Warp tabs (in orange) have been used to drag the chord to the starts of bars 18-21 so that the whole performance will play in time with the project tempo. In essence, these can all be thought of as 'markers' that are positioned within an audio clip, and control how Cubase then manipulates the timing of the audio in the clip.Īudio warp is useful for correcting timing drifts in live performances, as shown here with an acoustic guitar part. Coming To Terms With The Termsīefore getting to grips with practicalities, three terms need to be understood: 'hitpoints', 'warp tabs' and 'Q-points'. However, when it's just a few loops that require processing, or I want to create loops from performances I've recorded myself, or if something more than basic tempo-matching is needed, audio warp is definitely up to the task. The audio warp capabilities of Cubase that we're about to explore are undoubtedly very powerful, but I'd offer a word of caution: much as I like Cubase's audio warp functionality, if I'm working with projects that are dominated by commercial sample library loops and require simple tempo-matching, I'll usually go instead for a tool designed specifically for that job (in my case, Sony's Acid Pro). These provide a number of creative and corrective possibilities, but the emphasis of this sort of processing is mainly on loops, so I'll concentrate upon loop-based applications in this column. Under the broad heading of 'audio warp', Cubase also features some non-destructive tempo and pitch-shifting tools. Cubase's audio warp facilities provide a powerful toolkit for manipulating the timing of recorded audio to fit grids and grooves.īack in September, I looked at applications of the off-line Time Stretch function.