From the course: Pro Tools 2021 Essential Training: 110 - Advanced Techniques

Starting work on a new session - Pro Tools Tutorial

From the course: Pro Tools 2021 Essential Training: 110 - Advanced Techniques

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Starting work on a new session

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let's review a few things that you'll This will ensure that your recording and playback capabilities match your available hardware which you can do by choosing Setup you can optionally configure the Now the I/O setting are going to include the inputs, outputs and buses inputs, outputs and buses available for your system which are based in part on your currently connected hardware. So let's review an example. In this illustration we see the available hardware inputs on an Mbox Pro interface. These include two microphone inputs on the front panel and two additional microphone inputs on the back panel. Now these first four input channels are also available as line inputs one through four using the quarter inch jacks on the back panel. The back panel also provides access to auxiliary audio inputs for channels five and six via coaxial connectors and a stereo S/PDIF digital input via a breakout connector on the back panel corresponding to inputs seven and eight. And here's what those inputs look like in Pro Tools. By selecting the input tab in the I/O setup dialogue box we can verify that our hardware inputs are available in Pro Tools, and see the names of each input path. Here we can see analog one two, analog three four, analog five six, and the S/PDIF stereo left and right inputs for a total of eight available hardware inputs. This illustration shows the hardware outputs available with the Mbox Pro. All of the outputs are accessed on the back panel. Analog outputs one through six are available through quarter inch jacks on the back panel, so you might use these for stereo outputs to your main monitor speakers, a secondary pair of outputs to reference speakers, and perhaps a pair of outputs to an analog two-track tape machine, for example. Now the back panel also provides access to digital out via a stereo S/PDIF output on the breakout cable. Now by displaying the output tab in the I/O setup dialogue box, we can see these output paths in the software. And again, we can verify that the hardware options are showing up in Pro Tools and see the names of each output path. Here we have outputs analog one two, analog three four, analog five six, and the S/PDIF left and right stereo outputs. Again, giving us a total of eight available hardware outputs. OK, now let's create a session in Pro Tools. The Pro Tools dashboard displays options for selecting the I/O options for selecting the I/O when you create a session when you create a session using the I/O setting selector here. using the I/O setting selector here. You can select Stereo Mix You can select Stereo Mix to reset the I/O options to match your current hardware or you can leave it set to Last Used or you can leave it set to Last Used to preserve any customizations you may have made previously. to preserve any customizations you may have made previously. Now before we save, let's give this session a name. Now before we save, let's give this session a name. I'll just call it "Crash Down". I'll just call it "Crash Down". Now once you've created a session you can select Setup, I/O to display you can select Setup, I/O to display the I/O setup dialogue box and view available signal paths. As we've seen, the tabs at the top allow us to access the different pages including inputs, outputs and buses for our session. Now you want your inputs and outputs to match the available I/O channels to match the available I/O channels on your audio interface. And note that these are system specific. Buses provide routing options for the session Buses provide routing options for the session and these are session specific. Now the bus tab provides two different types of bus paths. Output buses are buses that route to a specific hardware output on your system such as output one two here, which maps to our analog outputs one and two on the audio interface. Internal mix buses are available for Internal mix buses are available for routing signals internally within your session. routing signals internally within your session. Those include bus one two through bus 23-24 Those include bus one two through bus 23-24 and also our reverb bus down here. and also our reverb bus down here. So that's a brief overview of I/O settings in Pro Tools. So that's a brief overview of I/O settings in Pro Tools. I/O settings are used to define the available I/O settings are used to define the available input, output and bus paths for your system input, output and bus paths for your system and you can always view your I/O settings at any time and make changes using the I/O setup dialogue box. I'll discuss details on customizing I/O settings I'll discuss details on customizing I/O settings later in this course. later in this course.

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