Steinberg WaveLab 3 Operation Manual

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Playback and recording 7 – 151
Using the meters
In the lower part of the Record dialog, you will find a meter display. This is 
useful for checking the input level, as well as the frequency spectrum of 
the input signal.
• The meters in the Record dialog are “miniature” versions of the Level, Spec-
trum and Phase Meters in the Meter windows. 
For detailed descriptions of the functionality and features, see “Level/pan meter” on page 159.
For the meters to register the signal, you need to activate the Monitor 
checkbox. This can be done automatically, if the option “Activate meters 
when opening record window” is activated in the Record Settings dialog. 
The pop-up menu in the lower left corner allows you to select between 
Level or Spectrum metering.
• When the Level Meter is selected, horizontal bars show the peak level (outer 
bars) and average loudness (VU, inner bars) of each channel.
Values are also shown numerically. If the Phase Scope option is activated on the pop-up 
menu next to the Reset button, a Phase Meter is displayed to the right of the Level Meter 
(see “Phase Scope” on page 165).
• When the Spectrum Meter is selected, a “bar diagram” will be shown, providing a 
continuous graphical representation of the frequency spectrum.
See “Spectrum meter (60 bands)” on page 166.
You can reset the meters by clicking the Reset button – this instantly re-
sets all meters and numerical indicators, including the Maximum Peak and 
RMS values to the right in the Level Meter.
You can also select one of five presets for the Level Meter on the pop-up 
menu next to the Reset button. These presets (containing settings for 
meter ranges, colors, etc.) can be edited by selecting “Settings…” from 
the pop-up menu. The options are described in the chapter “Making set-
tings for the level and pan meters” on page 161.
Use the Level Meter to check the audio input level. Adjust this (with the 
mixer controls or the audio card’s applications), so that the Peak Level 
Meters go as high as possible without ever reaching 0dB!
• You can also use the meters to monitor the signal being written to disk dur-
ing rendering or recording. See “Monitor file rendering” on page 157.  
						

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7 – 152 Playback and recording
Checking disk capacity
The Disk Capacity indicator above the meters helps you make sure you 
have enough disk space for the recording. This indicator shows the amount 
of available disk space on the hard disk specified in the Create Final File 
path, or the hard disk you have selected for your temporary files (see “Tem-
porary files” on page 28). Please note that this value is approximate.
When there is less than ten seconds of available hard disk space, the disk 
capacity indication is displayed in red.
Start recording!
When all the preparations are done, click Record to start the actual re-
cording.
•If you have selected one of the Auto-start options (click the question mark 
icon in the Record dialog), the recording will go into Pause mode (the 
Record button will blink), until the specified Auto-start criteria are met.
When recording starts, the Record button will be “lit” and the Recorded Time value will in-
dicate how much you have recorded. 
•If you have selected the “Auto-stop after given duration” option, the “Re-
maining Time” value will indicate how much recording time you have left.
•If you like, you can pause the recording by clicking the Pause button at 
any time.
The Record button will blink to indicate Pause mode. To resume recording, click the Pause 
or Record button again. As described above, a short section of audio just before you re-
sume recording (according to the Pause memory value in the Record Settings dialog) will 
be captured.
•You can drop markers in the file during recording by clicking the Drop 
Marker buttons.
See below.
•If you want to abort the recording, click the Discard button.
This terminates recording and discards the recorded file. 
• Note that if you have activated the option “Confirm when discarding record-
ing” in the Record settings dialog, a dialog will appear asking you to confirm 
whether you really want to terminate recording and discard the recorded file.
If you change your mind and select “Cancel”, recording will continue.
•When you have finished, click Stop. You can also have recording stop au-
tomatically by using one of the Auto-stop options. Either way, the record-
ing by default appears in a new window behind the dialog. 
						

