User`s guide

Chapter 21: Automation 295
You can permanently store the initial posi-
tion of an automatable control by doing
one of the following:
◆ Place the track in Auto Write mode and
press Play to write a few seconds of automa-
tion data to the track
◆ Manually place a breakpoint on the auto-
mation playlist somewhere after the initial
breakpoint.
Automating Switched Controls
Pro Tools treats switched controls (such as
mutes and Plug-In bypasses) as touch sensi-
tive controls. Automation data is written
for as long as the switch or button for that
control is pressed or touched.
For example, if you have just written a se-
ries of mute on/off states on a channel in
quick succession, the manual method for
clearing this automation data would re-
quire you to move to the Edit window,
choose automation playlist for Mute, select
the mute automation data, and delete it.
In Pro Tools, you don't have to perform all
of these steps. Instead, you can perform an-
other automation pass on the track and
hold down the Mute button when it
reaches the state you want to keep. As long
as you hold down the button, Pro Tools
overwrites the underlying mute data on the
track with the current state of the switch
until you press Stop.
Automating Sends
Pro Tools allows dynamic automation of
Send Level, Send Mute, and for stereo
Sends, Send Pans. This feature makes it easy
to control effects levels and stereo place-
ment during mixdown with great preci-
sion.
To automate a Send Level, Mute or Pan:
1 In the Automation Enable window, make
sure the automation type is write-enabled.
2 Choose an automation mode for each
track you want to automate. For an initial
automation pass, choose Auto Write.
3 Select Windows > Mix Window Shows >
Sends View.
4 Click the Send to open the Inserts/Sends
Editor for the Send that you want to auto-
mate.
– or –
Choose Display > Sends View Shows and
select the individual Send from the sub-
menu.
5 Click Play to begin writing automation.
Move the controls you want to automate.
6 When you have finished, click Stop.
Copying Track Automation to Sends
(TDM Systems Only)
There may be times where you want a
track’s Send automation to mirror automa-
tion in the track itself, for example, when
an effect level needs to follow the levels in
a main mix. To do this, you can copy the
entire automation playlist for the selected
control to the corresponding playlist for
the Send.