Let's get started by setting up Pro Tools and making sure everything is working for you. Troubleshooting is huge part of music production, no matter where you are in your career. We will go through some of the most common menus you need to know to fix problems. I would like you to set up your Pro Tools session like mine just because pro tools is so customization. And I want you to see exactly what I see. When you first open Pro Tools it will give you some options to create new projects with this quick start menu. You have the option for creating a blank session which is what we're going to do here. Creating a session from a template, which we'll make later in the course or opening a session that you've already made in Pro Tools to continue working on it. You also have some options for session parameters or different options on how this project is going to work. The first option is the Audio File Type and that just shows what type of audio files are created when they're recorded into Pro Tools. There are a few options for this and they're pretty common audio files like WAV and AIFF. These audio file types are what we call lossless audio files, which means that they're full resolution and you're not losing any data from having them. The next is what is called the Bit Depth. And that's basically a measurement of your dynamics. The higher the number for the bit depth, the more dynamic variation you're going to have between loud and soft. For this, I want you to choose 24 bit, which is a good bit depth for the projects we're going to be working on. Next, we have the sample rate which is basically a measurement of how many tiny pictures per second Pro Tools takes of a sound being recorded into it. There are many options for sample rate and generally the higher the number the more detailed the recording is going to be. However, higher sample rate recordings have larger file sizes and take up more room on your computer. So for these projects I want you to choose 44.1 kilohertz which is really common for audio and production. For your IO settings, you should see an option that says last used or something similar. Once you've completed all of these steps with the session parameters you can click OK, and create a new project. Pro Tools will ask you to save your session immediately, which is great because you can choose a location for it and keep yourself organized every time you go to open that session again. [MUSIC] Make sure you choose a good place to save your projects that you can always find them. So once Pro Tools open, you want to check and make sure that your headphone's working. The easiest way to do this is to create a click track or a metronome. Choose Track > Create Click Track, and then press Space bar which is play. [MUSIC] If you hear your click that's great but if you don't, here are some ways to troubleshoot. Where it says Playback Engine you should see your interface if you have one or if you're plugging in directly to your laptop or computer into the headphone jack, it should say built in output. If what's listed here doesn't line up with where you want to hear the sound come out then make sure you click on it and change it to something different. So once again, if you have your interface plugged in you'll be able to see it here. or if you want to come out through your headphones it'll be under Built-in Output. [MUSIC] You might need to restart Pro Tools if you change your playback engine. Once you're sure that you're hearing everything coming out of Pro Tools, let's go over exactly what you're looking at here. Depending on how Pro Tools opened you might see your edit or your mix window. What we're looking at here is what's called the edit window or has a timeline that we're going to be working with. If you're on a Mac choose Cmd+= or on a PC Ctrl+= to bring up your mix window. And once we add more tracks and Pro Tools this will look more like a traditional mixing desk. Cmd+= or Ctrl+= toggles in between both of these views. Bring your edit window into view, and let's get started. In the top left corner we have our edit modes. The most common one's we're going to use are Grid and Slip. Grid mode will allow you to snap your regions to a time grid that you can create, and Slip mode will allow you to move them anywhere that you want. We'll cover regions in the next lesson. Below your edit modes you have your track selector and your groups. Once again, we'll be going over these in a later lesson. Next to your edit modes you have your tools and most importantly the Multi-tool. The Multi-tool is selected by choosing the U shaped bar above your other tools to select all of them. And it allows you to use multiple tools seamlessly without having to change them in between your edit. Below your tools, you have your timeline. And if you don't see all of the options that I have here, you can customize this area by clicking on this menu at the top left hand corner. I usually like to see bars and beats, minutes and seconds, markers and tempo. Tempo, which is how fast or slow your production is, can be changed by clicking on this red arrow. Right now our productions at 120 beats per minute. I can change this to go faster or slower by double clicking on the red arrow next to my tempo. If we want to go faster just increase this number. [SOUND] If I want to go slower we'll try a lower number. [SOUND] Next, we have Grid options which correspond with our Grid edit modes. Turn the Grid on and off here, and set how the grid is subdivided by clicking right next to it. Right now my grid is set to seconds, but one of the most useful ways to separate your grid is by note values that correspond to your tempo. So I'm going to choose Bars and Beats. And you can choose to have quarter note, 8th note, 16th note or even an entire bar subdivisions for your grid. Remember when you're in grid mode your regions will snap to whatever this value is. Next we have our play, stop, and record buttons, which are also know as transport controls. Next to your Click Track you should see some options here. Customize your Pro Tools session to look like mine by clicking on this drop down menu that says Edit Window View Selector when you hover over it with your mouse. For the duration of this course, I would like you to select Inserts A-E which are basically your plug-ins or your effects. Choose Sends A-E which we'll use use for reverb. And choose I/O which is your input output settings. Yours should look just like mine. Hit Cmd+= on a Mac or Ctrl+= on a PC, and you can set the same settings in your mix window. This way you can see exactly the same parameters no matter what view you're looking at. Change this view in the bottom left corner where it says Mix Window View Selector when you hover over it with your mouse. Once again, choose Inserts A-E, Sends A-E, Meters and Faders so we can see how loud things are. Track color and comments if you want. [MUSIC]