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Playback and recording 7 – 153
• You can deactivate the option “Open audio file in  WaveLab after recording” 
in the Record settings dialog if you don’t want the recording to appear in a 
new window.
In this case, the recorded file is saved to disk but does not automatically appear in Wave-
Lab after recording.
If you want to perform more recordings after the first, click the Record 
button and record again. If you have selected the Named File option, and 
the Auto number option is deactivated, you have to specify another file 
name to avoid overwriting the previously recorded file.
When you have finished recording completely, click the Close button (in 
the lower right corner) to close the dialog.
• If you have created temporary files, and want to save the file(s) permanently, 
click on each document you have created and use Save As on the File menu 
to save each one.
See “Saving in another format (Save as…)” on page 117 for details.
About dropping markers during recording
When you are recording, you can click the marker buttons at any time, to 
add a marker to the recorded file. The yellow button will generate a num-
bered, generic marker (see “The various marker types” on page 329), 
while the white buttons will generate numbered, generic region start and 
end markers.
If you want to name the markers you drop rather than using generic, num-
bered markers, you can do this in one of the following ways, or use a com-
bination of both:
•Type in the desired name in the box below the buttons. 
You can type in a new name for each marker before you drop. This works well if you know 
beforehand where you want to drop the markers and what their names should be. If you 
want to be able to drop markers not planned beforehand though, the method described be-
low is probably better suited.  
						

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7 – 154 Playback and recording
•Activate the option “Confirm name of markers to drop” in the record set-
tings dialog.
In this case, a dialog will appear each time you click a button to drop a marker. In this dialog, 
you can either type in a name for the marker, or you can confirm that you want to use an al-
ready entered name. The benefit of using this method is that the marker will be dropped at 
the time position when you clicked the marker button, regardless of how long you take to 
type in a name for the marker.
Furthermore, this dialog also allows you to specify a delay value for the marker. The marker 
will then be dropped at the position when you clicked the marker button, minus the delay 
value you specify. So if you clicked the marker button after 10 seconds of recording and 
specify a delay value of 2 seconds, the marker will be dropped 8 seconds into the recording.
• Note: if you insert two or more region start markers in a row (with no region 
end markers in between), only the last of these start markers will be kept 
(the first marker(s) will be removed).
In other words, the last region start marker doesn’t become “permanent” until you insert a 
region end marker.
The same goes for region end markers – if you insert several end markers in a row, only the 
last one will be kept.
This is a very useful function, because it allows you to “change your mind” 
when inserting markers during recording. For example, let’s say you are 
recording a continuous performance and want to mark all takes worth 
keeping. At the start of a take you insert a region start marker. However, 
this turns out to be a false start or a flawed take. When the next take starts 
you insert a new region start marker again and the previous, unwanted 
start marker is removed.  
						

							8
Metering 
						

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8 – 156 Metering
Introduction
WaveLab offers very detailed and versatile metering, allowing you to moni-
tor level, pan, phase, spectrum and more during playback, on audio input 
and even during file rendering. This chapter describes how to display, set 
up and use the various meters.
Selecting what to monitor
On the lower part of the Analysis menu, you will find different monitor 
modes for the meters. You select a monitor mode either from the menu, or 
by clicking the corresponding button on the Meters control bar.
The six modes work as follows:
Monitor playback
This is the normal metering mode, in which the meters reflect the audio 
being played back. Note that metering occurs after the Master Section in 
this mode, which means the results of effects, dithering and Master faders 
are taken into account.
In this mode, the meters can be used for monitoring all kinds of audio 
playback: Wave windows, Audio Montage, audio CD track lists, audition 
in file dialogs, etc.
Monitor audio input
In this mode, the meters will reflect the audio input to the program. Typi-
cally, this is the mode to use when recording. The Master Section settings 
are not taken into account in this mode.
Freeze all meters
Selecting this “mode” will freeze all open meters, causing them to keep 
the values and readings displayed the moment you selected the mode. 
The meters will remain frozen until you select another monitor mode.  
						

