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J
Jim Darrah
Participating Frequently
February 24, 2021
Question

need help copy and paste part of a wav without distorting the copy

  • February 24, 2021
  • 1 reply
  • 333 views

I need to take a wav file with  a single cycle of a sound I will play via a computer program by repeating it to give a continuous sound. I need to duplicate the single cycle from a saved wav file and add it on the end so that the file now has 2 cycles which should be the same.  When I do the paste the 2nd cycle is messed up and doesn't accurately represent the same data as the 1st cycle.  Not sure if it matters but the 1st file has a 3k cutoff applied.  As you can see  in the 2 cylc file when I  copy the first cycle and paste it to its end, the data points at the beginning of the 2nd cycle are now flattened and don't look like the source, however it seems to be fine after that.  How can I duplicate the original file to give a new file with 2 cycles without the distortion I'm seeing? 

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1 reply

SteveG_AudioMasters_
Community Expert
SteveG_AudioMasters_Community Expert
Community Expert
February 24, 2021

With samples that short you have to go to Edit>Preferences>Data and turn off all the smoothing. The other thing about your samples though is that they don't start and stop on zero-crossings, so anything you play back is going to have an additional 'buzz' added to it, which will be especially noticeable with no smoothing.

J
Jim DarrahAuthor
Participating Frequently
February 24, 2021

Thanks for the quick reply.  I'm a self contained amateur and I would have never found it on  my own.  The samples were done by eye from a recording of the instrument. The intent was to get the same part of the wave as it rises above the midline and closes to the same point as closes back to the midline.  What terms would I  use to search this  forum  for a way to clip the wave at exactly the zero crossing on each end?

SteveG_AudioMasters_
Community Expert
SteveG_AudioMasters_Community Expert
Community Expert
February 24, 2021

I don't know, but I can tell you how to do it. Would that do? Right-click on the timeline, and make sure that Snapping is enabled, and that there's a check in Snap to Zero Crossings. Whenever you make a cut, it should snap the cursor to the nearest one. 

 

The chances of sampling an instrument with just a couple of samples in any meaningful sort of way are about zero. I think you're about to find this out...  and when you've finished, remember to reset the edit smoothing so that it's enabled. If you don't do this, you'll end up with clicks on pretty much all edits - that's what it's there to prevent!

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