ADR Tools

Package published on November 29, 2020 by Ivan Che

ADR Tools is not just a set of commands, it's more like an application integrated with your Pro Tools session. It is best used with a streamdeck, turning it into a one-of-a-kind ADR-specialized DAW controller.

You can, however, assign keyboard triggers to the commands in this package and make perfect use of it without a streamdeck.


SESSION PREPARATION

To use ADR Tools, your tracking session should look somewhat like this:
In this screenshot, Audio 1 is the REC track, the one you record your mic signal on to. GT is the Guide track. Audio 2, 3, 4 are the tracks containing ADR audio of different characters that we might have already recorded earlier.
Btw, track names are NOT important. Call them whatever you like.
H that you see in the first send slot of every track on the picture is Headphone send. The one that you feed to your talent. It is recommended that you use the first slot for this purpose. You could use different slots, but then you'd have to modify the scripts. Note that Headphone send on Guide Track should be PRE-Fader and all the other Headphone sends in the session should be POST-Fader. This is important in order for ADR Tools to work as expected.
That's it! Easy, right?
Now that all the preparation is done, let's see what each command of the package does.


ASSIGN TRACKS

Assign GT

This command lets ADR Tools learn which track in your session is the Guide track.
Select your guide track in PT and run the command. In the top right corner you will see soundflow log saying "Guide assigned".
It only takes single track as an input, if you select multiple tracks it will remember the first one. So if you have more than one guide track in your session, you could group them into a single AUX bus (make sure you put Headphone send on this bus, not the individual tracks) and then assign that bus as GT.


Assign REC

This command lets ADR Tools learn which track is your record track. The one that has microphone as an input.
Use it in the same manner as Assign GT with the only difference that this command supports selecting and assigning multiple tracks at once. For when you need to record with more than one mic for example.
Running this command will also record enable newly assigned REC track(s), and remove record enable from the old ones.

You will need to assign both Guide and REC Tracks before you attempt to play or record anything with ADR Tools. However, it will give you a warning if you try to run a command that requires REC or Guide Track to be assigned.


Clear GT REC

This one, as you can tell from a pretty straight-forward naming, removes the assignment of both Guide and ADR Tracks. However you can skip this step entirely, since assigning new Guide and REC tracks will rewrite the previous values.
Running this command also removes record enable from prevously assigned REC Track(s).


Assign PRTNR

To understand what this command does, we need to review the concept of Partner Tracks:
These tracks contain previously recorded ADR of different characters speaking in the same scene, likely having a dialogue with the one we're tracking at the moment. It is not rare, when we play back what we have just recorded, we want to hear it in the context of the scene.
This is what this command is for. It lets you assign Partner Tracks, which will get unmuted every time you choose to Play ADR. You can expect this behavior as long as you don't...


Clear PRTNR

Much like Clear GT REC, this command clears the assignment of Partner Tracks. You can assign new Partner Tracks on top of the old ones (without clearing), they will get rewritten. But if you don't want any Partners to play back along with your main REC Track when you review what you have recorded, you should use this command.
(The whole Partner Tracks concept may seem hard to understand when you read about it in the tutorial, but if you try it, it's actually really easy to figure out.)


INPUT MONITORING

This is yet another command that is not simply a command, but more of a concept. And that concept is: Pro Tools' input monitoring is not perfect. There is no way of being able to hear the talent at all times, while also being able to play back clips on the record track.
If you use input monitoring on your record track, you won't be able to hear clips that are ON IT, and your talent won't hear the pre-roll of his previously recorded lines before you punch in. You could disable input monitoring, but then you won't be able to hear your talent live when you review what he had recorded, and during the pre-roll as well, or when you're listening to the guide track. You could do what we did for a long time: enable input monitoring on your rec track, but move recorded clips to a different track, but that just honestly feels like an unnecesary complication. Let's be straight forward about it: there was no easy way of doing this in Pro Tools. Not until now.
When you run this command for the first time in your tracking session, it creates an aux track called InputMon. You should set its input and output to match your record track's I/O. You should also assign a headphone send to the first slot (PRE-Fader, just like on your Rec track), so the talent can hear himself at all times as well.
Once you've done that, you're all set. Now, everytime transport goes into play, InputMon aux will unmute, allowing you to hear mic input through it. When transport goes into record, it mutes, because you can already hear your mic through the record track. When you punch out, it unmutes again, and when the transport stops, it mutes, cause in stop you can hear record-armed track's input.
ADR Tools' Input Monitoring will run in background all the time, until you trigger the command again, which will disable it (You will see soundflow message "InputMon is OFF").
And the best part is, InputMon is not in any way connected to any other ADR Tools' functions. It does not rely on ADR Tools' Play / Rec commands, it just follows PT transport. So you can use it without using other ADR Tools' functionality, or the other way around, use all of the ADR Tools without InputMon. However I recommend you use both ;)


Mark

This is the simpliest command in this package. It colors the selected clip black (none). That's it.
Why black? We always use color "none" to mark preferred takes, because once you start putting clips into playlists, they tend to get super colorful. And after a fair amount of takes it gets hard to tell preferred clips from not preferred. Black is the only color that lets a clip stand out in playlists.


PLAY / REC MODES

This set of commands is the main event. ADR Tools suggests that you don't use Pro Tools' built in transport controls, but instead use these three "Modes" based on what you want to hear. After you've taught ADR Tools which tracks in your session are Guide, REC and (optionally) Partner Tracks with Assign commands, you can trigger following Modes to manipulate these tracks' mutes and send bypass states along with transport control.


Play GT

GT stands for Guide Track. Select this mode when you want to hear back your reference audio without the disturbance of previously recorded ADR. This mode will:
  • Un-mute Gude track
  • Un-bypass Guide send
  • Mute Rec track
  • Start playback
InputMon will Un-mute as well allowing you to hear the talent in case if he has any comments during the playback.


Play ADR

This mode is for when you want to review what you have recorded. It will:
  • Mute Guide track
  • Bypass Guide send
  • Un-mute REC track
  • Un-mute Partner tracks (as long as you have any assigned)
  • Start playback
InputMon will Un-mute as well allowing you to hear the talent in case if he has any comments during the playback.


REC

Obviously enough, use this one when you want to record. When recording, we don't want to hear the guide track, but we want to let the talent hear it. So you can expect this mode to:
  • Mute Guide track
  • Un-bypass Guide send
  • Un-mute Rec track
  • Start recording
InputMon will Un-mute during the pre-roll and after you punch out, and mute during record.
Before going into record, this command will also make sure that the track(s) assigned as REC Track(s) are record enabled, and if they aren't, throw a warning. This is for when you decide to record into a different track, arm it, but forget to let ADR Tools know with the Assign REC command. The better way to go about is to form a habbit of not manually arming the tracks, but using Assign REC command instead. It does record enable the selected tracks for you and at the same time it remembers them as REC Tracks.

All of the three modes, when triggered from stop, also remove any existing selection prior to starting the transport. This is to deal with accidental one-frame-long (or clip) selections. These happen to the best of us, but not anymore :)
You can switch between the modes on the go and punch in and out both with REC command or Pro Tools' default controls. ADR Tools will work as expected.