(Pro Tools demo report continued) screen or use a rather primitive MIDI fader box - far from satisfactory. Long in the making, Digidesign finally brought out a fully operational version of their hardware interface in 1997. Called ProControl it looks much like a modern digital mixer with faders, a display, illuminated buttons and ajog wheel. ProControl allows all editing and mixing functions to be controlled in a more traditional way. It is, though, just a control surface, with all the digital and analogue audio electronics being contained in a range of rackmount hardware, ideally safely out of the way in a machine room somewhere. New Standard Post, in California, are even prepping and mixing mainstream features entirely in Pro Tools from the editing and tracklaying right through the dub to the final mix using four sets of 32-channel Pro-Controls. All sound and picture is stored on a vast central server (a single set of hard disks) which can be accessed simultaneously by any number of editors, limited only by the speed of the server which currently allows up to nine users. The idea is that everything gets recorded only once; avoiding lots of transfers and re-recording. One facility that Version 5 is still without is multiple levels of undo (it only has one level). The problem. say Digidesign, is that with such a complex multi-faceted system, it’s hard to know how to apply the undo: which bit of what you just did do you want to undo? To put in a full facility with a menu, etc, running in realtime, would apparently slow the system down considerably. There are third-party software add-ons that will execute progressive saves in the background, so you can always go back to ‘n’ minutes ago - depending on how often you have it set to save. You would then end up with a history of your project’s progress in the form of perhaps hundreds of saves by the end of a project - a nice security blanket but no replacement for undo. Apparently Digidesign is to address the issue very soon. A New Tool For A New JobI’ve always been put off by the apparent fiddliness of Pro Tools as compared to most dedicated systems; there always seems to be so much information on the screen at once and so many screens to lose yourself in. ProControl and Version 5 has done a lot to address this, but even so for cutting and pasting and roughly levelling out, I still think my Akai DD1500 is hard to beat. For many jobs the rest can be done by any one of the many excellent stand-alone digital (or digitally controlled) mixers on the market. As the sound editor/mixer’s job gets more complex, however, a simple cut and paste system appears increasingly limiting and the scope of something like Pro Tools becomes more meaningful. With the arrival of inexpensive ADSL (fast Internet connections), we’re likely to see increasing use of the net for audio and video file transfer. Computers are well set up for that. | There is also a vast array of third-party programs that can be brought into play once your audio is in the system. File format, sample rate and bit depth are all less of a problem with such an array of tools at your disposal, and these factors are even more important for anyone working on projects for CD-ROM, DVD or the Web - and that could be a lot of us as time goes on. Also, as newer, faster computers come to market, your system can benefit from increased performance with minimum outlay and inconvenience. And if you are indeed sending a project down the line for a colleague to work on (possibly on the other side of the world), it would be very convenient to be able to send the sound, picture and all the mixing, effects and processing that goes with them as one integrated package. Equally, the same data could be put to a single Data DAT or DLT and courier’ed to its destination. This is truly ‘total recall’. Clearly there are other computer-based systems out there that also offer a great deal, often for less money, but none I’m aware of offers the same compatibility with Avid or the same level of sophistication and inclusiveness as Pro Tools. I say all this as one always deeply suspicious and resistant to non-dedicated systems. My Mac manages to act up at least once a fortnight and I don’t know a serious/honest computer user who wouldn’t say the same. To a large extent this could be because I’m forever updating this or that and using it for many different applications. If you were a serious Pro Tools user, we were told, you’d be careful to avoid the use of the system for non-Pro Tools applications (or at least use a separate system disk). With a system like this, the already vitally important need for efficient and reliable archiving becomes life-or-death. That central server is very big basket piled high with every single one of your precious audio eggs; and if you’re opening yourself to the Internet and the world of viruses... Shortly after this discussion, the demo system crashed. This, we were told was because a prohibited combination of keys had been pressed which was really asking for trouble. Hmm. The advantages of Pro Tools are many but, as with any computer system, you’d want to get in the habit of pressing that Save button on a regular basis. In balance, though, it does seem to have a lot going for it. JIM BETTERIDGE |
