Steinberg WaveLab Essential 6 Operation Manual

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Master Section
This function is useful if you are working on several 
projects, since it makes for a convenient way to keep spe-
cific Master Section presets for specific projects well or-
ganized and easily accessible.
Rendering
While the Master Section can perform all processing in 
real time during playback, it’s also possible to save the au-
dio output to a file on disk. This is done with the Render 
function.
There are several uses for Rendering:
Mix down a complete Audio CD Montage to an audio 
file.
This can be a goal in itself, but can also be necessary if your Montage 
uses e.g. more effects than the system can handle in real time. By Ren-
dering it to a file first, and creating a CD from this file instead, you can 
avoid dropouts and CD burning failure.
Mix down a file in a Wave window to a new audio file, 
complete with Master Section effects, dithering and other 
settings.
You can freely choose the format of the new audio file, allowing you to 
create an mp3 file and add effects at the same time, for example.
“Apply” all settings in the Master Section to a file in a 
Wave window.
This is the same as the previous option, but the Master Section process-
ing will transparently and permanently be “applied” to the current file in-
stead.
What is rendered?
When you use Render, all Master Section settings (ef-
fects, master levels, dithering, etc.) are included in the re-
sulting audio file. In other words, what you hear is what 
you get.
ÖOne thing to note: the Bypass switch affects playback 
only, while the effect On switches affect both playback 
and Rendering.
Calling up the Render dialog and filling out the 
options
Click the Render button to call up the following dialog:
The Render dialog for Wave windows (for information on Rendering Au-
dio CD Montages, see “Mixing down – The Render function” on page 
131).
Here is what the options mean:
Range
This is where you specify what part of the wave to render.
Result
Here, you can choose whether the original wave file 
should be changed (“applying” the Master Section set-
tings) or whether a new audio file should be generated.
!Rendering Audio CD Montages is described in the 
Audio CD Montage chapter (see “Mixing down – The 
Render function” on page 131). This section de-
scribes Rendering waves.
Option Description
Selection Process only the portion that is currently selected 
in the Main view.
Whole file Process the entire file.
Option Description
Process in place Modifies the original file. If you wish to keep the 
changes, you need to save the file again. Note: if you 
use this for adding effects to a file, you may want to 
activate the “Activate Global Bypass” option on the 
Schedule tab (see below).
No tail If this is activated, the resulting file will end where the 
original did, even if the processing adds material (like 
for example echoes or reverb tails).
Copy markers If this is ticked, the resulting new file will contain all 
markers present in the original file. 
						

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Master Section
Create named file
If this is activated, the resulting new file will be saved (not 
temporary). The field below the checkbox allows you to 
specify a name and location for the file, and you can click 
the audio properties button to set the desired audio for-
mat. Clicking the “Rename as source” button will set the 
file name to the same as the file being processed (but re-
taining any path you have specified above).
ÖIf you click the audio properties button at the bottom 
of the dialog, you open the Audio File Format dialog in 
which you can choose the desired format of the file and 
make settings for the conversion and encoding.
Options on the Schedule tab
 The On Start options determine what WaveLab Essential 
should do before rendering:
 The On Completion options determine what should happen 
after rendering: The Priority setting lets you specify how fast the file should be 
processed.
Processing the file
Once everything is set up correctly, click OK to initiate the 
processing. Or, if you change your mind, click Cancel.
ÖTip: If you just need to process the current audio se-
lection in place, you can press [Ctrl] while clicking on the 
Render button. This will process the audio selection in 
place without opening the dialog. 
Other settings are kept from the last time you accessed the dialog.
Working with multiple files
Once you have applied settings to one wave, as de-
scribed below, you can continue with processing the next. 
The processing of the first wave will continue in the back-
ground. This way you can apply processing to as many 
waves as desired. Please also note that each wave can 
have its own priority setting, as described below.
Stop playback Stops playback to free up some processing 
power. This option is not available if playback is 
already stopped.
Open Monitor window Opens the Monitor window, see “The Monitor 
window” on page 93.
Minimize window The file window is minimized to free up screen 
space.
Beep WaveLab Essential will beep to signal that the opera-
tion is completed.
Show 
message boxWaveLab Essential will display a message to confirm 
the operation. Click OK to continue.
Restore 
audio windowUpon completion, WaveLab Essential will restore a 
minimized window (see above) to its original size.
Activate 
Global BypassWaveLab Essential will automatically activate the By-
pass switch in the Master Section’s Effects pane (see 
“Bypass, Mute and Preset” on page 86) upon comple-
tion. This allows you to play the processed file back af-
ter rendering, without hearing the effects “twice” 
(applied to the file and activated in the Master Section).
Relax 
BackgroundThe file is processed in the background, but priority is 
given to audio playback and to your continued work on 
other files. This makes WaveLab Essential as responsive 
as possible, but slows down processing.
Background The file is processed in the background but with a lower 
priority given to your continued work on other files. This 
makes processing faster but the program less responsive. 
Try this mode when several files should be processed in 
the background.
Fast Processing is given a high priority. A fairly high-perfor-
mance computer may be required to avoid dropouts in 
playback.
!Any dropouts that occur as a result of too little pro-
cessing power left will only affect the played file. 
Files processed in the background will always be 
free of dropouts!
!If you are rendering to MP3 format, you should only 
render one file at a time. 
						

