Subject:Loop Tuner "stuck"

Posted by: Doug_Marshall

Date:8/4/2012 10:14:21 AM

Has anyone else found the loop tuner getting stuck with some .wav files, as in refusing to move the loop points more than one sample in either direction?

That's what's happening with a bunch of .wav files that were rendered in SpectraLayers. I wonder if there could be a problem on that end? My old looping software won't open these waves at all, for some reason. It insists they are an unsupported format. SF opens them fine, but the Loop Tuner is unhappy about half the time. Yikes!

Subject:RE: Loop Tuner "stuck"

Reply by: rraud

Date:8/4/2012 12:17:54 PM

If it's the demo version of Spectra Layers, it has weird save limitations which could be the problem. Otherwise I have no idea.

Subject:RE: Loop Tuner "stuck"

Reply by: Doug_Marshall

Date:8/4/2012 12:44:03 PM

It probably is SpectraLayers but, if so, it's the real thing and not the demo. :-(
FWIW, since my use of SF is sample oriented, I've encountered other oddities in its handling of MIDI metadata before, just not this particular one.

For the tasks I've been able to get SpectraThing to do, it seems to do them well. However, my auto looper won't open the .wav files it renders.

Subject:RE: Loop Tuner "stuck"

Reply by: ChristoC

Date:8/4/2012 5:00:33 PM

Doug
Can you upload a short one of these dud SpectraThing .wav files somewhere?
I have a whole bunch of tools to examine wav files, and can maybe find the cause.
Christo

Subject:RE: Loop Tuner "stuck"

Reply by: Doug_Marshall

Date:8/5/2012 1:42:25 PM

Hi Christo,

Here's a link to two files, an original 24-bit sample file and SpectraLayers rendering of the same file:

http://www.marshallandogletree.com/index.php?cID=148

Many thanks for your offer to look at them.

Doug

Subject:RE: Loop Tuner "stuck"

Reply by: ChristoC

Date:8/5/2012 5:24:01 PM

Thanks!
This is what I've found.
Three Pro applications will not recognize your SpectraLayers rendered file as a valid WAV. However so far I cannot find a reason why.
Those applications are
SSL Soundscape Editor V6.3
Celemony Melodyne Studio V3.2.2.2
Celemony Melodyne Editor V2.1.0

SoundForge9 & SoundForgePro10 both are able to edit the loop length with 'loop tuner' quite happily so far, not just 1 sample as you suggest.

Subject:RE: Loop Tuner "stuck"

Reply by: Doug_Marshall

Date:8/5/2012 5:40:35 PM

Wow, that's bizarre! I wonder what the heck it is? It sounds like a significant SNAFU.

I only experienced the Loop Tuner problem about half the time, actually, and I see that this particular file loops OK on my system as well.

"Yoohoo, S-O-N-Y!"

Subject:RE: Loop Tuner "stuck"

Reply by: ChristoC

Date:8/5/2012 5:58:58 PM

It is possible the files are WAVEFORMATEXTENSABLE format, which is a format hardly used … instead of “normal” WAVEFORMATEX format.

Subject:RE: Loop Tuner "stuck"

Reply by: MarkWWW

Date:8/6/2012 12:48:32 PM

Running these through RiffView shows:

for Original_File.wav:

RIFF 'WAVE' (wave file)
<fmt > (format description)
PCM format
2 channel
48000 frames per sec
288000 bytes per sec
6 bytes per frame
24 bits per sample
<data> (waveform data - 2748360 bytes)
<smpl> (sample parameters)


and for Spectral_Render.wav:

RIFF 'WAVE' (wave file)
<fmt > (format description)
Extensible (multi-channel) format
2 channel
48000 frames per sec
288000 bytes per sec
6 bytes per frame
24 bits per sample
24 active bits per sample
{00000001-0000-0010-8000-00aa00389b71} PCM format
<data> (waveform data - 2780160 bytes)



As you can see, the output from SR is in the "Extensible" format rather than the usual format for a WAV and this is probably what is causing the difficulty. It also is missing the "smpl" chunk which carries loopimg data, MIDI note data, etc, that was present in the original file. And as you say, it has a great lump of silence appended to the audio data.

Perhaps Sony can offer some explanation.

Mark

Subject:RE: Loop Tuner "stuck"

Reply by: Doug_Marshall

Date:8/7/2012 11:19:14 PM

Ah, a tragic revelation! Let's hope they will fix that quickly. Thanks so much for the info. The loss of the loop data isn't quite as surprising to me, given that the render is a "fresh" file, but it would be extremely helpful if there were some check boxes in the Render dialogue to allow these data to be passed to the file - as we have in Sound Forge.