RipX DAW Manual - J
RipX DAW Manual - J
It is also a good idea to watch the walkthrough YouTube videos available from Help >
YouTube Videos.
Contents
RipX DAW & RipX DAW PRO ....................................................................................................................... 5
The RipX DAW Panels ................................................................................................................................. 5
Rips ...................................................................................................................................................................... 5
Layers .................................................................................................................................................................. 7
Find...................................................................................................................................................................... 7
FX......................................................................................................................................................................... 7
Input .................................................................................................................................................................... 8
Sounds ................................................................................................................................................................. 8
Repair (PRO only) ................................................................................................................................................ 8
RipScripts (PRO only)........................................................................................................................................... 8
Interactive Help ................................................................................................................................................... 8
Opening, Ripping & Exporting Audio/Video ................................................................................................. 8
Opening & Ripping Audio .................................................................................................................................... 8
Preparing Rips for Editing ................................................................................................................................. 11
Exporting Audio................................................................................................................................................. 11
Video Import & Export (macOS only) ................................................................................................................ 12
The Cursor, Selections, Groups & Effects ....................................................................................................13
The Cursor ......................................................................................................................................................... 13
Note & Time Selections ..................................................................................................................................... 13
Groups ............................................................................................................................................................... 15
Applying Effects to Selections ........................................................................................................................... 15
Automation Lanes ............................................................................................................................................. 19
Presets & Combos ............................................................................................................................................. 20
Essential Step-By-Step Editing Instructions .................................................................................................22
Pitch .................................................................................................................................................................. 22
Chromatically edit pitch ................................................................................................................................ 22
Edit pitch over a musical scale ...................................................................................................................... 22
Finely edit pitch ............................................................................................................................................. 23
Quickly flatten, slide, or add constant vibrato to pitch ................................................................................ 23
Rhythm .............................................................................................................................................................. 24
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Pitch .................................................................................................................................................................. 49
Rhythm .............................................................................................................................................................. 49
Volume .............................................................................................................................................................. 50
Unpitched Sound............................................................................................................................................... 50
Noise Removal, Repair & Timbre Editing .......................................................................................................... 50
Clean / Repair Unpitched Audio.................................................................................................................... 50
The Repair Panel ........................................................................................................................................... 50
Edit Pitched Timbre ....................................................................................................................................... 51
PRO: Using RipX DAW with Other DAWs ....................................................................................................52
Pro Tools AudioSuite ......................................................................................................................................... 52
VST3/ARA2 ........................................................................................................................................................ 52
Studio One..................................................................................................................................................... 52
Cubase Pro/Nuendo ...................................................................................................................................... 53
REAPER .......................................................................................................................................................... 53
Cakewalk ....................................................................................................................................................... 54
Other DAWs .................................................................................................................................................. 54
Using As External Sample Editor ....................................................................................................................... 54
Setting Up the DAW ...................................................................................................................................... 54
Sending the Sample to RipX DAW ................................................................................................................. 55
Editing and Updating the Sample ................................................................................................................. 55
Let the DAW Know About the Update (only required for the following DAWs) .......................................... 56
PRO: Additional Keyboard & Mouse Shortcuts (macOS/Windows) ..............................................................57
How To… ...................................................................................................................................................58
Change the Key of a Rip .................................................................................................................................... 58
A/B..................................................................................................................................................................... 58
Manually Separate/Re-assign Instruments ....................................................................................................... 58
Use RipX DAW for Transcription ....................................................................................................................... 58
Some Creative Applications .......................................................................................................................59
Copy & paste notes between different Rips and different parts of the same Rip............................................ 59
Create mashups of your tracks ......................................................................................................................... 59
Import MIDI tracks from another DAW ............................................................................................................ 60
Put notes onto a different scale ........................................................................................................................ 60
Creative Ideas.................................................................................................................................................... 61
PRO: Build suspense with an infinite glissando (slide)...................................................................................... 61
PRO: Replace an instrumental phrase with a vocal phrase that has the exact same pitches & timing (vocal
transplant) ......................................................................................................................................................... 61
PRO: RipScript Editor .................................................................................................................................63
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RipX DAW PRO includes all of the features of RipX DAW and more, as described below. In the following,
chapters with headings prefixed by PRO concern features that are only available in RipX DAW PRO and can be
skipped by those who do not have that tier. All other chapters are essential reading for everyone but may also
contain a small amount of information about PRO features.
• RipX DAW – Includes essential tools for separating audio files into stems (including vocals, guitars,
piano, bass and drums), editing, applying effects, sound replacement, and creating new music by
recording and using AI music generation and samples. Also includes guitar-chord recognition,
audio-to-MIDI export, and more.
• RipX DAW PRO – Adds advanced tools for manipulating and cleaning up audio (all the way down
to its deepest harmonic, amplitude and frequency levels), repair features, the RipLink plugin for
using RipX DAW with other DAWs, and an editor for writing and editing scripts in Python to
automate audio processing.
• Click on the title bar of a panel to hide or show its contents. Panels can also be opened and closed
from the Panels menu.
• Click & drag vertically on its title bar to move it above or below other panels.
• Click & drag horizontally on its title bar to move it into a new or different column of panels.
• Click & drag immediately above its title bar to move it up or down over the contents of the panel
above. (This is useful if one panel is hiding the contents of another panel above or beneath it.)
• If any of the contents of a panel are hidden, use the mouse wheel to scroll up or down to them or
hover the mouse pointer over the panel and click & drag the vertical scrollbar on the outside edge.
• The width of the panels can be adjusted by clicking & dragging their inside edge horizontally.
o Tip: If a panel contains sliders, widen it to make finer adjustments with them.
Rips
In this panel, you will find your Rips – the music that you have opened or created with RipX DAW. A Rip is an
audio file that, instead of containing indecipherable and inflexible waveform information, stores the actual
notes, sounds and harmonics that can then be used to generate waveforms for playback.
Rip files can be created from audio files by ‘Ripping’ them, which uses an AI process known as source
separation. They can also be created by recording or by adding sampled sounds to an empty Rip. To create an
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empty Rip, hover over the title bar of the Rips Panel and click the + that appears, click File>New or press
X/Ctrl+N. If you do this by mistake, you can quickly undo it by pressing X/Ctrl+Z. For information on how to
create a Rip by opening an audio file, see Opening & Ripping Audio. For information on recording a new
Rip, see Recording. A Rip can also be created with an effect or sound applied to it so that it’s automatically
applied to notes added to that Rip, by clicking on that effect/sound in its Panel or by dragging & dropping it
onto the area between the panels when no Rip is open.
RipX DAW keeps up to three Rips open at a time so that it’s possible to switch between them quickly. An open
Rip has an open folder icon to the left of its name. Simply click on the name of an open Rip to display it.
Quickly swap between the current and previously displayed Rip by pressing ^/Ctrl+Tab. Double-click on the
name of an open/closed Rip to close/open it. The currently displayed Rip can also be closed by clicking
File>Close or pressing X/Ctrl+W.
If you have a large number of Rips, you can search within them by hovering over the title bar of the Rips Panel,
clicking on the button and typing. A shortlist is shown that narrows as you type. Click the x button to
clear and close the search. (Note: It’s necessary to do this before Step Time recording with the Computer
Keyboard – see Step Time Recording).
Right-click to rename a Rip, remove/delete it, or show the folder where it is stored.
Select multiple Rips and right-click on one of their names to remove/delete more than one at a time.
Markers can be added to a Rip to indicate where various sections of a song (such as the second verse or first
chorus) begin by right-clicking on area at the top of the Rip (where the bar numbers are) and choosing from
the menu. Click Add Marker… to create a custom marker. Markers are added to the hovered beat or bar
where the menu has been opened. They can be removed and renamed by right-clicking on them. Apart from
being useful for analyzing music for educational purposes and for marking points of interest to other musicians
(e.g. where they should record their backing vocals), markers make it easier to navigate longer Rips. Their
positions are shown on the horizontal scroll bar beneath the Rip and pressing Tab or x/Shift+Tab will cause
the Rip to jump to the next or previous marker, respectively.
The list of Rips within the Rips Panel is called a RipList. Rips can be reordered within this list by clicking &
dragging them up or down. Right-click on the name of a Rip to rename it, remove it from the RipList, delete it
from your hard drive, open the folder in which it is stored, or select all Rips in the RipList. Multiple Rips can
also be selected by clicking and x/Shift+Clicking or X/Ctrl+Clicking them. Right-clicking on any one of them
will then give the option to remove or delete all of those selected.
Right-click on the title bar of the Rips Panel to create a new RipList, open another RipList, rename the one that
is currently open, or show the folder in which it is stored.
You can drag a Rip from the Rips Panel onto the Rip that is currently displayed. Click the arrow to the left of its
name to list and do the same with its individual layers (think: instruments). You can hover for a moment over
each of the listed layers to audition its audio. Once dragged onto the currently displayed Rip, their contents
our grouped together for quick and easy editing, including fitting to the key of the Rip (see Groups). The Rip
or layer is automatically stretched to fit the BPM of the Rip it is dragged onto. Hold down z/Alt while clicking
& dragging to prevent this.
