Splice Now

In the days of mono Nagras, production mixers mixed their mics into a single audio track. But multi-track digital recorders have made that idea seem quaint, and today, editors typically cut from two-track source clips (if not from four- or eight-track clips). Through version 4, Media Composer helpfully remembered source track activation. Which meant that if you loaded a particular clip into the source monitor, selected track 1 for editing and deselected track 2, when you came back to that clip at some point in the future, those tracks would still be highlighted, ready for your next cut.

In version 5, that feature broke. Reload a clip and all tracks were automatically highlighted. No memory.

I recently learned that the feature returned in MC5.5 — but only via a setting. It’s called “Auto-enable Source Tracks,” available in the Edit tab of Composer Settings. It’s enabled by default — which turns off activation memory. If you want your source track selection remembered, be sure to disable it.

Also note that changing track activation does not trigger an autosave. You must do something else to the relevant bin (make a mark or move a clip, for example) to ensure that the track status gets saved.

For more tips like this, check out my book Avid Agility, available in print or for Kindle, from Amazon.

This entry was posted on September 17, 2011 at 1:13 pm and is filed under Avid, Avid Technical Tips. You can subscribe via RSS 2.0 feed to this post's comments. You can comment below, or link to this permanent URL from your own site.