Steinberg Cubase SE 3 Operation Manual

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Working with hitpoints and slices 17 – 311
Editing hitpoints
In this section, we go back a bit and look at what can be done with hit-
points in the Sample Editor. There are two ways to invoke the hitpoint 
calculation:
• Select Calculate Hitpoints from the Hitpoints submenu on the Audio menu.
• Select the Hitpoint Edit tool from the toolbar or Quick menu.
The last method will calculate hitpoints if they haven’t already been calculated.
As outlined in the previous section, this makes the program calculate 
(or detect) hitpoints in the audio event, and you can use the Sensitivity 
slider to change how many hitpoints are shown. 
For some loops, this may be all that is needed to set the hitpoints so 
that each slice to be created will contain a single “hit” or sound. How-
ever there will almost certainly be cases when the automatic calcula-
tion may add a hitpoint where there shouldn’t be one, and fail to add a 
hitpoint where one is needed, even if the Sensitivity slider is set to 
maximum. If there are too many or too few hitpoints in a loop, it will 
most probably not play back properly.
When this occurs, you have to edit the hitpoints manually in the Sam-
ple Editor.
Auditioning slices
A slice is a section of the waveform, from one hitpoint to the next. 
The first thing you should do before editing hitpoints is to listen to 
each slice in the Sample Editor, to determine what they contain. The 
aim is basically to avoid “double hits”, like a snare hit being followed 
by a hi-hat hit within the same slice. You also want to determine 
whether any hitpoints have been added that should be removed:   
						

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1.Open a loop in the Sample Editor.
If you have already created slices you can open them in the Sample Editor by double 
clicking any event in the Audio Part Editor. If it is a new loop, follow the instructions in 
the tutorial.
2.Select the Hitpoint Edit tool.
When you point in the waveform display the pointer changes to a speaker icon.
3.Now you can simply point and click in any slice area and the corre-
sponding slice will be played back, from the beginning to the end.
Listen for “double hits” and slices that contain parts of a single sound. 
If you find hitpoints that need to be removed or instances where a hit-
point needs to be added, the first thing to try is to change the sensitiv-
ity setting – see the following section.
Setting the sensitivity
The loop is first analyzed to determine where hitpoints should appear 
(where the individual “beats” in the loop are), then you manually set the 
sensitivity with the Sensitivity slider to determine how many hitpoints 
there should be.
•Try raising the sensitivity to add “missing” hitpoints, and lowering it to 
remove unwanted hitpoints.
This may or may not work, depending on the situation, but as a general rule you should 
try this first.
•Audition the slices again to determine if changing the sensitivity has 
improved matters.  
						

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The “Use” pop-up menu
The “Use” pop-up menu on the toolbar affects which hitpoints are 
shown and is a useful tool for removing unwanted hitpoints. The op-
tions on the pop-up menu are:
How many slices do I need?
If your main reason for slicing the loop is to change the tempo, you 
generally need as many slices as you can get, but never more than 
one per individual “hit” in the loop.
Option Description
All All hitpoints are shown (taking the Sensitivity slider into account).
1/4, 1/8, 1/16, 1/32 Only hitpoints that are close to the selected note value positions 
within the loop (e.g. close to exact sixteenth note positions, if you 
have selected the 1/16 option) will be shown. Again, the Sensi-
tivity slider is taken into account.
Metric Bias This is like the “All” mode, but all hitpoints that are close to even 
meter divisions (1/4 notes, 1/8 notes, 1/16 notes, etc.) get a 
“sensitivity boost” – they are visible at lower Sensitivity slider set-
tings. This is useful if you are working with dense or cluttered ma-
terial with a lot of hitpoints, but you know that the material is 
based on a strict meter. By selecting Metric Bias it will be easier 
to find the hitpoints close to the meter position (although most 
other hitpoints are also available, at higher sensitivity settings). 
						

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Disabling slices
You might run into situations where there are too many slices – a sin-
gle sound may have been split into two slices for example. You could 
of course reduce the sensitivity to get rid of the hitpoints you don’t 
want, but then other hitpoints could disappear too, which may be un-
desirable. What you need to do in a situation like this is to disable an 
individual slice, using the Hitpoint Edit tool:
1.Select the Hitpoint Edit tool.
2.Press [Alt]/[Option] and move the pointer to the handle (the triangle).
The pointer turns into a cross in the Sample Editor window. 
3.Click on the handle of the hitpoint you wish to disable.
The hitpoint handle is diminished and its line disappears to indicate that it is disabled.
4.Now, the hitpoint won’t be taken into account when you create slices.
5.To reactivate a disabled hitpoint, [Alt]/[Option]-click on the hitpoint 
handle with the Hitpoint Edit tool.
Locking slices
If you lock a hitpoint by clicking on its handle with the Hitpoint Edit tool, 
it will stay even if you drag the Sensitivity slider all the way to zero. This 
can be used in situations where one or several slices contain double 
hits, but raising the sensitivity adds a lot of unwanted slices.
1.Find the place where you hear double hits when auditioning.
2.Remember the current slider setting.  
						