Drag & drop a selection of a Rip’s listed layers onto another Rip inside the Rips Panel and they will be added to
that Rip’s list of layers. This can also be done with an entire Rip except that it will be moved there and it will
no longer be possible to double-click on it to open, view or edit it. Hold down X/Ctrl while dragging &
dropping to copy it there instead. In either case, this can be undone by right-clicking on it within the list of
layers and clicking Return To Main List or Remove From Rip. From this menu, it can also be renamed. Once a
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Rip has been copied into another Rip’s list of layers, the two Rips are linked. Subsequently removing the Rip
from the RipList will cause it to be hidden (so that it’s still accessible from within the other Rip). However,
deleting it from the RipList will also cause it to be removed from the Rip.
Layers
This panel lists all of the layers (such as Voice, Guitar, Bass, and Kick Drum) that are in the currently displayed
Rip. Each layer has its own color and notes that belong to that layer have the same color.
Before editing any notes, or recording with RipX DAW, you should first select which layers you would like to
edit or record into. A single layer can be selected by clicking on its name. Multiple layers can be selected by
clicking and x/Shift+Clicking or X/Ctrl+Clicking on their names. The notes of all other layers will be shown
more faintly and, to avoid any accidents, it will not be possible to edit them. However, when playing back the
Rip, all layers, not just those that are selected, will be heard. Click on the Master layer to allow edits and
recording to all layers.
To mute a layer, hover over its name and click on the M button. Notes in muted layers are displayed as thin
lines. Click on the S button to solo that layer. Click on the arrow button to assign selected notes to that layer.
Click on the record button to record into that layer.
A slider is shown when hovering the mouse pointer over a layer’s name – click & drag the slider button to
adjust the level of that layer in the mix. Clicking the arrow button to the left of the instrument’s name reveals
additional sliders for adjusting the stereo panning and EQ of that layer. For a more detailed description of this,
see Volume & EQ.
A new layer can be created by clicking Add beneath the list of layers or by clicking the + button that appears
when hovering the mouse pointer over the title bar. Right-clicking on a layer presents a menu containing
several options for customizing it, including its name, color and the height of its notes. From there it is also
possible to delete a layer (including all of its notes) and to duplicate it so that a copy of its notes are placed on
top of themselves. For an explanation of the Stem Group area of this menu, see Exporting Audio.
Find
To search through all effects, sounds and loops, click on the button (or press X/Ctrl+F or click Edit>Find
FX/Sound/Loop) and start typing – the search results will appear beneath. For example, search for Pitch to
see a list of different pitch effects. If you cannot think of the precise name of the effect, sound or loop you’re
looking for, try a similar name in case RipX DAW recognizes it.
Effects and sounds can be applied from the Find Panel by clicking on them (see Applying Effects to
Selections) while loops can be added to a Rip by dragging & dropping them onto it (see The Loops Panel).
However, after a search, it’s also possible to apply effects and sounds without moving away from the keyboard
by pressing Enter to apply the top search result or by using the Up/Down arrow keys followed by Enter to
apply a different one.
Click the x button to the left of the search box, press X/Ctrl+F, or hold down Backspace to clear the search.
When the search box is empty, the Find Panel shows a list of all effects and sounds that are applied to the
current selection. Click the x button again to close the Find Panel. (Note: It’s necessary to do this before Step
Time recording with the Computer Keyboard – see Step Time Recording).
FX
This panel contains effects that can be used to alter the pitch, timing and level/volume of notes in various
different ways:
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• For pitch, these include vibrato, pitch slide and pitch quantization. Harmony and chords can also
be added.
• Time-related effects include reverb, time reversal and time quantization.
• Effects that alter the level/volume of a selection include stereo panning, filters and compression.
For information on how to use these effects, see Applying Effects to Selections.
Also included are some presets – effects that have been saved in a particular configuration so that they can be
quickly used again and again – and some combined effects called combos. Information on how to create and
use these can be found in Presets & Combos.
All effects are listed in alphabetical order but can also be searched by using the Find Panel (see above).
Input
This panel lists your currently connected input devices (such as microphones and MIDI keyboards) that you can
use to record into RipX. It also includes a Computer Keyboard input device that allows notes to be input or
recorded with a computer keyboard. More information about this panel can be found in Recording, AI
Music Generation & Using Samples.
Sounds
Sampled sounds can be applied to selected notes in the same way as effects. These are grouped into sound
palettes which can be expanded by clicking on their names. The sound of an existing note can be completely
replaced or blended with a sampled sound. Multiple sounds can be applied to the same note and the mixture
of sounds can be adjusted over time to cause a note to, for example, change from one sound to another.
Samples can also be clicked & dragged onto a Rip from this panel. For more information, see The Sounds
Panel.
Repair (PRO only)
More advanced tools for fixing and cleaning up audio can be found in this panel. See The Repair Panel for
more information.
Interactive Help
This panel gives a short explanation of what is currently under the mouse pointer and is useful if you need
information quickly.
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To open one or more audio files, click File>Open, press X/Ctrl+O, drag & drop them onto RipX
DAW or click on the large folder button that is shown when no Rip is open in RipX DAW.
For other types of audio, if the filename includes, or is, a stem name, for example drums.wav or
mysong_vocals.flac, RipX DAW will offer to rip it as a stem, optimizing separation for the type of stem named.
Otherwise, a dialog box will appear, offering a range of options.
• If the audio only contains one instrument or you do not need RipX DAW to separate them out,
leave Separate Instruments unchecked. Options are made available that allow the type of
instrument/special effect (SFX), to be specified. This helps RipX DAW to optimize the Rip file it
produces for that specific instrument/SFX and lets it know that it should put all notes in the same
layer for that instrument/SFX. A time range can also be chosen. Leave this blank to open the
entire track.
• If you are opening a full mix containing multiple instruments and other sounds that you’d like to
separate, check Separate Instruments. Choose which instrument(s) you would like to extract from
the audio. The available options are Voice, Bass, Other Sounds & Instruments, and Drums &
Percussion. You can also choose to Separate Guitar & Piano.
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o When it creates the Rip file, RipX DAW will assign notes performed by the various
instruments to appropriate color-coded Layers which are listed in the Layers Panel. (See
Layers for more information about this panel.)
o If you only need to create stems from the audio (e.g. for your DAW or for DJing purposes),
check Save Stems Only. No Rip file is created. Instead, WAV stems are placed inside a
RipX/Stems folder (or a location set in RipX/File>Preferences…) within your user account’s
Documents folder.
▪ To generate one vocal.wav stem plus one containing all other audio (called
instruments.wav), choose Voice only.
▪ For other file formats, uncheck Save Stems Only and use File>Export once the file has
been ripped.
o Check the Smaller Rips option if you’re just ripping songs to learn them and don’t mind if
the quality is slightly lower on pitch edits. The Rip will occupy significantly less space on
your hard drive so this option is also ideal for fast cloud transfer and storage.
o are around four times smaller than normal, ideal for uploading to iCloud, for example, to
use with RipX Backstage on Apple Vision Pro Pitch. These are ideal for learning songs and
uploading to iCloud, for example, to use with RipX Backstage on Apple Vision Pro
o Windows only: If you have an NVIDIA graphics card with at least 8GB graphics memory
and CUDA support, plus at least 16GB RAM installed, RipX DAW can use its power to rip
significantly faster.
▪ You will need to have the NVIDIA CUDA Toolkit v11.0 (free download) installed. If your
system meets these minimum requirements to use CUDA, RipX DAW will show a
message about where to download the toolkit if it is not already installed.
▪ Once installed, RipX DAW will use your graphics card automatically. You can check if it
is by clicking RipX>About RipX (macOS) or Help>About (Windows) and seeing if it says
Ripper GPU Hardware Acceleration On (CUDA) in the information that’s displayed.
▪ Graphics cards with the recommended 8GB VRAM supported include GeForce 1070 /
1080 / 2070 / 2080 / 3070 / 3080 / 3090 / 40XX.
Whilst the audio is being ripped, a progress bar appears in the Rips Panel, showing the name of the track
and how much time is remaining. Right-click on the progress bar and click Cancel Ripping to cancel it. If
ripping multiple instruments, once they have been separated, the Ripper app will open to analyze each.
Once finished, the Rip will be listed in the Rips Panel with an open folder
icon to the left of its name. Click on it to view the separated audio’s layers,
notes and unpitched sounds. Right-click on the name of the Rip in the Rips
Panel to rename it, remove it from the RipList, delete it from your hard
drive, or open the folder in which it is stored.
Add a background image to your Rip by dragging & dropping a JPEG or PNG
file onto it. (This can be removed by right-clicking on the name of the Rip in
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• In the Layers Panel, hover the mouse pointer over the layer that you would like the selection to
be in and click the arrow button that appears to the right of the layer’s name.
• If the layer does not exist, first click Add beneath the list of layers.
• You can then use the keyboard shortcut M to continue transferring selections to this layer.