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Master Section
The Monitor window
This window allows you to monitor the ongoing processes 
and check how hard your computer’s CPU is working with 
various tasks.
To open this window, select “Monitor” from the Special-
ized Windows submenu on the View menu or press [Ctrl]-
[F10].
The window has two displays, selected by clicking the 
corresponding tab at the bottom of the window.
The Progress display
The Progress display shows a list with the following col-
umns:
Process menu
Even while a wave is being processed, you can change its 
settings. Position the pointer in the monitor window and 
press the right mouse button.
The following options are available:
The Performance display
The Performance display provides an overview of the pro-
cessing power currently being used.
Column Description
Name The name of each wave or montage being pro-
cessed.
Progress How much of the wave has been processed so far.
Remaining time This indicates how much time is required to finish 
the processing.
Priority Boost The priority assigned to this particular processing 
(see “The Priority setting lets you specify how fast 
the file should be processed.” on page 92 and be-
low).
Option Description
Suspend/Resume Suspends processing of the wave. The menu 
option changes to Resume so that you can acti-
vate processing again. When a process is sus-
pended, more CPU power will be available to 
the other processes.
Suspend/Resume All Halts/starts processing of all waves.
Relax Background, Back-
ground, FastChanges the priority status for the wave, see 
“Relax Background” on page 92.
Cancel Cancels the processing operation for the se-
lected wave, in which case the message in the 
Priority Boost column reads Cancelled until 
WaveLab Essential has performed all the nec-
essary clean up operations. 
						

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Master Section
 The yellow lines refer to the power used for providing input to 
the Master Section, i.e. reading waves from disk. Please note 
that the values are an approximation.
 The purple lines indicate the processing power that is re-
quired for all processors currently running in the Master Sec-
tion. The shorter the line, the less the load on the CPU. This is 
a very precise measurement.
 The blue lines reflect the processing power required by the 
output device.
 There is also a number indicating processor usage in percent.
Customizing the Performance display
You can customize the way the processing information is 
displayed. If you want to see more of what is going on, re-
size the window. 
Other options are available if you position the cursor any-
where in the black part of the window and press the right 
mouse button. 
The following options are available:
 You can activate/deactivate the Input, Process, and Output in-
formation (see above).
 To get an exact (but not as smooth) picture of the processor 
usage, deactivate Average.
 You can select a Zoom factor for the display (50%~400%).
 You can change the direction of the status information flow 
(horizontal or vertical). 
						

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Batch file encoding 
						

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Batch file encoding
Basic procedure
WaveLab Essential can open and play both uncom-
pressed and compressed files in a number of different for-
mats, including WAV, AIFF, MP3, WMA (Windows Media 
Audio) and OSQ (Original Sound Quality), which is 
WaveLab Essential’s proprietary lossless audio format.
It’s also possible to convert WAV or AIFF files to another 
format. While this can be done by opening a file and se-
lecting “Save As” or “Save Special/Encode” on the File 
menu, you can also convert several files in one go (batch 
conversion).
Proceed as follows:
1.Select “Batch file encoding…” from the Tools menu.
The “Encode audio files” dialog opens.
2.Click on the green “plus” symbol.
A file selector opens, where you can select the desired audio files (WAV 
or AIFF). Files must have the same sample rate and number of channels 
(e.g. stereo/mono).
Click here to add files.
3.In the file type pop-up select one of the available for-
mats (WAV or AIFF) and then – in the file list – select the 
desired files. If necessary, use the [Ctrl] and/or [Shift] keys 
to select several files. Confirm your selection by clicking 
“Open”.
This brings you back to the “Encode audio files” dialog.
4.Select the destination folder for the converted files 
from the corresponding pop-up menu.
5.Select the desired destination format by clicking the 
audio properties button at the bottom of the dialog.
This opens the Audio File Format dialog in which you can select the de-
sired format and make settings for it.
6.For some compressed file formats, clicking on the ar-
row button to the right of the Encoding and Attributes 
menus calls up dialogs where you can set the encoding 
parameters and enter text strings.
!Note that it is possible to simultaneously batch en-
code audio files of different formats, given that all the 
files have the same sample rate and number of chan-
nels. 
						

