Using bookmarks for beat lines to match effects with music

Ben_sfg

Trying to learn the software. Looking for a way to add beat marks while listening to audio track. I found bookmarks and they are SO CLOSE to what I need. It appears like you can hold down CTRL-SHIFT and then hit the B key where you want a bookmark. You can easily move small effects to those bookmark lines. Exactly what I need! However, every time I press B while holding CTRL-SHIFT it opens a dialog box to give the bookmark a name and color. Neither of which I care about ... and the audio keeps playing UGH!

Without that unwanted pop up to name and color the bookmark I could easily just tap B every time I hear a spot in the audio where I want the effect to go.

Sure you can look at the wave form and try to line up things that way but that's not always easy or obvious.

Is there a work around or another way to go about this?

Thanks

borate

Experiment with this approach...

Add a blank file, drop it onto the next higher track (overlay) and drag its right handle to the length of the sequence.

Right-click the blank clip's track, click the fx icon and add a zero opacity TRANSPARENCY effect.

Drag the cursor to where you want the first mark, right-click the blank track and SPLIT SELECTED CLIP. Repeat as needed.

Each split represents where you want your effect to be placed.

When done, the blank track can be deleted.

Record_2022_11_05_08_58_13_586.mp4

Ben_sfg

That looks like something that could help but what I'm trying to do is add multiple marks while the audio track is playing so I can later add effects at the selected spots. I could only find an option to split all tracks. A hotkey "L" is possible but not while the preview is playing. Bookmarks can be added while playing but just with the pop-up that makes it useless for my needs.

Thinking about trying a macro program that presses CTRL-SHIFT-B then waits 20ms and presses enter key. It needs to be fast. Bookmark BOOM... BOOM...BOOM... boomboomboom. Hopefully up to 3 bookmarks a second.

borate

Here's a convoluted method to test...

Right-click the audio track and Save Audio Clip As New File. It should land in the PC's MUSIC folder.

Open that file in Wavepad.

Play the file and press the B key for each mark, which will add squares to the timeline.

Open a video capture program, like Debut, and capture the screen playback of the Wavepad project, saving it as an mp4.

In Videpad, import the captured mp4 and place it (overlay) on the next highest track. Use the POSITION effect to move it to a convenient screen location.

Right-click the audio track and SYNC AUDIO. Mute the overlay audio track.

The waveform image will precisely track playback, with the squares marking potential edit points.

When done, hide or delete the overlay track.

Ben_sfg

Still just really starting to learn this program. It seems like trying to key in the beat in real time isn't that helpful anyway. I've been having to micro adjust the bookmarks using the sound wave form... easier than I thought to just really zoom in and manually add bookmarks.

borate

File a suggestion for pressing the B key to add bookmarks while playing, without the pop up, as is possible with Wavepad.

https://www.nch.com.au/suggestions/index.html?software=VideoPad