RipX DAW automatically works out where bar lines should be placed. However, if you plan
to work with rhythmic aspects of audio, you should first ensure they are marked out
correctly:
• Starting from the first bar line, go through and check the position. If incorrect, click and drag the
line in the timeline to the correct place.
• RipX DAW will automatically update the bar lines that follow using audio from the currently
selected layers, so it’s a good idea to first select layers with the most audible beats.
• Continue through the Rip until they are all correctly placed.
Exporting Audio
From the File menu, use Export or press X/Ctrl+E to export Rips in a range of audio formats, including MP3,
WAV, FLAC, OGG, MIDI - Detailed (containing all pitch and amplitude changes within notes) and MIDI - Simple
(containing just the overall pitch and amplitude for each note). Rips can also be exported as Stem (.stem.mp4)
files for DJ apps like Native Instruments Traktor. Depending on the selected file format, choose from a
selection of bit-depths and sample rates as well as between Stereo and Mono.
Also choose whether to export the entire rip, a selection of it, a loop that’s marked within it, or all Rips
currently selected in the Rips Panel (see Note & Time Selections, Loops and Rips). Note that since MIDI
files contain bar position information, the exported MIDI file of a selection or loop will start from the
preceding bar line. If you would like it to start from the first note in the selection, you should move the bar
line to its start before exporting. (A bar line can be moved by clicking & dragging its top end.) When exporting
to MIDI, check Filter Notes to quickly remove quieter notes that aren’t needed for converting it into a score.
(For more control over this with the Filter Notes effect, see Applying Effects to Selections.)
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Finally, choose whether you would like to export the Rip as a single file or as separate stems or layers. Right-
click on the name of a layer in the Layers Panel to change the stem group to which it is assigned. In the same
menu, you can hover the mouse pointer to the right of one of the stem names and click on the pencil icon that
appears in order to rename that stem.
In addition, RipX can import AVI video files that use the Motion JPEG codec.
Once a video file has been Ripped, the audio is displayed as normal, and the video is displayed in its own
window which can be resized by clicking & dragging its corners. If you close the video window, it can be
reopened by clicking on the Rip.
The video automatically plays back in sync with the audio during playback, including when playing back
selections and loops (see Note & Time Selections and Loops). However, note that the video will no longer
be in sync with the audio if any time edits are made (such as deleting certain time selections or changing the
tempo of the Rip). RipX DAW is not designed to edit the video.
Videos can be exported as MP4 and MOV files by clicking File>Export or pressing X/Ctrl+E.
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• Click on a blank part of the Rip to place the cursor at that time.
• Press the Left/Right arrow key to move it to the previous/next beat marker.
o Hold down X/Ctrl whilst doing so to move it to the previous/next bar line.
• In a note selection, notes are selected but not the time that they occupy. For
example, this means that deleting a note selection will not affect any other
notes or unpitched sound at the same time as it, and will leave behind silence if
there is nothing else at the same time.
o You can apply effects or sounds to multiple notes, but if you wish to control level
adjustments with a single automation lane (see Automation Lanes), select time instead
or group the notes and then apply the effects/sounds to the group (see Groups).
• In a time selection, a length of time is selected together with all notes within it.
Time selections are useful for ensuring that no notes are missed when selecting
everything between two times. They also select any unpitched sound between or
at the same time as the notes (see Unpitched Sound).
o If Master is selected in the Layers Panel (so that all layers are editable), deleting a time
selection will not leave behind any silence and will shorten the Rip by the length of time
that was deleted. A pasted time selection will be inserted, causing the Rip to lengthen.
o If one or more other layers are selected instead (so that only those layers are editable),
silence will be left behind so that all layers remain in sync with each other. For the same
reason, pasted time selections are not inserted but overdubbed instead.
o When copying & pasting a time selection between Rips, the pasted time will only be
inserted if it was copied from a Rip with Master selected. Otherwise, it will be
overdubbed and, if Master is selected in the destination Rip, any layers in the selection
that it does not have will be added.
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• Click on a note to select only that note. (This deselects anything else that was selected.)
• Click & drag the mouse pointer over notes to select them with a selection rectangle.
o Hold down z/Alt to only select those parts of the notes that are within the rectangle.
o PRO only: Check Fine Selection in Audioshop when using its Move/Resize tool to reverse
this behavior (see Audioshop).
• Select all time in a bar by clicking within that bar in the area just above the beat markers.
x/Shift+Click on the same area inside other bars to include more bars in the selection. (A bar can
also be selected by double-clicking on the background of the Rip.)
• Select all time in a beat by clicking within that beat in the area that’s between the tops of the beat
markers. x/Shift+Click on the same area inside other beats to include more beats in the
selection.
• To select a region of time that isn’t a bar or a beat, click & drag over the background of the Rip,
without passing the mouse pointer over any notes or without moving the pointer up or down by
much.
• Alternatively, click on the background of the Rip at one point of time and then x/Shift+Click on
the background of the Rip at another point of time to select all time in between. (This is
particularly useful when selecting long sections of audio.)
• Hold down x/Shift and then press Left/Right to select all time from the position of the cursor to
the previous/next beat marker.
o Also hold down X/Ctrl whilst doing this to instead select all time from the position of the
cursor to the previous/next bar line.
• Hold down x/Shift and press Left/Right to extend or shorten an existing time selection to the
nearest beat maker.
• When nothing is selected, press X/Ctrl+C to select and copy time in all bars from the cursor
position to the end of the Rip.
• Triple-click the background of the Rip to select all time in the Rip.
• Click & drag any note in a time selection to move all of its notes (and any groups that intersect it)
through pitch or time.
When selecting multiple notes or time, or double-clicking an individual note, group, or bar/beat region, a
context bar appears beneath the mouse pointer for quickly applying commonly used effects, making specific
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edits such as duplication, and transferring notes to other layers. So it doesn’t get in the way, it disappears as
soon as the mouse pointer is moved away from it or the Rip is scrolled.
Groups
Notes can be grouped together so that they can be selected and edited as a single object.
For example, this is particularly useful when copying & pasting a vocal phrase from one
Rip to another. In this case, its notes are automatically grouped so that they can be more
easily tweaked to fit the timing and key of the surrounding audio.
• To group notes, select them and then click Audio>Group or press X/Ctrl+G. A box is shown
around them whose color depends on the color of the layer(s) to which they belong.
• A title bar is shown at the group’s top containing a name for the group, and an arrow icon at the
left, which can be used to open/close it, hiding/showing its contents.
• Select the group by clicking its title bar, but not over a note as that will be selected instead.
• Change the pitch of the entire group by clicking & dragging its title bar up/down. The pitch will
snap to the semitone guides if selected in the View menu. Hold down z /Alt whilst dragging for
the opposite effect.
• Change the time of the entire group by clicking & dragging its title bar left/right. The timing will
snap to the beat markers if selected in the View menu. Hold down z /Alt whilst dragging for the
opposite effect.
• Click & drag the left/right edge of the group’s title bar to change the time at which the group
starts/ends.
o Tip: When cutting/copying & pasting a group, RipX DAW remembers where the bar lines
were in that group and shows them when the mouse pointer is hovered over the title bar.
Align these guidelines with the Rip’s bar lines to put the pasted group in time with its
surroundings.
• You can select notes/groups within a group, and press X/Ctrl+G to create a further group within.
• Note: Any ungrouped notes that are dragged & dropped or cut/copied & pasted onto an open
group are automatically added to it. Close the group (by clicking on the arrow button in its title
bar) to prevent this.
The way in which an effect is applied to a selection depends on the type of selection it is:
• Note selection – The effect is applied separately to each and every note in the selection. For
example, the Slide Pitch effect causes every note to slide up or down from its original pitch.
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• Time or group selection – The effect is applied to the selection as though it were a single object.
For example, Slide Pitch causes the overall pitch to increase/decrease from the start to the end of
the selection.
o Note: If there are no note, group, or time selections, the effect is applied to all time in all
selected layers and is applied as though the entire layer were a single object. An exception
to this is Slide Pitch, which is applied to each note separately.
It is best to select a layer in the Layers Panel and then apply the effect to a time selection. The benefits of this
are that effects will not be accidentally applied to notes in other layers and that adjustments to how the effect
is applied over time can be made across the whole selection rather than one note at a time – see Automation
Lanes below.
Every effect has a slider that appears when the mouse pointer is hovered over it. Some effects have an
additional slider that appears when the effect is applied. Depending on the effect, each slider may determine
the effect’s strength or direction, or select from a range of options that are available for it.
• Click on an effect or click & drag it onto a selection to quickly apply it with some default settings.
o Level, Shift Pitch, Shift Formant, Shift Time, Clip Start and Stereo Panning are applied
with 0 adjustment so that, for example, fades and slides can be added more quickly.
o If no Rip is currently displayed, dragging an effect over from the panel will create a new
Rip with that effect applied to Master.
• Click & drag an effect’s slider to apply it with a chosen setting.
• Once applied, an effect can be adjusted by clicking & dragging its sliders.
o Tip: To audition different effects, press L to place a loop over the selection and then start
playback by clicking on the Play button in the toolbar above the Rip. Then add and
remove various effects as the loop repeatedly plays back. (More information about loops
can be found in Loops.)
