M-AUDIO Pro Tools Recording Studio - Manual (Page 1047)

Chapter 47: Working with Synchronization 1029
A highlighted numeric field indicates the cur-
rent active field for numeric entry editing. En-
tering a value in a field allows you to move a se-
lected element to the time location that you
enter. The Start, Sync Point, and End fields are
accessible when the Time Grabber tool is active.
Only the Start or End (depending on where you
click the mouse) and Duration fields are active
when one of the Trimmer tools is active (see
“Using the Trimmer Tools in Spot Mode” on
page 1030).
Use Subframes Option
A subframe is 1/100th of a frame. The Use Sub-
frames
option enables you to use these smaller
units for greater accuracy. This command adds
an additional time field in the SMPTE
hours:minutes:seconds:frames box, which ap-
pears as the far right time field when enabled.
Use a Period (.) to separate subframe values from
whole frames.
Capturing Time Code
Pro Tools also allows you to easily capture frame
locations on-the-fly in the Spot dialog by press-
ing the Equal key, or by clicking the Current Time
Code
button while valid time code is being re-
ceived by Pro Tools. With VITC, you can accu-
rately capture a paused or “crawling” VTR’s
SMPTE location.
When Time Code is selected for the Time Scale,
pressing the Equal key captures the incoming
time code. When Bars|Beats is selected for the
Time Scale, pressing the Equal key will capture
to the nearest measure.
Although Capture Time Code works with free-
running Linear Time Code (LTC) or VITC, frame
numbers of a paused frame can only be captured
with VITC.
SYNC peripherals can read VITC. With
MachineControl and a SYNC peripheral, you
can also read serial time code.
To spot a region to a specific SMPTE frame:
1 Enable Spot mode.
2 Set the Main Time Scale to Time Code. (See
“Setting a SMPTE Session Start Time (Start
Frame)” on page 1016.)
3 Identify the SMPTE frame location where you
want to trigger playback of your region by paus-
ing your video deck on that frame.
4 With the Time Grabber tool, click a region in
a track, or in the Region List, and drag it into a
track. The Spot dialog appears.
To increase or decrease SMPTE values in
the Spot dialog by a specific number of
frames, press Plus (+) or Minus (–) on the
numeric keypad, enter a number, and press
the Enter key.
Additional time field with “Use Subframes” enabled
Subframe measurements are not available
in the Current Time field.
To use Remote mode with MachineControl,
you will need an approved serial port. For a
complete list of currently approved ports, see
www.digidesign.com.