Audio file editing refers to opening, editing, and saving audio files.
This section describes the principal editing operations within the Audio Editor.
You can copy sections of audio within the same file or between audio files.
The following list informs you about the most important improvements in WaveLab Pro and provides links to the corresponding descriptions.
Thank you for purchasing WaveLab Pro and embracing the true art of mastering. Welcome not only to the number one choice for mastering professionals, but also to a community of users who are true masters of their craft.
Before you start working, you need to make some settings.
This chapter describes general concepts that you will use when working with WaveLab Pro. Getting accustomed with these procedures allows you to work more effectively with the program.
The Workspace window provides an editing and playback environment for each particular file type. Each environment contains functions that are tailored to the specific purpose of each file type.
In WaveLab Pro, you can handle files in various ways. For example, save file settings that you regularly use as templates, rename files using naming schemes, or create a favorite files lists.
This chapter describes the methods for controlling playback and transport functions.
The wave window in the Audio Editor displays audio files graphically. Here, you view, play back, and edit individual audio files.
The tabs in the Audio Editor give you access to the tools and options you need to edit audio files.
WaveLab Pro is very flexible in its handling of stereo. All editing operations can be performed on either one channel or on both.
A multichannel audio file is a set of audio channels. These channels are organized in channel clusters. A channel cluster is a logical group of channels. It is always one channel or a channel pair.
WaveLab Pro can open and save audio files in a number of file formats.
You can create an empty audio file, to assemble material from other audio files, for example.
You can change the file format, sampling frequency, bit depth, and stereo/mono status when saving.
Audio can be saved in different formats. The process of converting audio to another format is called encoding. When saving audio files, you can specify various encoding options for some file formats.
You can assemble an audio file from several audio files.
You can turn selections into new files via drag and drop, via the context menu in the wave window, or by using the Render tab in the Audio Editor.
When opening files via the Unknown Audio option, you can specify how to interpret the format of the audio file that you want to open.
Dual mono files are two mono files that are the left and right channels of a stereo recording. You can open several dual mono files at the same time and have them grouped automatically, provided the files have channel tags in their file names.
You can convert audio files from mono to stereo and from stereo to mono. Converting a mono file into a stereo file produces an audio file that contains the same material in both channels, for example for further processing into real stereo. Converting a stereo file into a mono file mixes the stereo channels to a mono channel.
You can swap the two channels in an audio file, that is, you can move the audio in the left channel to the right channel, and the audio in the right channel to the left channel.
On the Paste pop-up menu in the Audio Editor, you find additional paste options.
You can rearrange the order of the audio in a file by dragging, and cutting and pasting.
When you drag or copy stereo or mono files to other locations, the target location determines how the files are inserted.
If you copy or move audio from one window to another, and the sample rates of the two files are not the same, the copied/moved sound plays back at the wrong pitch (speed). The program warns you if this is about to happen.
You can edit, process, and monitor audio material in the left/right and in the mid/side domain. Mid/Side editing can be applied on the waveform view and in spectral editing mode. This allows you to do spectral editing only on the mid or on the side channel, for example.
You can render regions of audio files or whole audio files to a single audio file format or to multiple audio file formats at the same time.
You can change the sample rate and bit depth of audio files.
Metadata consists of attributes that describe the audio contents, for example, the title of the track, the author, or the recording date of the track. Depending on the file format of the selected audio file, this data varies.
You can save a number of snapshots of your audio file, to capture the current scroll position, zoom factor, cursor position, and audio selection.
This dialog allows you to insert silence or ambience sound in an audio file.
You can replace a part in an audio file with tone to cover a swear word, for example.
The Pen tool allows you to redraw the waveform in the wave window. This can be used to quickly repair waveform errors. The Pen tool can be used if the zoom resolution is set to 1:8 (one pixel on the screen equals 8 samples) or higher.
WaveLab Pro provides you with a comprehensive set of tools for analyzing your audio and for detecting any errors.
You can search for unwanted clicks and digital artifacts in an audio file. The detection and correction methods allow you to detect, mark and name, jump to, play back, and remove individual audio errors.
Offline processes are useful for a variety of editing purposes and creative effects, for example, if the computer is too slow for real-time processing or if the editing requires more than one pass.
The audio montage is a multichannel and multitrack non-destructive editing environment that allows you to arrange, edit, play back, and record audio clips.
You can record audio in the Audio Editor and in the Audio Montage window.
The Master Section is the final block in the signal path before the audio is sent to the audio hardware, to an audio file, or to the audio meters. This is where you adjust the master levels, add effects, resample, and apply dithering.
Markers allow you to save and name specific positions in a file. Markers are useful for editing and playback.
WaveLab Pro contains a variety of audio meters that you can use for monitoring and analyzing audio. Meters can be used to monitor audio during playback, rendering, and recording. Furthermore, you can use them to analyze audio sections when playback is stopped.
In WaveLab Pro, you can author a DVD-Audio from a collection of audio montages and write it to DVD-Audio.
To start the CD/DVD writing process, you must have completed all CD/DVD writing preparations. Refer to the description about DVD-Audio, and CD window for a description of the preparations before following the instructions here.
Spectral editing allows you to edit and process individual frequency ranges instead of the full frequency spectrum.
The auto split function allows you to automatically split audio files in the Audio Editor or clips in the Audio Montage window according to specific rules.
Looping a sound allows you to repeat a section of the sample indefinitely in order to create a sustain of unlimited length. Instrumental sounds in samplers rely on looping organ sounds, for example.
In WaveLab Pro, you can generate synthesized sounds and DTMF or MF tones.
You can read audio tracks from regular CDs and save them as a digital copy in any audio format on your hard disk.
WaveLab Pro allows you to add video files to your audio montage. You can play back video files in various formats from within WaveLab Pro, extract the audio from a video file, and edit your audio alongside the video.
You can use WaveLab Pro as an external editor for Cubase Pro, Cubase Artist, and Nuendo, and vice versa.
Batch processing in WaveLab Pro allows you to process any number of audio files or audio montage files with Master Section plug-ins and presets, offline effects, and other plug-ins that are unique to batch processing.
You can convert multiple audio files simultaneously to another format. If no processing is needed, this can be done using the Batch Conversion dialog.
With the batch renaming functions, you can batch rename multiple files, markers, and clips. You can convert, remove, format, import, and insert text. This allows you to batch rename file names according to user specified rules.
A Podcast is an episodic series that consists of audio files. Users can stream or download Podcasts to their device and listen to it. WaveLab Pro with its audio editing tools and effects allows you to create Podcast episodes and upload these episodes to various host services.
Podcasting is a method of distributing multimedia files over the Internet, for example, for playback on mobile devices and personal computers. Podcasts are distributed via the RSS standard (Rich Site Summary).
Customizing means making settings so that the program behaves and looks the way that you want it to.
You can configure WaveLab Pro according to your needs.