• Click on the effect to remove it.
• When one or more effects have been applied to a time selection, a block with the names of those
effects on it is shown at the bottom of the Rip where the selection was made. Click on this block
to see the effects highlighted in their panels.
• For effects applied to a note or group, this block is shown only when the note/group is selected.
The effects are automatically highlighted in their panels in this case.
RipX DAW applies effects to notes each time they are played back but they can be set in stone (e.g. to add
layers of effects or reduce the amount of work your computer has to do during playback) by making a
selection and clicking Audio>Render Effects & Sounds or pressing z /Alt+R. (PRO only: Doing this will also
allow their effects on the harmonics of the notes to be edited with Audioshop’s Harmonic Editor – see PRO:
Audioshop & Other Advanced Tools.)
All effects in the FX Panel are listed in alphabetical order but can also be searched by using the Find Panel (see
The RipX DAW Panels). Most of the effects are self-explanatory. Below is a brief description of some of
them, organized by type.
Pitch effects:
• Pitch To Scale – Moves the pitches of notes in the selection towards the nearest pitches that lie on
any musical scale that has been applied to the bar(s) that they are in. If no musical scale has been
applied, it moves them towards the nearest semitone.
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o You can click Scale at the bottom-left of the Rip to choose a musical scale for all bars in the
Rip or, if any scale changes have been added (see below), only those up until the first scale
change.
o Once a musical scale has been set, move the mouse pointer below and to the right of a
bar-line and click Scale to choose a musical scale for all bars from that bar line onwards or,
if any scale changes have been set at later bar lines, only those up until the next scale
change.
o Tip: To apply a musical scale to a specific layer, first select that layer by clicking on its
name in the Layers Panel then set/add the scale with Auto Pitch To Scale selected.
• Vibrato – Use the top slider to adjust the strength of the vibrato and the bottom slider to change
its frequency.
• Expand Pitch – Stretches notes vertically over a greater range in pitch, exaggerating any pitch
slides or vibrato.
• Invert Pitch – Swaps the pitches of notes around the pitch chosen with the slider. For example,
choosing F3 will cause A4 (16 semitones higher than F3) to become C#2 (16 semitones lower than
F3).
• Shift Pitch – Use the top slider to change the pitches of selected notes by a number of semitones
and make fine adjustments to the pitch with the bottom slider.
• Harmony – Adds a harmonizing note to each selected note at an interval of a third above it, or one
or two octaves above/below it, as specified with the top slider. (The key of the Rip is used to
determine whether the third should be major or minor.) The bottom slider can be used to adjust
the volume of the harmonizing note relative to the original.
o Note: Harmonizing notes are displayed as separate thinner notes but can only be adjusted
with the Harmony effect’s slider. They cannot be selected or edited like other notes.
• Chord – Adds a chord that fits the musical scale that has been set (see Pitch to Scale above). (If no
musical scale has been set, the chord is fit to C Major.) Use the top slider to choose from a
selection of chords and the bottom slider to arpeggiate it.
Level effects:
• Low Pass – Applies a filter to the selection that only allows frequencies to be heard that are below
a specific frequency that can be set with the slider.
• High Pass – Applies a filter to the selection that only allows frequencies to be heard that are above
a specific frequency that can be set with the slider.
• Filter Notes – Removes quieter notes. Drag the slider button towards 100% to increase the level
below which notes are removed. This can be useful for removing quieter unwanted notes before
exporting to MIDI for transcription purposes.
o Tip: Check Filter Notes when exporting to MIDI to automatically apply Filter Notes at 50%
to the exported file only (see Exporting Audio).
o Note: This effect looks at the original volume of notes before any effects were applied to
them.
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• Stereo Pass – Limits audio to the chosen stereo position with a 25% stereo window. This is useful
for filtering out similar sounding instruments in a layer that were recorded at different stereo
positions.
• Saturation – Adds a type of distortion with harmonic enhancement. Use the slider to choose
between various presets such as Warm and Edgy.
• Gate – Use the top slider to remove parts of the selection that are below the selected dB level.
Then use the bottom slider to specify a length of the selection to bring back.
• Compression – Choose the level above which the volume is reduced with the top slider and how
much it is reduced with the second. Note that dragging the bottom slider all of the way to the
right sets it to infinity:1, causing this effect to act as a Limiter.
Time effects:
• Reverb – Applies reverb to all notes in the selection with a spread over time specified with the top
slider. Use the bottom slider to choose the number of repetitions.
• Delay – Applies delay to all notes in the selection with a separation that is a fraction of a bar, as
specified with the top slider. Use the bottom slider to choose the number of repetitions.
• Chorus – Adds multiple performances of the selection, creating a chorus effect. Choose the extent
of pitch and time variation using the top slider, and the number of added performances with the
bottom one.
• Flanger – Adds a whooshing effect across high frequencies. The top slider adjusts the frequency at
which the sound modulates and the bottom, the number of times the modulation is fed back.
• Reverse – Set the slider to 100% to completely reverse a selection. Set the slider to a lower
percentage to reduce the strength of the effect.
• Warp Time – Click & drag this effect’s slider to the left/right to shorten/lengthen notes without
changing where they start.
• Quantize Time – Moves notes towards the nearest division of the bar. Use the top slider to
choose the size of the division and the bottom slider to choose how close to the division they are
moved.
o For example, if the time signature is 4/4, choose 1/4 and 100% to move the starts of notes
to the nearest beat.
o Note: Before using this effect, ensure that the bar lines are correctly positioned. (A bar
line can be moved by clicking & dragging its top end. Subsequent bar lines update
automatically so it is best to start with the first and work forwards through the Rip.)
• Fit To Bars – Fits notes or a group to a chosen number of bars. This is useful for setting the
duration of a loop (a type of group) dragged onto the rip from the Loops Panel.
• Clip Start – Removes the start of a note by the selected amount of time without changing when it
starts.
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Automation Lanes
When one or more effects are applied to a selection or an entire layer, a graph appears along the bottom of
the Rip.
In RipX DAW, these are called automation lanes, although what they do is slightly different from the
traditional ones of the same name.
• An automation lane (also called a lane in the following) shows how the level of the effect varies
over time.
• The bar beneath the automation lane, called its selection panel, contains a button for each effect
that has been applied.
o Click on these buttons to view the automation lane for each effect or hover over them to
view them temporarily.
o For effects that have two sliders, click/hover further to the left to see the lane for its first
slider or further to the right to see the lane for its second slider.
• Selection panels are not shown for layers that have been muted in the Layers Panel unless they
are selected.
• To avoid clutter, the lane is hidden when it’s no longer being used but, with the exception of
effects applied to notes, the selection panel is always visible when Master or the layer in which the
effects were applied is selected in the Layers Panel. For effects applied to notes, it is only shown
when the notes are selected.
o Click on a button on the selection panel to view a hidden lane or hover over it to do this
temporarily.
o Double-click on a note or the title bar of a group to view its hidden automation lanes.
When an effect is applied, its automation lane is flat at first. This can be changed as follows:
• Use the automation lane’s selection panel to choose which effect and which of its sliders you’d like
to vary. (The first slider is selected by default.)
• Click & drag over the graph within the automation lane to draw a curve.
o X/Ctrl-click & drag to erase these changes.
• Double-click on the graph to add a handle and set straight lines to and from the point that you
double-clicked.
o Click & drag a handle up/down to change its value.
o Click & drag it left/right to change its position in time. Curves drawn either side will
stretch appropriately.
o Remove a handle by double-clicking on it or by dragging it to the top or bottom of the
lane.
• While the automation lane is selected, press Delete to reset it. Press Delete again to delete the
automation lane and remove the associated effect.
• Hold down x/Shift then click & drag vertically to adjust the overall scale of the variations.
• To apply the same curve/graph to another automation lane, press X/Ctrl+C while it’s selected,
click on another automation lane and then press X/Ctrl+V to paste.
• Copy a note with varying attributes (e.g. pitch, volume, or panning), select an automation lane and
then paste to make its graph vary in the same way as one of the note’s attributes. Which attribute
is pasted depends on the type of effect to which the automation lane belongs. For example, the
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pitch of the note will determine the shape of the curve for a pitch effect and its volume will shape
the curve for the Level effect, allowing volume vibrato to be copied & pasted between notes.
o Tip: An automation lane can be resized to make fine adjustments easier by clicking &
dragging its top edge.
• Like any effect, the overall level of a preset and how its level varies over time can be adjusted with
its slider and automation lane. These adjustments only affect how it’s applied to the current
selection.
• To change how a preset is applied to all selections, hover over its name and click on the arrow
button on the left. An additional slider appears below.
o Click & drag its button to adjust the overall level wherever the preset is applied.
o Click on it to display an automation lane that can be used to vary its level over time
everywhere the preset is applied.
o In this automation lane, click Stretch On or Stretch Off to toggle whether its curve will
adjust to fit the length of the selection or always be the same length. (This is particularly
useful when applying preset fades created with the Level effect.)
