Any good Wavelab tips?

[Luke]

So after not finding RX upgrades significant enough (still on 9 here) and after deciding that the layout for Acorn's Acustica can be a little too busy to glean information when moving quickly, I decided to demo Wavelab Essential. I'm currently cutting down a Theme into Stinger/bumpers and cut-downs, so I want to double-check my work outside the DAW and glean things like timing quickly. So far so good with Wavelab.

But now I'm wondering if any of you power users might have some tips to get me going quickly. This is definitely for utility work and I don't want to disappear into the manual just yet...

All tips welcome, thanks!

[Guy Rowland]

I've had Elements for years and never really clicked with it tbh, so useless for tips. Just wondering what specifically you'd like it to do?

I've had better luck with Acon's Acoustica for general mastering / tidying chores.

[Luke]

I was going back and forth between Acustica and Wavelab on these files and I've got to say that Acustica ain't all that bad after all. It still feels a bit like "PC" software to me, but Wavelab has that feel even more.

I was looking for quick ways of zooming around the file via key commands, setting regions/markers, selecting the material between markers, multi-track editing (big one, this), processing via plugins, etc. Wavelab might be slightly more intuitive than Acustica, but it's basically a coin toss. I guess I'm after whatever the fastest, least mouse-intensive workflow is.

Thanks for chiming in, Guy. I'll keep testing it out for the next 60 days. Already own Acustica so nothing to lose.

[Guy Rowland]

I'm hoping you might end up educating us (or me, anyway). On paper, Wavelab is your guy. It just makes me cross - you can do everything but nothing is intuitive, simple things turn out to be complex. But I have always known that if I just stuck with it for a while I may well adjust (as happens so often).

[wst3]

I was a staunch, far too loyal Sound Forge user for way longer than was healthy. It just worked so well in a Windows environment, and it did everything I ever asked it to do.

I did purchase a license for a much earlier version of Wavelab out of curiousity. And it just didn't work for me. To the point where I didn't bother keeping it up to date for years. In fact I don't think I reinstalled it during my previous hardware rebuild.

Then Sound Forge went toes- up... Sony did a mediocre job of maintaining it, waiting too dang long to update it for 64 bit operating systems. And Magix has been no better.

How loyal was I? I actually upgraded to the first Magix release. Gl;ad it was pretty cheap!

In the meantime I did upgrade to a current version of Wavelab, and I've been keeping it up to date since.

I probably use less than 25% of its capabilities. It is a DEEP program, designed for pretty much anyone that does any audio work. I just don't do a lot of those tasks regularly.

So, you asked for tips.

First, throw away everything you know about audio editors (SF, RX, etc). Wavelab works differently. Not sure I agree with all their design choices, but one does acclimate<G>.

Learn the Audio Montage tool first. Then learn how to jump back and forth, and back again between Audio Montage and the editor. The Audio Montage is a really powerful sound design tool. It is also pretty handy for sequencing a CD release (what's a CD?)

Once you are comfortable with all of that spend some time rendering through the master section - it is actually quite useful, although it took some time for me to accept that.

If you have specific questions fire away.

As Guy points out, it is powerful, and about the opposite of intuitive!

Pity!!

[Jaap]

It is awesome for editing and using it daily here, but as many pointed out already, it's not really the most intuitive. I use my stream deck for most editing functions so that I never have to remember again where in the *heavily censored" name I have to look.

[Guy Rowland]

This thread has forced me to go back and familiarise myself (I'm on Elements 12). I think I probably could get used to it. I really like clip fx - don't think I have anything else that can do that.

Elements 13 doesn't seem to have much that's useful and new except clip gain pre and post fx. That's really handy - is it £20 upgrade worth of handy I wonder?