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3.Raise the Sensitivity slider to a higher value so that a hitpoint appears, 
separating the two sounds.
Most likely this will add a lot of other unwanted hitpoints as well.
4.Audition to make sure you got what you wanted.
5.Select the Hitpoint Edit tool and point at the handle.
The speaker icon changes to a normal arrow pointer.
6.Lock the new slice by clicking on its handle.
Locked hitpoints are dark blue in color.
7.Drag the Sensitivity slider to the original setting.
The locked hitpoint will remain shown.
•You can unlock a locked hitpoint by clicking it again with the Hitpoint 
Edit tool with [Alt]/[Option] pressed.
Setting hitpoints manually
If you cannot get the desired result by adjusting sensitivity, disabling 
or locking, you can add, move and delete hitpoints manually.
Adding hitpoints
Manually adding hitpoints can be done in situations where a hitpoint is 
missing at a specific point, but doesn’t appear even if the sensitivity is 
set to full.
1.Zoom in on the waveform at the point where you wish to add a hitpoint.
2.Audition the area with the Hitpoint Edit tool to make sure that the start 
of the sound is in view.
3.Activate Snap to Zero Crossing on the Sample Editor toolbar.
By finding zero crossings in the waveform (positions where the amplitude is close to 
zero), manually added slices won’t introduce any clicks or pops. All hitpoints found by 
the Calculate function are automatically placed at zero crossings. 
						

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4.Press [Alt]/[Option] with the Hitpoint Edit tool selected so that the 
mouse pointer changes to a pencil tool and click just before the start 
of the sound.
A new hitpoint appears. Manually added hitpoints are locked by default.
•If you click and keep the mouse button pressed, you can adjust the 
position of the new hitpoint by dragging.
Releasing the mouse button adds the hitpoint.
5.Audition the new slice with the Play tool to make sure you got what 
you wanted.
Moving hitpoints
If you manually added a hitpoint, and it was either placed too far away 
from the start of the sound, or too far into the sound, you can manually 
move the hitpoint. It is also possible to move calculated hitpoints this 
way.
1.Make sure Snap to Zero Crossing is activated on the Sample Editor 
toolbar.
2.Select the Hitpoint Edit tool.
3.Click on the hitpoint handle and drag it to the new position.
Deleting hitpoints
To delete a hitpoint, select the Hitpoint Edit tool and drag it to the left 
out of the Sample Editor window. Hitpoints that you have created 
manually can also be deleted by clicking its handle with the Hitpoint 
Edit tool. 
						

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About Q-points
Optionally, hitpoints can have individual Q-points. These are mainly 
used for audio quantizing. Their function is to define the point to which 
the quantizing will apply. Sometimes a slice might have a slow attack, 
and a peak further into the slice which you wish to use as the Q-point. 
When you apply quantize, the Q-point will define the point which will 
be stretched to a grid position when quantizing.
•To activate Q-points, open the Preferences–Editing–Audio page on 
the File menu and check the “Hitpoints have Q-Points” option.
Next time you use the Calculate Hitpoints function, the hitpoints will have Q-points. 
Manually added hitpoints do not have Q-points.
•To offset the position of a Q-point in relation to the hitpoint, simply point 
and click on the “Q” icon and drag it to the right to the desired position.  
						

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Using the Audio Tempo Definition tool
When this tool is selected, you can set the tempo, length (in bars and 
beats) and time signature for an audio file. The Audio Tempo Definition 
tool can be used to determine the tempo of an audio clip when calculat-
ing hitpoints. In case you have an audio clip with an unknown length and 
tempo you can calculate the tempo by defining the length of one bar:
Determining the tempo of an audio clip
You can use the Audio Tempo Definition tool to determine the tempo 
of an audio clip with an unknown length and source tempo. 
For this to work properly the audio clip must have a steady tempo that 
doesn’t vary over time. 
After importing the audio file, the first thing you should do is to make 
sure that, with the Audio Tempo Definition tool selected, the first down-
beat of the audio clip is aligned with the first beat of the first bar in the 
Sample Editor:
1.Import the audio file.
2.Double-click the audio event to open the Sample Editor.
3.Select the Audio Tempo Definition tool.
When the Audio Tempo Definition tool is selected, the Sample Editor 
ruler does not reflect the audio event position in the Project window, 
but instead displays the length of the audio file in bars and beats. 
In case the audio file starts with a downbeat there is no problem. But 
in case it doesn’t, you can offset the ruler in the Sample Editor.
4.Audition the file to determine where the first downbeat occurs.
Stop the auditioning when you have located it. 
						

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5.Move the mouse pointer to the upper part of the ruler until the pointer 
changes to a hand symbol.
6.Click and drag the ruler to the right until the first bar in the ruler 
matches the first downbeat in the sample.
7.Release the mouse button.
Now the ruler grid is offset so that it starts on the first downbeat in the sample.
8.Audition the file to determine where the next downbeat occurs, i.e. the 
first beat of the second bar in the sample.
Stop the auditioning when you have located it.    
						

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9.In this example the second downbeat in the sample is located at the 
start of the second beat of the second bar (at the cursor position in 
the picture).
10.Place the mouse pointer at the start of bar 2 in the waveform display.
The pointer changes to a metronome icon with a blue line indicating the pointer posi-
tion. The pointer will snap to the grid positions.