Effects can also be combined into Combos by clicking & dragging them onto each other. Like presets, they can
be renamed and removed by right-clicking on them. The effects within a combo can be viewed by clicking the
arrow icon to the left of its name and they can also be renamed and removed by right-clicking on them. Both
the overall level of a combo and the levels of its effects can be adjusted with their sliders. Click on one of its
effects to display the automation lane for that effect. Changes made to each effect will affect the combo
everywhere that it is applied.
The order of the effects within a combo determines the order in which they are applied and this sometimes
affects the final outcome. Upon dragging one effect onto another, the one that was dragged will be added to
the bottom of the list within the combo. Effects can be reordered within a combo by clicking & dragging them
up/down. Anything listed below Harmony, Chord, Reverb, or Delay will only affect additional notes created
by that effect and not the original note(s). Below are some interesting examples of how this can be used.
• Click & drag the Vibrato effect onto the Harmony effect to create a combo of the two with Vibrato
below Harmony. When applying this combo to notes, vibrato is only applied to the added
harmony notes. To apply vibrato to both the harmony and the original notes with a combo, click &
drag Harmony onto Vibrato so that they are listed and applied in the reverse order.
• Create new types of reverb and delay by dragging & dropping different effects onto the Reverb
and Delay effects. Any effects dropped onto them (such as Slide Pitch) will only apply to the
reverb/delay.
• The same effect can be dragged & dropped onto a combo multiple times. If they are listed below
Reverb or Delay, they will be applied to alternate notes in the delay/reverb. For example, if
Stereo Panning is added twice beneath Delay, once with a pan to the left and once with a pan to
the right, the delay will bounce between left and right.
• Replace notes with reverb by creating a combo of Level, Reverb and Level. Set the Level effect
above Reverb to reduce the level by 50 dB so that the notes cannot be heard and set the Level
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effect below Reverb to increase the volume of the added reverb by 50 dB so that it has the original
volume. Note that the second Level effect only applies to the added reverb and not to the original
notes.
Combos can be dragged & dropped into other combos so you can create combos that are as complex as you
like.
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Pitch
Chromatically edit pitch
• Ensure that Snap To Semitone Guides is checked in the View menu and then click & drag a note,
selection of notes and/or their parts up/down to raise/lower their pitches by a number of
semitones.
• Hold down X/Ctrl whilst doing this to shift the selection up or down by an octave.
• Note: To edit the pitch of a note selection by any number of semitones, there must either be no
scale applied to the bar that contains it, or that scale must be chromatic (see below).
3. If you intend to edit pitch by clicking & dragging, ensure that Snap
To Semitone Guides is checked in the View menu. With this, any
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edits made to the pitch of a note by clicking & dragging it vertically, or by pressing Up/Down whilst
it is selected, will shift it up or down only through pitches that are on the chosen scale as indicated
by the semitone guides.
o Applying the Pitch To Scale, Quantize Pitch or Flatten Pitch effects to notes from the FX
Panel will cause them to snap to these guides.
o Tip: First zoom in on pitch by positioning the mouse pointer over the area you would like
to zoom in on and using the mouse wheel whilst holding down xX/Ctrl+Shift.
Alternatively, click & drag horizontally over the piano keyboard in the region of pitch that
you’d like to zoom in on.
o Tip: Once zoomed in, scroll vertically by using the mouse wheel whilst holding down
x/Shift or by using the vertical scrollbar to the right of the Rip.
• Apply the Shift Pitch effect, using the top slider to change the pitch by a number of semitones and
the bottom slider to make fine adjustments.
• Where no musical scale has been set, use the Pitch To Scale effect in the FX Panel to quickly
correct the pitch of selected notes and/or parts of notes that are out of tune.
o Tip: Snap all notes in the Rip to the nearest semitone by clicking Set Musical Scale at the
bottom-left of the Rip, choosing a Chromatic scale and ensuring that Auto Pitch To Scale is
checked in the same menu.
• PRO only: See PRO: Advanced Editing Techniques to learn how to finely adjust a note’s pitch
over time.
o Click & drag the slider button left/right to reduce/increase how much they are flattened.
o Tip: Use Flatten Pitch to reduce or remove vibrato from a note. (PRO only: Any associated
vibrato in volume can be removed with Audioshop’s Smooth Region Tool – see PRO:
Audioshop & Other Advanced Tools).
• Make all selected notes and/or their parts slide in pitch by applying the Slide Pitch effect in the FX
Panel.
o Click & drag the slider button to the right/left to slide the pitch up/down.
o Subsequently click & drag the slider button in the opposite direction to reduce the amount
of slide or reverse the direction of the slide.
o PRO only: See PRO: Advanced Editing Techniques to learn how to apply slides with
finer control.
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• Add a pitch vibrato of constant amplitude/strength and frequency to selected notes and/or their
parts by using the Vibrato effect in the FX Panel.
o Click & drag the top slider to the right/left to increase/decrease the amplitude of the
vibrato.
o Click & drag the bottom slider to the right/left to increase/decrease its frequency.
o PRO only: See PRO: Advanced Editing Techniques to learn how to add more realistic
vibrato and clone vibrato (and other pitch variations) from notes performed by real
musicians.
Rhythm
Edit rhythm by moving the starts of notes
• Tip: Use the mouse wheel whilst holding down X/Ctrl to zoom in on time and see additional
vertical guidelines that mark divisions of the beat. Alternatively, click & drag vertically over the
time bar (just beneath the Rip) or over the Loop bar located above the Rip (see Loops).
• Click & drag a note left/right so that it starts and ends sooner/later.
o Tip: Use this for shorter notes (e.g. violin pizzicato) where the sustain of the note is not as
important as its attack.
• Apply the Shift Time effect to a note from the FX Panel. Click & drag the slider button to the
right/left to move the note in that direction.
• Use the Quantize Time effect to move notes towards the nearest division of the bar. Use the top
slider to choose the size of the division and the bottom slider to choose how close to the division
they are moved.
o Note: Before doing this, ensure that the bar lines are correctly positioned. A bar line can
be moved by clicking & dragging its top end. Subsequent bar lines update automatically so
it is best to start with the first and work forwards through the Rip.
• Click & drag the start of a note left/right so that it starts sooner/later without affecting when it
ends.
o Tip: Use this for longer notes where the sustain of the note is an important part of its
effect (e.g. long sustained notes played by strings).
• Note: The starts and ends of notes will automatically snap to the beat markers (which mark the
beats and their divisions) if Snap To Beat Markers is checked in the View menu. Hold down z
/Alt whilst clicking & dragging to reverse this setting.
• Delete the start of a note by holding down z /Alt whilst clicking & dragging over it and then
pressing Delete.
o PRO only: Check Fine Selection in Audioshop when using its Move/Resize Tool to select
parts of a note without having to hold down z /Alt (see PRO: Audioshop & Other
Advanced Tools).
o Tip: Use this with notes that do not have a strong attack or in cases where the resulting
change in attack is desirable, not noticeable in the full mix, or otherwise unimportant.
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• Select multiple notes then click & drag the end of the selection to change the speed of its rhythm
without affecting the tempo of the music that contains it.
• PRO only: See PRO: Advanced Editing Techniques to learn how to change the rhythmic feel of
one or more bars.
o Click & drag the area just above the tops of the beat markers to move it to the start of
another bar.
o Click & drag the area between the tops of the beat markers to move it to the start of
another beat.
▪ Note: Before doing this, ensure that the bar lines are correctly positioned. A bar line
can be moved by clicking & dragging its top end. Subsequent bar lines update
automatically so it is best to start with the first and work forwards through the Rip.
o Tip: Add a strum to each chord in a sequence of guitar chords by copying & pasting the
sequence to the right of itself. While the pasted notes are still selected, apply the Level
effect in the FX Panel to the selection with a negative dB to decrease their volume for
added realism.
o Click & drag samples from the Sounds Panel into the space between notes. (See The
Sounds Panel for more information.)
o PRO only: See PRO: Advanced Editing Techniques to learn how to draw new notes
between other notes.
• Select notes between the starts of other notes and press Delete to decrease the speed of the
rhythm.
o Note: The end of a note will automatically snap to beat markers if Snap To Beat Markers is
checked in the View menu. Hold down z /Alt whilst clicking & dragging to reverse this
setting.
• Apply the Warp Time effect from the FX Panel to shorten or lengthen a note without changing
when it starts.
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• Apply the Clip Start effect from the same panel to remove the start of a note without changing
when it starts.
• Copy & paste a note so that it immediately follows itself then join the two notes together by
selecting them and clicking Audio>Join or pressing X/Ctrl+J.
o Tip: This works best with notes whose characteristics (e.g. pitch, volume & timbre) do not
differ by much between their starts and ends.
Edit tempo
• Before working with the tempo of any Rip, ensure that its bar lines are correctly positioned. A bar
line can be moved by clicking & dragging its top end. Subsequent bar lines update automatically
so it is best to start with the first and work forwards through the Rip.