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Metering 8 – 157
Monitor edit-cursor position
This mode is only available for Wave windows. When this is selected, the 
meters will be static, showing the levels and other values for the audio at 
the position of the Wave Cursor, in stop mode. This allows you to analyse 
a certain position in an audio file, in real time. The Master Section settings 
are not taken into account in this mode.
Analyse selection
Again, this mode is only available for Wave windows. It allows you to 
make a selection and have the meters display the average values over the 
selected range, statically. The Master Section settings are not taken into 
account in this mode.
When you change the selection, you need to update the meter displays by 
selecting “Refresh selection analysis” from the Analysis menu (or by click-
ing the Refresh button on the Meters control bar).
Monitor file rendering
When this mode is activated, you can monitor what is being written to 
disk during file rendering or when recording. Master Section settings are 
taken into account. Like Analyse selection, average and min/max peak val-
ues are computed.
After rendering, the meter(s) will freeze, and remain so until you refresh or 
change monitor mode. 
						

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8 – 158 Metering
Multi-channel metering
As previously mentioned, WaveLab features 8 audio channels internally 
that can be routed to inputs and outputs on a multi i/o audio card. The Au-
dio Montage supports various surround channel configurations using up 
to 6 channels (see “Multichannel operation in the Montage” on page 506 
for more information).
WaveLab can display multiple meters so when working with multiple 
channels in the Audio Montage, each channel can be metered. This ap-
plies to all meters (up to 8 real time FFTs, 8 level meters, 4 pan meters, 4 
phase scopes, etc.). If a surround configuration is selected, each meter 
indicates the corresponding surround channel (Lf, Rf, LFE, etc.).
The Bit Meter in a 6 channel (5.1) surround configuration.  
						

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Metering 8 – 159
The meters
There are seven different meters in WaveLab, each with its separate win-
dow. The meters are opened and closed from the Analysis menu (or by 
clicking the buttons on the Meters control bar).
• To close all open meter windows, click the Close Meters button on the 
Meters control bar.
As with any standard window, you can resize the meter windows by drag-
ging the window borders, and fold the windows by clicking the fold icons 
(or by double clicking the title bars).
On the following pages, the available meters are described.
Level/pan meter
Level meters
The upper part of the level/pan meter window shows the peak level and 
average loudness, in the following way:
• The Peak Level meters display the peak levels of each channel, graphically and 
numerically.
By default, the meter segments and numerical peak values are displayed in green for low 
levels, yellow for levels between –6dB and –2dB, and red for levels above –2dB. You can 
change both the colors and the range boundaries if you wish, as described on “Making set-
tings for the level and pan meters” on page 161.
VU meters
Peak level 
meters
Meter presets (see “Selecting meter presets” on page 165)Reset button   
						

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8 – 160 Metering
• The VU (Volume Unit) meters measure the average loudness (RMS) of each 
channel.
These meters have a built-in inertia, evening out loudness variations over a user-defined 
time span. 
If you are monitoring playback or audio input, you will also note two vertical lines following 
each VU meter bar, seemingly “trying to reach” the current RMS value. These lines indicate 
the average of the most recent minimum RMS values (left line) and the average of the most 
recent maximum RMS values (right line). To the left, the difference between the minimum 
and maximum average values is displayed (the level value in brackets) – this gives you an 
overview of the dynamic range of the audio material.
• If you are monitoring real-time audio (playback or input), the maximum peak and 
loudness values are displayed numerically to the right of the meter bars.
Numbers in brackets to the right of the Maximum Peak values indicate the number of suc-
cessive clips (0dB signal peaks). 1 or 2 clips can be acceptable, but if you get a larger 
number, you should lower the master level to avoid digital distortion.
Pan meters
The lower part of the window shows the pan (the difference in level be-
tween the left and right channel, only applicable when monitoring stereo 
audio):
• The upper pan meters show the peak level difference between the channels, 
graphically and numerically.
Note that the pan meters are “two-sided”; the level bars can go to the left or right, indicating 
which channel is the loudest. The two sides are shown in different colors (which can be 
edited – see “Making settings for the level and pan meters” on page 161).
• The lower pan meters show the average difference in loudness between the 
channels, in a similar way.
This gives you a visual indication of whether a stereo recording is properly centered, etc.
Recent minimum Recent maximumDifference value