline lists the layers of the composition that make a sound, as tracks, over the same time as the Timeline. It keeps its own zoom, scroll and twirls.

The outline’s columns are #, Track and Lane. Each track carries mute, solo and effects switches, a twirl, its number, its label colour and its name.

The twirl opens the track’s Volume row and its Effects.
Search tracks lists only the tracks whose names contain what is typed.
Enter renames the selected track while the panel is active.
The Lane chip switches the track’s lane between Wave and Spectral.
Drag the lower edge of a track to make it two to eight rows tall. Double-click the edge to put it back to two.
Right-click the empty ground under the tracks for Insert audio layer, an empty track above the selected one, or at the bottom.

A layer with a picture as well as sound is drawn faded and cannot be worked on here. Its Detach audio button moves its sound to an Audio layer of its own and mutes the original, which leaves the list.

Clips

An Audio layer is a track of one clip until the first edit on it turns it into a Sequence layer of clips. Clicking a clip selects it and its track. The body of a clip drags it along its track or to another, and either edge trims it.

With the pointer on a track, each clip shows a handle at its top corners. Dragging one sets the length of the fade at that end, and dragging it back to the corner removes the fade.

Right-click a clip:

Command	What it does
Fade in ▸, Fade out ▸	Sets the shape of the fade: Linear, Fast, Slow, Smooth or Sharp.
Split at playhead	Cuts the clip at the playhead.
Audio streams ▸, Split audio streams, Merge audio streams	As on a layer, when the clip’s file has more than one audio stream.
Delete clip	Removes the clip and leaves a gap.

Right-click a fade, or an overlap between two clips, for the same five shapes and Custom…, which opens the Fade shape editor. A shape picked on an overlap goes on both sides of it.

Right-click a keyframe for Linear, Easy ease, Hold, Copy ease, Paste ease and Delete key.

Delete removes the selected keyframes, or the selected clip when no keyframe is selected.