• The BPM (beats per minute) can be viewed in a few different ways:
o The overall BPM of a Rip is displayed at the top-right corner of the RipX DAW window.
o When the mouse pointer is placed over the top end of a bar line, the BPM of the preceding
bar is shown to the left of it. This updates as the bar line is dragged left or right.
o PRO only: To view in the toolbar the tempo of the bar currently under the mouse pointer,
click Tempo Info under Tempo in the RipScripts Panel. This panel can be opened from the
Panels menu.
• Change the tempo of the entire Rip by hovering the mouse pointer over the tempo shown at the
top-right corner of the RipX DAW window then clicking & dragging the slider button that appears.
• Change the tempo from the cursor onwards or for all selected
bars by clicking on the background of the tempo slider or by
right-clicking on the background of the Rip when nothing is
selected and clicking Change Tempo. (PRO only: Change Tempo
is also available from the RipScripts Panel.) Enter a new number
of BPM (beats per minute) and click Apply To Selection (which
applies to all bars from the cursor if nothing is selected). It is
also possible to change the tempo for the entire Rip from here
by clicking Apply To Rip.
• When copying & pasting notes between Rips with different tempos, use xX/Ctrl+Shift+V to
paste the notes and they will be automatically adjusted to fit the destination tempo.
o Tip: Quickly swap between the current and previously displayed Rip by pressing
^/Ctrl+Tab.
• Prevent specific notes from being stretched when a tempo edit is made by selecting them and
pressing xX/Ctrl+Shift+T. The notes are displayed with twice the height. This allows for higher
quality tempo stretching of loops where drum sounds are well defined.
Edit time
Note: Before editing time, ensure that Master is selected in the Layers Panel.
• Make a time selection (see Note & Time Selections) then press Delete to delete the time and
everything in it. Notes and unpitched sounds either side of it will move together in time.
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• Move a time selection by clicking & dragging the top of it horizontally. (Before doing this, ensure
that the bar lines are correctly positioned. A bar line can be moved by clicking & dragging its top
end. Subsequent bar lines update automatically so it is best to start with the first and work
forwards through the Rip.)
o Click & drag the area just above the tops of the beat markers to move it to the start of
another bar.
o Click & drag the area between the tops of the beat markers to move it to the start of
another beat.
• Hold down X/Ctrl while clicking & dragging a time selection to copy & paste it to another bar or
beat, replacing the time that is already there.
• Copy & paste time by selecting it then pressing X/Ctrl+C, clicking on the background at the time
at which you would like to paste, and pressing X/Ctrl+V. The pasted time is inserted, causing
notes either side of it to be shifted further apart in time.
• Quickly duplicate a time selection to the next visible beat marker by pressing X/Ctrl+D.
o The distance of the selection from the preceding beat marker is maintained unless it is
very close to it, in which case it is snapped to it. (Windows only: It will not be snapped to it
if Alt is held down.)
o Any notes at the destination that belong to the currently selected layers in the Layers
Panel are deleted.
o Press Xx/Ctrl+Shift+D to have the duplicated audio adjust for any changes in tempo.
• PRO only: Use Equalize Bar Lengths from the RipScripts Panel to set all bars to be the same length
as bar 2.
Volume & EQ
• Change the overall volume of a selection of notes by applying the Level effect to it from the FX
Panel.
o Click & drag the slider to the right/left to increase/decrease the volume.
• Change the overall volume of an entire layer by hovering the mouse pointer over the name of that
layer in the Layers Panel and using its slider.
• Change the overall volume of the entire Rip by using the slider for Master in the Layers Panel.
o Note: Master has a hard limiter to prevent overloading and clipping on playback and
export.
• Mute or solo a layer by clicking the M or S button that appears to the right of its name when the
mouse pointer is hovered over it. Notes in muted layers are displayed as thin lines.
• The EQ and stereo panning of each layer, and of the entire Rip, can be
adjusted as follows:
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1. Hover the mouse pointer over that layer, or Master, in the Layers Panel.
3. Hover over the options that appear beneath and use their sliders.
o Select a layer in the Layers Panel whose level needs to drop to make room for another.
o Make a time selection. (E.g. triple-click the background of the Rip to select all time.)
o Apply the Compression effect to the time selection from the FX Panel.
o Click & drag the layer that needs more room (e.g. Kick Drum) from the Layers Panel onto
the automation lane.
o x/Shift-click & drag vertically over the automation lane to change the intensity of the
effect.
• Apply fades and other volume envelopes to selections of notes with the Level effect from the FX
Panel:
o Click on the Level effect to apply the effect without any change to the overall volume.
o Click & drag over the automation lane to draw the volume envelope or click on it to apply
straight lines. (For more information about automation lanes, see Automation Lanes.)
o Apply the volume envelope to other selections by applying the Level effect to them then
copying & pasting the automation lane with the volume envelope onto the other
automation lanes.
o Create a Preset from the Level effect with a specified volume envelope and apply it to
other selections as and when needed. Click Stretch On or Stretch Off in the Preset’s
automation lane to toggle whether the envelope will adjust to fit the length of the
selection or always be the same length. (More information about Presets can be found in
Presets & Combos.)
• PRO only: See PRO: Advanced Editing Techniques to learn how to remove volume vibrato and
other fluctuations from a note.
Unpitched Sound
• Unpitched sound is any sound without a definite pitch. This includes certain special effects and
sibilants (e.g. vocal sss, sh, f & t sounds).
o Note: Drum and other percussion notes are not unpitched sound since they are notes.
These notes are shown at pitches that roughly correspond to how high- or low-pitched
they are. (For example, kick drum notes are shown at a low pitch whereas cymbal notes
are shown at a high pitch.) Like other notes, they can be shifted vertically to change their
pitches.
• When selecting notes by clicking & dragging them, or by clicking on them individually, RipX DAW
intelligently selects (or deselects) the accompanying unpitched sound where there is not a louder
unselected note that the unpitched sound might belong to.
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• To reduce noise between notes, select the time between them and then apply the Level effect to
that selection.
• PRO only: Use Audioshop’s Edit Unpitched Tool to view unpitched sound and make more precise
edits over specific frequencies and times, without affecting notes (see Audioshop).
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• The metronome button can be clicked to toggle an audible metronome on or off . During
playback, a metronome bar is displayed to the right of the playback/record controls:
o Hover the mouse pointer over the bar and click & drag the slider button left/right to
decrease/increase its volume.
o You can also click on the background of the slider to turn the audible sound off or on.
• Place the cursor (e.g. by clicking on the background of the Rip) before starting playback to start it
from there.
• Playback can be paused either by clicking the Stop playback button or by pressing Spacebar once
again. Press Shift+Spacebar to stop playback without moving the cursor, for example if you wish to
replay a section several times to hear edits.
• If audio is selected and there is no loop set, only the selection is played back.
• When nothing is playing or recording, the Stop playback button is replaced by a Rewind button –
click this or press Enter to rewind to the start of the Rip or to the start of the loop if one is set (see
below).
• Edits and effects can be applied to a Rip while it is playing back, creating a live performance. This
is particularly effective when playing back a loop (see below).
Loops
The Loop bar, located just below the playback controls, can be used to create loops. It is also possible to zoom
time by clicking & dragging it vertically.
o Click & drag over the Loop bar from left to right.
o Make a selection of notes or time and press L to mark a loop that covers that selection.
o Double-click on the Loop bar to set a loop over the bar in which you double-clicked.
o Move the loop forwards or backwards in time by clicking & dragging it along the Loop bar.
o Click outside of the loop or double-click on it in the Loop bar to cancel it. This can also be
done by pressing L while there’s a note or time selection.
o Note: The loop will automatically snap to the beat markers if Snap To Beat Markers is
checked in the View menu. Hold down z /Alt whilst clicking & dragging to reverse this
setting.
• Start and stop playback (see above) to hear the loop play back.
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• Each time playback returns to the start of the loop, experiment with applying different edits and
effects to the notes within the loop.
o See below to learn how to make RipX DAW randomly apply different musical scales to the
loop each time its playback restarts.
• In the same menu, Auto Pitch To Scale is automatically selected, meaning that the pitches of all
notes will automatically snap to the randomly selected scale each time playback is started.
• To apply random scales to a selection of notes, uncheck Auto Pitch To Scale and apply the Pitch To
Scale effect to them from the FX Panel.
• Once a scale has been set, scale changes can be added by hovering the mouse pointer below and
to the right of a bar line and clicking Scale. From there, select Randomize again to have multiple
random scales in the same Rip, or choose a fixed scale.
• Uncheck Randomize to prevent RipX from making any further random changes to the musical
scale and click Clear to remove it.
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Note Pitches
• The pitches of individual notes are overlaid on the keyboard at the left
side of the screen. Hover over a note, make a selection, or play back a
section to see the notes performed.
• Select a guitar, piano, or other track containing chords from the Layers
Panel, and RipX DAW will recognize and show the chord symbols for
each bar or beat at the top of the screen.
• Hover over a chord symbol to see the pitches and beats the chord
applies to, highlighted below. Click a chord symbol to toggle this
on/off for all chords.
• Select multiple layers (e.g. Guitar, Piano and Bass) in the Layers Panel
to include all of their notes in the chord recognition.