							12
Markers 
						

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Markers
Introduction
What are markers for?
Markers allow you to save and name certain positions in a 
file. You can use these positions later on in various ways:
 Set the wave cursor to a marker.
 Select all audio between two markers.
 Loop the section between two markers, etc.
There is no limit to the amount of markers you can have in 
a file.
The various marker types
The following marker types are available:
About marker pairs
Two of the marker types come in pairs: Loop and Region.
Since you can’t have a region that starts but never ends, a 
loop end point without a start, etc., special rules exist for 
creating, deleting and moving these types of markers.
Loop and region markers only have a functionality when 
balanced.
You can enter just a start marker, but its purpose will be defeated by the 
lack of a corresponding end marker. Furthermore, if you delete a start 
marker, the corresponding end marker will also be deleted.
About importing and saving loop markers
There are a few points to be aware of when importing files 
with loops into WaveLab Essential. This is because the 
loops can be defined in two places: Wave and AIFF file 
formats have the ability to contain loop points, and Wave-
Lab Essential stores loop points as markers separately for 
each file, in “.MRK” files. So, there’s a potential risk for 
conflict:
 When you import a file that has never been used in WaveLab 
Essential before, and which contains loops, the loops are “im-
ported” and displayed as loop markers (in addition, the sample 
note and detune information described in the section “Editing 
sample attributes” on page 170 is imported, if present).
 When you then save the file in AIFF or Wave format, the loop 
points are stored, both as part of the actual file (so that other 
applications can read them) and in the “.MRK” file (for Wave-
Lab Essential).
 When you open a file that has been used in WaveLab Essen-
tial before, loop indications that were originally in the file, be-
fore you used it in WaveLab Essential, are ignored. Only the 
loop information in the “.MRK” file is used.!This chapter describes how to use markers in Wave 
windows. 
Audio CD Montages have their own markers, see 
“Using markers in the Montage” on page 127.
Marker type Description
Generic This is mainly used for locating certain important 
positions and for editing (for example selecting all 
audio between two positions). Generic markers 
can be created directly during recording if needed 
(see “About dropping markers during recording” 
on page 62).
Loop start and 
endThese are used for defining loop points. This is 
useful for editing purposes as well as when creat-
ing loop sounds (e.g. for samplers).
Region start and
endUse these to define start and end points for ge-
neric regions. This is useful for editing purposes 
and can be created directly during recording if 
needed (see “About dropping markers during re-
cording” on page 62). 
						

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Markers
The Marker toolbar
This is a special control bar for markers. It can be brought 
up from the Control Bars submenu on the View menu.
Creating markers
Dropping markers on the fly
To add a marker on the fly, proceed as follows:
1.Play back the file.
2.When the cursor reaches the position where you want 
a marker, do one of the following:
Press [Insert].
Click the Drop marker button on the Marker toolbar.
Select Drop Marker from the time ruler speed menu.
You can give the marker a proper name later.
ÖThe markers dropped this way are generic.
Creating a marker from “stop mode”
1.Set the wave cursor to where you want the marker to 
appear.
2.Do one of the following:
Click on the New Marker button on the Marker toolbar.
Click with the right mouse button on the time ruler and 
select New Marker from the menu that appears.
Press [Ctrl]+[Insert] as a shortcut for the “New Marker” 
operation described above.
3.Select a marker type.4.Fill out the other options in the dialog and click OK.
The new marker appears at the wave cursor position.
Dropping markers while recording
You can drop markers during a recording. For example, if 
you are auditioning some material while transferring it from 
DAT tape to WaveLab Essential, you can add markers at 
important positions, as they are coming up. The marker 
types you can add are: Generic, Region start and Region 
end. See “About dropping markers during recording” on 
page 62.
Creating marker pairs from the Marker toolbar
To create a loop or a generic region, you can use the 
Marker toolbar:
1.Make a selection that spans the area you want to en-
close by a marker pair.
2.Click on the corresponding marker pair symbol on the 
Marker toolbar.
Markers are added at the start and end of the selection.
About the marker list
There is a marker list window that displays all markers in a 
wave. This can be used for various purposes, for editing, 
deleting and locating to markers, as described in the fol-
lowing sections.
Add new 
marker
Drop Generic markerAdd region markers Open marker listGo to previous 
markerGo to next 
marker
Add loop markers 
						

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Markers
Opening the list
To open the marker list, either select “Specialized Win-
dows”/”Wave Marker List” from the View menu, or click 
the corresponding button on the Marker toolbar.
The marker list
To sort the list alphabetically, click on the “Name” head-
ing.
To sort the list according to position, click the “Position” 
heading.
This is the default when you first open the window.
Marker appearance and visibility
Hiding marker heads
To hide/display the marker triangles from the ruler, click 
with the right mouse button in the ruler and select Hide/
Show Marker Heads.
Changing the appearance of marker lines
To hide the marker lines in the waveform, click with the 
right mouse button in the waveform and select Elements. 
From the menu that appears, set things up so that neither 
Solid markers, nor Dotted markers are activated.
Hiding all markers of a certain type
There’s a special dialog for hiding markers of certain 
types. To open it:
Click with the right mouse button on the time ruler and 
select Visibility, or…
Open the marker list, click with the right mouse button 
on a marker and select Visibility.
In this dialog you can show/hide markers of any type.
Editing, converting and naming 
markers
The Edit Marker window can be used to change existing 
marker’s properties. There are several ways to open this 
window with settings for a certain marker:
 Right click on the marker in the time ruler and choose “Edit 
Marker” from the menu that appears. 
 Hold down [Alt] and double click on the marker.
 Open the marker list, select a marker and click with the right 
mouse button on a marker and select Edit or press [Return].
To transform a marker into any other type, select that type 
in the list to the left.