Acoustica Mixcraft 7 - Manual (Page 13)

7
QUICK START
We know what you’re thinking … “I don’t wanna read this big ol’ manual now, I wanna
rock!” (or thereabouts). Don’t worry, we’ve got ya covered. In this section, we’ll show
how to play audio clips from Mixcraft’s huge included library, record audio and MIDI
tracks, and add effects.
LOAD AND PLAY AN AUDIO CLIP
To launch Mixcraft, double-click the Mixcraft 7 icon on the desktop. We’ll begin by
dragging an audio clip of a bass line into the Main Window – that’s the big gray grid
where clips of audio, MIDI, and video playback.
Click the Library tab at the bottom of the arrange window, then click the Sort By
pop-up menu and select Song Kit. You’ll see a list of song styles below; select 12-8 Blues.
In the list of loops on the right, you’ll see Bass 12 Bars. Click and drag this to bar 1 of
Audio Track in the empty gray grid beneath the word Start. While hovering a loop over
the grid in the Track View window, you’ll notice two tiny white triangles; this is called
the Caret.
The Caret shows where clips will land when the mouse button is released. It also
indicates where playback or recording will begin. Once you’ve dropped the audio into
place, a dialog box will open and ask: “Use Best Sounding Project Tempo, Key & Time
Signature?” We’ll explain exactly what this means later on, but for now, click Yes.
Once you’ve dropped a loop into the main grid, it creates a “Clip.” Clips are the rectan-
gular audio, MIDI, or video “building blocks” in the main grid that make up a project.