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• Record through an audio input device (e.g. microphone), MIDI device (e.g. MIDI keyboard) or
computer keyboard – see below,
• Use Step Time recording to enter notes with a MIDI device or computer keyboard – see Step Time
Recording,
• Use AI music generation – see AI Music Generation,
• Use sampled sounds and VST instruments – see The Sounds Panel.
Before Recording
Connect any devices to your machine that you would like to use to record into
RipX DAW. These can be microphones and/or MIDI devices, including those
that support MPE, and even your computer keyboard (see Recording). A list of
the currently connected input devices is automatically shown in the Input
Panel. No setup is required before you record but some options are available –
see Advanced Input Settings.
When hovering the mouse pointer over the Input Panel, two buttons are displayed on the right side of its title
bar. The one on the left can be used to assign MIDI controllers and keys to different effects, sounds and other
buttons in RipX DAW (see Advanced Input Settings). The one on the right toggles Step Time recording
on/off (see Step Time Recording). When toggled on, this button continues to be displayed, wherever the
mouse pointer is.
Recording
Follow the steps below to record a new Rip from scratch:
• If any Rips are open, close them by clicking File>Close or pressing X/Ctrl+W, remembering to save
any changes you wish to keep.
• Choose the tempo (BPM) and time signature by clicking & dragging the slider buttons for them in
the top-right corner of the RipX DAW window.
• In the Layers Panel, choose a layer (e.g. Voice or Guitar) that you would like to record by clicking
on its name. (For more information about the Layers Panel, see Layers.)
o Note: If the layer is not shown in the list, hover the mouse pointer over the title bar of the
Layers Panel and click the + button that appears on the right.
• A new empty Rip is created that contains the chosen layer. Right-click on the name of the layer to
rename or delete it.
• Choose which input device you would like to record with by clicking on its name.
• Choose effects and sounds that you would like to be applied to the newly added audio by clicking
on them or clicking and dragging their sliders. (See Applying Effects to Selections and The
Sounds Panel for more information about effects and sounds.) These are applied across all time
in the layer.
o For example, choose the Level effect to adjust the volume.
o Click on effects/sounds to remove them.
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o Select a region of time and apply sounds and/or effects to it to have them automatically
applied to any notes recorded during that time. If another sound has been applied to the
entire layer, this will be ignored during the time selection.
o RipX DAW will choose a default sound, based on the name of the layer, if you don’t select
one before recording MIDI.
• To record another instrument through a different device (e.g. synth strings through a MIDI
keyboard in addition to voice through a mic), click Add in the Layers Panel and select another
layer. Then select the input device and any effects and sound you’d like to apply to that layer.
RipX DAW will remember which settings to use with each layer.
• Select which layers you would like to record by clicking and X/Ctrl-Clicking or x/Shift-Clicking on
their names.
• The metronome button can be clicked to toggle an audible metronome on or off . During
recording, a metronome bar is displayed to the right of the playback/record controls:
o Hover the mouse pointer over the bar and click & drag the slider button left/right to
decrease/increase its volume.
o You can also click on the background of the slider to turn the audible sound off or on.
• To start recording, click on the Record button in the RipX DAW window’s toolbar, or press z
Spacebar (macOS) or Ctrl+Spacebar (Windows).
o A one-bar countdown begins.
o You can continue to choose effects and sounds by clicking on them or clicking and
dragging their sliders.
o When recording through a mic, an indicator on the input device flashes to show the
recording level. If it flashes red instead of green, the level is too high and should be
reduced in the device’s settings. (If the Input Panel is closed, this indicator is shown in the
title bar of the Input Panel instead.)
• Once you’ve finished recording, press Escape or click on the Stop button in the RipX window’s
toolbar.
o If RipX DAW is still processing the audio from a mic recording, the amount of time left is
shown in red.
o The cursor stays at the point it reached so that you can continue recording from that
point.
o The recorded notes are automatically grouped for quick and easy editing.
To record into an existing Rip, click on the background of that Rip to choose the time at which you would like
recording to begin. Then choose the layers, input devices and effects/sounds as above before clicking Record.
If you are using a MIDI keyboard with pitch and modulation wheels, these are automatically assigned to RipX
DAW’s Shift Pitch and Vibrato effects, respectively. These wheels can be recorded over an existing recording
(e.g. to apply vibrato) by using them without playing anything.
It’s possible to record MIDI notes with the computer keyboard by selecting Computer Keyboard in the Input
Panel. In an arrangement similar to a piano keyboard (with higher keys associated with black notes), specific
keys in the top two rows of letters on the computer keyboard can be pressed to produce notes of different
pitches. While recording, the pitch that each key is associated with is shown on the piano keyboard to the left
of the Rip. The range of pitches is limited to just over an octave but the octave can be changed by pressing the
Up and Down arrow keys.
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• Place the cursor at the time that you would like to start.
• Press one or more keys at the same time to record a note or chord at the cursor.
• Hold keys down for longer to enter a longer note. (The end of each note is snapped to the nearest
visible beat marker if it is near to it.)
• The cursor automatically moves to the next visible beat marker as soon as the key or keys are
released.
• Zoom in on time (e.g. by using the mouse wheel while holding down X/Ctrl) to see more beat
markers and enter faster rhythms.
• Press the Right arrow key to skip to the next visible beat marker or use the Left arrow key to go
back to a previous one (e.g. to add harmony).
RipX DAW automatically attempts to choose the best option given the name of the layer.
For MIDI devices, the same arrow button gives a different list of options. RipX DAW supports MIDI Polyphonic
Expression (MPE), allowing it to understand pitch bends and other continuous variations in expressive control
from MIDI devices that support it. This is automatically detected and enabled upon playing whenever it’s
available. It is always off for devices that do not support MPE. Otherwise, it can be disabled/enabled by
clicking the MPE On/Off option.
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Click & drag the slider buttons on the Pitch Bend, Aftertouch, and Timbre options to adjust their levels. When
MPE is on, their default connections are to the Shift Pitch, Level and Shift Formant effects, respectively.
When MPE is off, these connections are to Shift Pitch, Vibrato and nothing. They can be changed (e.g. so that
the pitch bend wheel controls the Stereo Panning effect) as follows:
1. Press X/Ctrl+M or hover the mouse pointer over the title bar of the Input Panel and click on the
settings button on the right. (Press X/Ctrl+M again or press Escape to cancel.)
2. Click on the option listed under your input device that you’d like to reassign.
3. Click on an effect. The name of the input option that you’ve reassigned is shown next to the
effect.
4. Press Escape to finish.
In a similar way, it is also possible to assign any knob, button or key on a MIDI device to a specific playback
button, effect, or sound (including presets and combos) in RipX DAW. Simply press X/Ctrl+M, follow the
onscreen instructions and press Escape once you are done. For example, you could:
If you have a RipX DAW .ini file for a MIDI device, you can drag it onto RipX DAW to use its pre-set MIDI
controller and key assignments. If you need to transfer the .ini file to another computer, they can be found in
the following location (where <username> is the name you use to log on to your computer):
To reset all of the settings for a device to their defaults, right-click on its name in the Input Panel and click the
reset button.
AI Music Generation
AI music generation is a rapidly evolving technology that is able to automatically create fully mixed audio from
a simple text-based description. The quality can be impressive but, without RipX DAW, it may be difficult to
get exactly what you want – parts of the melody may be great, but not the rhythm, or the instruments may not
have quite the right sound. Fortunately, it’s simple to download and Rip the audio into RipX DAW where it can
be improved, customized, humanized, or incorporated partially or fully into an existing Rip.
• If no Rip is currently displayed, click on the Music Generator button in the area where Rips are
displayed. Otherwise, click on the button to the left of the playback buttons (centered above the
Rip).
• After agreeing to continue for the first time, you’ll be taken to a 3rd-party website where you can
type a simple description of the audio you’d like, generate it, and download it to your machine.
• Choose to download it to your Downloads folder and RipX DAW will bounce in the Dock (macOS)
or flash in the Taskbar (Windows) once it has downloaded.
• Switch to RipX DAW and the Ripper Options dialog box will open automatically, ready to rip the
downloaded file.
o Note: If you choose to download the audio file to a different location, you will need to
open it with RipX DAW manually (e.g. by clicking File>Open).
Disclaimer: Hit'n'Mix is not affiliated with the 3rd-party site, which may charge a subscription for generation of additional
content and for commercial use of the music. Hit'n'Mix has no control over the content of the site or the audio generated
and cannot be held liable for either. By clicking on the Music Generator button in RipX DAW, you agree that you use the
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site at your own discretion and are to be held fully responsible in the event of any damages being sought for misuse.
Please read and understand the site's terms of service and ensure appropriate copyright infringement checks are made
before releasing generated music publicly.
o In the Layers Panel, select the layer that you would like to record.
o Select the MIDI input device in the Input Panel.
o RipX DAW automatically tries to choose the correct instrument given the layer’s name. If you’d
like to change this, click on a different sound in the Sounds Panel. (This will automatically deselect
the one that is currently selected.)
o Select and configure any effects (such as Vibrato) that you’d to apply to the sound.
o Press the Record button in the RipX DAW window’s toolbar.
