F.A.Q.

Common Questions

·         Q.: Does SAW EDL Investigator work with SAWStudio or SAWStudio Lite?

A.: No.  We are working on creating a separate version for SAWStudio and SAWStudio Lite.  The web site will be updated when the new version is available.

·         Q.: Could you please explain to me exactly what EDL Investigator does and why it would be a benefit to me?

A.: At its simplest form, EDL Investigator loads a SAW EDL file (actually any SAW version's EDL file) and creates a listing on your screen of the EDL, which you can save to a text file. I've attached an example text file from EDL Investigator, so you can see an example of what you'd get. EDL Investigator has a real easy interface, where you can set up through a preferences tabbed dialog, what is and isn't listed and the format that it's listed in.

Besides this most basic function, EDL Investigator also includes extra features:

1) Session Packer - which takes your EDL file, analyses it, and creates a new EDL file and sound files consisting of only the audio from sound files which is actually used in the session. Say you record a vocal to a sound file VOC1.WAV which lasts 5 minutes, but you only use 1 phrase (you create a region of only 1 phrase) which lasts only 12 seconds. SAW doesn't have any easy way to retrieve those extra 4:48 minutes of hard disk space. Session Packer does this for you -- it creates new sound files and an EDL in a new directory for you that minimizes the amount of hard disk space an EDL would require... but still maintains the complete EDL. So after you've done a session and you want to back up the session, you can "pack" it to a new folder. Once completed, you can check the new EDL file, and if you're happy, delete the original -- the new "packed" EDL file and sound files will consist *only* of actual audio used in the MT (or if you prefer, of all audio included in regions in the session).

2) Path Changer - Let's say you move a sound file in SAW, the only way to change where SAW looks for that sound file, is in SAW in the File menu... "Change EditListFile Paths". However this method is really unintuitive, un-Windows like, and really time consuming because you have to actually type in the new path for each sound file one by one. Path Changer makes it a 5 second job... Load the EDL file, run Path Changer, select which files you want to change (actually, EDL Investigator will list all sound files which it can't locate in red and you can easily select all those files in Path Changer with one button click)... then you may either point to where the sound files are located by using a simple dialog, let Path Changer search your drives for the sound files, or manually enter a new path for the sound files. Hit OK and wham it's done instantly.

3) Region Filer - This lets you create new sound files from regions in an EDL file. Simply load an EDL file, run Region Filer, select the region(s) and hit OK. This is useful if you work on multimedia apps which need every word to be delivered as a separate sound file.

4) Session Mover - This copies/moves a complete SAW session from any one location on your hard drives to any other location. This is perfect for when you need to make a backup of your EDL... It copies all files which the EDL requires to a new location. Simply run Session Mover, select the source EDL and then select a new destination... check if you want to delete the original session... and hit OK.

5) Merge - Merge is similar to the Blend feature in SAW, but has less limitations and actually merges in more data than SAW's blend.

6) The ability to Import and Export regions and markers between SAW and Sound Forge... This simply does as described... You can select which regions and markers you wish to import and export.

7) Import Sound Files As Regions - In SAW there is no easy way to "Open Soundfile and create region" on more than one sound file at a time. This feature lets you open a normal Windows file dialog and select multiple sound files and build up a list of sound files to Open and create Regions. So you can select say 45 sound files and hit OK... and all the files will be added to the currently loaded EDL file and their peak data files can be created for you.

8) Offset - Say you have an EDL file, and you want to apply an offset to the session. This lets you do it to subframe accuracy. Unlike SAW's offset, this doesn't just change the start offset, it actually moves all the region and mix moves' and markers' locations by the offset amount.

9) SND to WAV conversion - If you open a SAWPro EDL which contains any SND files, this feature will convert those SND files to WAV files and update the EDL file to point to the new WAV files.

10. PDF Center - Create new peak data files (SPD and WPD files) for all the sound files in a session.

11. Clear Read Only Attributes - This will go through all the files in an EDL and clear their Read Only attributes. Really useful if you recover a session from a CD-ROM in Windows Explorer.

12. There are 2 additional extras... a SMPTE Calculator and a Delay chart calculator .

Most of these features may seem like simple things... But as a SAW user, you probably would perform these tasks repetitively, or through some work-around. EDL Investigator makes them simple and fast!

·         Q.: I have an older version of SAW EDL Investigator. What's new in V3.0?

A.: There are numerous additions that have been added to SAW EDL Investigator since V2.18.

The ability to display the FX data
Print & Print preview
Region Filer
Path Changer
Offset
Session Packer
Session Mover
Sorted data (regions, sound files & unused files & regions weren't sorted in previous versions)
Display sound file size & total size of all sound files
Display the regions in a table format
Ability to apply the MT offset to the region SMPTE values
The MT Offset is now applied to the SF Markers (as in SAW)
There is no layout option in previous versions - region names in a track's table view was limited to 25 characters
Help file
Merge now copies/creates the FX files for the new EDL

 

·         Q.: What's the difference between Merge and SAW's Blend ?

A.: Merge features that Blend doesn't do:

Merge can merge EDLs even if their sample rates are different.
Mix moves are merged into the new EDL (Blend discards all mix moves).
Merge can merge into the same time domain if there are no conflicts (Blend requires you to select and drag the regions).
Merge can merge different SAW EDL formats together (Blend can only import from the same EDL format).

Click here for a complete description of the Merge feature

 

 

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Please note: SAW EDL Investigator is a continuously growing program, so these features & their methods of implementation are subject to minor changes & enhancements.