Syncpoint shortcuts

Here are a few shortcuts to save you time when syncing.

Equally spaced syncpoints

If your recording has a perfectly consistent tempo — like if it was recorded to a metronome — then you don’t need to manually create each syncpoint. Instead, you can enter a start syncpoint and end syncpoint, then tell the system to equally subdivide that space.

The trick is: You can double-click any downbeat syncpoint and enter a different bar number. Our system will then subdivide accordingly.

In this example, we have music that uses a constant tempo from bars 10 to 16:

Here’s what happened in that animation:

1. We created syncpoints in the right places for bars 10 and 16.
2. Upon creating the syncpoint for bar 16, Soundslice labeled it “11” because the system assumed we were going sequentially and that bar 10 was just really long.
3. We double-clicked the syncpoint number for 11 and typed “16” instead.
4. Soundslice detected a gap in the syncpoint numbers, so it equally subdivided the space.
5. Some light-gray syncpoints (11 through 15) appeared automatically. Those are “implied syncpoints,” described in the next section.

Implied syncpoints

Whenever there’s a gap in syncpoints, Soundslice displays light-gray circles representing the implied syncpoints within. These show you where the barlines are, even though you didn’t explicitly create syncpoints there.

Implied syncpoints are a bit magical, because they’re not set in stone. If you drag either of the “real” syncpoints at the edges of implied syncpoints, the implied syncpoints will move proportionally:

Converting an implied syncpoint to a real one

To “upgrade” an implied syncpoint to a real syncpoint, click the small note (or rest) at the top of the syncpoint and drag it left or right. This will immediately turn the syncpoint circle black, indicating it’s a real (manually adjusted) syncpoint.

Why would you want to do this? Because it lets you fine-tune situations in which most of the music is metronomic but a few bars here-and-there are played out of time.

Converting a real syncpoint to an implied one

To “downgrade” a real syncpoint to an implied one, use the “Delete without renumbering” function, as explained in Deleting syncpoints.

Why would you want to do this? Because it lets you simplify your syncpoints, taking advantage of Soundslice’s equal spacing, for music that was recorded to a click track.

The “end” shortcut

We offer a convenient shortcut for the very last syncpoint in your music — that is, the one representing the final barline.

Double-click a syncpoint’s number and type “end”, followed by the Enter key. This will calculate the correct bar number for the last syncpoint, looking at your slice’s notation.

This is simply a shortcut to help you from needing to manually calculate how many bars are in your music. So one common syncpoint workflow is:

1. Create a syncpoint at the beginning, at the music’s initial downbeat.
2. Create a syncpoint at the end of the last bar (i.e., at the final barline).
3. Double-click the second syncpoint and type ‘end’, followed by the Enter key.
4. Optionally drag the first and last syncpoints left/right to fine-tune the positioning.

This will automatically create a syncpoint for each measure of your music, evenly spaced, and you’re done. That was fast!