User manual STEINBERG CUBASE LE 4 GETTING STARTED

[. . . ] Getting Started Tutorials by Steve Kostrey Revision for Cubase LE and Quality Control: Cristina Bachmann, Heiko Bischoff, Sabine Pfeifer The information in this document is subject to change without notice and does not represent a commitment on the part of Steinberg Media Technologies GmbH. The software described by this document is subject to a License Agreement and may not be copied to other media except as specifically allowed in the License Agreement. No part of this publication may be copied, reproduced or otherwise transmitted or recorded, for any purpose, without prior written permission by Steinberg Media Technologies GmbH. All product and company names are TM or ® trademarks of their respective owners. [. . . ] Setting the output to "Stereo Out" allows us to hear what we are recording. We have a setting of 125 which means 125 BPM (beats per minute). Setting levels We have a bass guitar playing through an amplifier with a microphone in front of the amplifier's speaker. This microphone is plugged directly into the Steinberg MI|4 microphone input. We have set the level on the MI|4 so that we have enough volume without clipping. Clicking the Monitor button will allow us to hear the bass guitar. You should see and hear the audio coming in to the right of the track. Audio coming into this track Turning on the metronome click We'll want to have a click or metronome play in the background as we record the bass guitar so that what we record aligns with the bars and beats in Cubase LE. 26 Tutorial 1: Recording Audio 2. Now click the "Record Enable" button on the track. Setting the track to Record Enable lets Cubase LE know that you want to record on this track and no other one. You can have many tracks Record Enabled at a time. Do not allow the audio level to go past this line! This is the safe area for recording 3. In the Inspector, open the "Channel" tab. This will display the channel fader for the selected track. Click here to display the channel fader. · Once the level is set, you are ready to record! Recording bass guitar 1. Position the cursor at the beginning of the project. This will make sure we start recording on bar 1. 2. Click the Record button to record the bass guitar. Since the "Precount/Click" button is activated, we'll hear two bars of click before recording begins. · Do the best you can to send the maximum amount of volume to the audio inputs of your audio card before you hear any distortion. If yours doesn't, don't worry we can change the amount here. Move the fader up or down so that the volume is loud enough without going into the red on the channel meter. You will see a line near the top of the channel meter ­ make sure the level does not go over this line! 3. Turn off the Monitor and Record Enable buttons on the track so that we don't hear the input or record on the track any more. Move ahead to the next section to learn how to play back audio. 27 Tutorial 1: Recording Audio Playback We are going to learn how to play back audio in Cubase LE. It is actually this simple but there are a few tricks to learn so that you'll be playing back what you want with precision. ! · Select the audio event called "Audio 01_01" and choose "Loop Selection" from the Transport menu. ! The default key command for this is [Shift]+[G]. This is the quickest way to loop an audio event and start playback! Load the project called "Playback" found in the "Tutorial 1" folder. To stop playback · Click the "Stop" button on the Transport panel. · Clicking the "Stop" button twice moves the cursor to the position in the project where you started playback. · Press the space bar on your computer keyboard. This toggles between stop and start. To start playback There are a few ways you can play back in Cubase LE. · Click the "Start" button on the Transport panel. · Press the "0" key of the numerical computer keypad. Cycle playback · Press the space bar on your computer keyboard. This toggles between start and stop. Cubase LE has the ability to loop or cycle a section of your project. On the Transport panel, set the left locator to "1" and the right locator to "5". This tells Cubase LE that we want to loop or cycle between bars 1 and 5. Meaning we will have a 4 bar loop since the end of bar 4 is the beginning of bar 5. The left locator set to "1". · Press the [Enter] key of the numerical computer keypad. [. . . ] In the subtrack that appears below the audio event use the "Draw" tool to draw in automation so that it resembles a fade in. There are so many examples to show when it comes to automation. We could have even automated objects while Cubase LE was playing back. The automation can be placed into write mode and moving almost anything will create automation that we can edit for fine tuning later!Make sure you read the chapter "Automation" in the Operation Manual to fully realize how exciting automation can be. Exporting 6. [. . . ]