• Hover over the sound for a moment. Then move up/down to hear other sounds, to find one you
like.
To apply a sound to a selection of existing notes/time, or to selected layers if no note/time selection has been
made:
• Click on a sound to apply it at 100%. This will cause the sound to completely replace the existing
sound of the selection.
• Click & drag the slider button on a sound to apply a proportion of it to mix with the existing
sounds.
• Use the slider on another sound to mix it with the other sounds.
• Click on another sound to apply it at 100% and remove all other sounds that have been applied to
the selection.
• Click on an applied sound to remove it.
• X/Ctrl-Click on sounds to add/remove them from the selection.
• Vary how much of the sound is applied over time by drawing/clicking on the automation lane at
the bottom (double-click a note or group, or click the bar at the bottom to open this if necessary).
For example, this can be used to cause a note to change from one sound to another. (For more
information about automation lanes, see Automation Lanes.)
• Note: RipX DAW applies sounds to notes and unpitched sounds each time they are played back but
they can be set in stone by selecting audio and clicking Audio>Render Effects & Sounds or
pressing z /Alt+R. (PRO only: Doing this will also allow their effect on the harmonics of the notes
to be edited with Audioshop’s Harmonic Editor – see PRO: Audioshop & Other Advanced
Tools.)
To add sounds to a Rip as new notes:
• Click & drag a sound onto the Rip from the Sounds Panel, releasing the mouse button at the time
you would like it to be placed.
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o Ensure you are not clicking and dragging the vertical slider bar as this will instead apply the
sound to the selected notes/time/layers.
o Pitched samples are placed at the pitch where you release the mouse button.
o Unpitched samples are placed at special vertical positions that depend on the type of
sounds they are. (For example, Kick Drum notes are placed lower down in the Rip.) Edit
how high these notes sound after they have been created (e.g. by clicking & dragging them
up/down).
o The duration of these notes is initially set to one beat, but this can be adjusting by clicking
and dragging the ends. (See Edit note duration for other ways in which a note’s duration
can be changed.)
o You can edit and apply effects and other sounds to these notes as normal.
• If no Rip is currently displayed, dragging a sound over from the panel will create a new Rip with an
appropriate layer for that sound.
• PRO only: Use the Draw Sound Tool to draw notes into selected layers by clicking & dragging over
the background of the Rip – see Audioshop.
A selection of instrument sounds is included with RipX DAW, but you can add your own sounds and
instruments by hovering the mouse pointer over the Sounds Panel’s title bar and clicking on one of the three
buttons
• Add instruments by adding notes from a Rip with the + button:
1. Ensure each note is assigned to the correct layer for the instrument by selecting it,
hovering over the correct layer in the Layers Panel and clicking the arrow button on the
right.
2. Click on a note and click the + button.
3. Repeat for differently pitched notes if required, each around an octave apart. RipX DAW
automatically generates missing pitches as and when they are needed.
4. The new instrument is added to a new Sound Palette that has the same name as the Rip.
• Import samples from audio files by clicking the folder button:
1. In the dialog box that opens, click the Samples… button and browse to the folder where
the audio files are located.
2. Select the files and click Open.
3. Specify whether the samples are pitched or unpitched.
▪ If Pitched is selected, RipX DAW will change the pitches of the samples to fit the
pitches at which they are used.
▪ If Unpitched is selected, it will keep the original pitches of the samples.
4. Click Import and wait for all of the audio files to be ripped. As ripping completes, they are
automatically added to a new Sound Palette with the same name as the folder that
contains the audio files.
• Import VST3 Instruments by clicking on the third button:
1. In the dialog box that opens, click VST Plug-In…
2. Browse to the .vst3 file for the plug-in that you’d like to use, select it and click Open.
3. In the plug-in, select the instrument and its parameters (e.g. decay).
4. Back in the Import VST Instrument dialog box, enter a name for the instrument. (This is
the name that it will have in the Sounds Panel.)
5. Choose the range of pitches to import and whether RipX DAW should import every pitch
or leave gaps of a certain size between the pitches it imports.
▪ Note: It isn’t necessary to import every pitch since RipX DAW can fill in the gaps. More
pitches take longer to rip and take up more disk space.
6. Specify whether the samples are pitched or unpitched.
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▪ If Pitched is selected, RipX DAW will change the pitches of the samples to fit the
pitches at which they are used.
▪ If Unpitched is selected, it will keep the original pitches of the samples.
7. Click Audition to listen to examples of the sound, spread over the specified pitch range,
before importing.
8. Click Import and wait for ripping of the imported samples to complete. Once finished, the
imported instrument is placed inside a Sound Palette with the same name as the VST plug-
in.
▪ Note: To protect the interests of 3rd party VST instrument manufacturers, it is only
possible to use VST Instrument Sound Palettes created using a copy of RipX DAW with
the same license/activation code. If you wish to use them on another computer with a
different RipX DAW license, it is necessary to re-rip the VST instruments on that
computer.
Added and imported Sounds can be reordered by clicking & dragging them vertically and renamed or deleted
by right-clicking on them. They are grouped into Sound Palettes which are stored as special Rip files that can
be accessed by right-clicking on them in the panel and clicking Show in Finder (macOS) or Show in Folder
(Windows). Also, right-click on a Sound Palette to rename it, delete it, or remove it from the panel without
deleting it. Sound Palettes can be added to the Sounds Panel by dragging & dropping them onto RipX DAW.
To display or hide their contents, click the arrow icon at their left.
To play back or edit a Rip containing imported instruments on another computer, it is first necessary to copy
the appropriate Sound Palette files (of the format #<Sound Palette Name>#.rip from Documents/RipX/Sound
Palettes to the same folder on the other computer. Then drag & drop them onto RipX DAW so that it imports
them.
• To add a loop to a Rip, click & drag it onto the Rip from the Loops Panel, releasing the mouse
button at the time you would like it to be placed.
o Note: The loop is automatically stretched to fit the BPM of the Rip. Hold down z/Alt
while clicking & dragging the loop to prevent this.
• They are placed at a vertical position that depends on the pitches of the loop’s contents. Click &
drag it vertically to adjust its pitch.
• Click & drag it horizontally to reposition it in time and click & drag its ends to adjust its timing,
aligning its guidelines with the beat markers in the Rip.
• As with notes, you can use X/Ctrl+D to make further consecutive copies of the loop over time. Or
alternatively X/Ctrl+drag it to make a quick copy.
• Hover over the loop with the mouse pointer and click on the arrow button on the left to view its
contents. Click on this again to hide them.
o Edit selections of notes inside the group (e.g. deleting them, shifting them in pitch/time,
and applying effects/sounds to them).
• If no Rip is currently displayed, dragging a loop over will create a new Rip with that loop’s tempo
and layers.
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A selection of loops is included with RipX DAW, but you can add your own by hovering the mouse pointer over
the Loops Panel’s title bar and clicking on one of the two buttons
• Add a loop by selecting notes in a Rip and clicking the + button. Loops are added to folders inside
the Loops Panel that have the same names as the Rips from which they were added.
o A BPM is added to the end of the name of the loop – this is used to fit it to the BPM of any
Rip that it is dragged onto.
• Import loops from audio files by clicking the folder button:
1. In the dialog box that opens, click the Loops… button and browse to the folder where the
audio files are located.
2. Select the files and click Open.
3. Click Import and wait for all of the audio files to be ripped. As ripping completes, they are
automatically added to a new folder inside the Loops Panel with the same name as the
folder that contains the audio files.
It’s possible to edit a loop you’ve created (but not any of the ones included with RipX DAW) by clicking on the
loop in the Loops Panel. When editing loops, the background is colored dark blue, to make it clear that it is
not a Rip that is being edited. In addition to being able to make the usual edits to notes inside of a loop,
effects and sounds can be applied to them. Additional groups can also be created. Press X/Ctrl+S to save the
changes you’ve made.
Rename or delete loops that you’ve added/imported by right-clicking on them and using the menu that opens.
Rename, remove or delete their folders by right-clicking on those. From this menu, it is also possible to show
in Finder (macOS) or File Explorer (Windows) the loop file that contains the folder’s loops. These can be
dragged & dropped onto RipX DAW to add them to the Loops Panel (e.g. if sent to you by a friend or
accidentally removed from the panel).
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Click+drag Multiple select whole notes & unpitched sounds or, by clicking & dragging
over an empty region, select a period of time.
z Click+drag
Alt+click+drag Multiple select parts of notes & unpitched sounds.
x Click background
Shift+Click background Select time from the position of the cursor to this point.
x Left/Right
Shift+Left/Right Select time from the position of the cursor to the previous/next beat marker.
Also extends or shortens an existing time selection to the nearest beat maker.
Xx Left/Right
Ctrl+Shift+Left/Right Select time from the position of the cursor to the previous/next bar line. Also
extends or shortens an existing time selection to the nearest bar line.
Up/Down Shift the selected notes up/down a semitone or one pitch up/down in a scale.
X Up/Down
Ctrl+Up/Down Shift selected note up/down one octave.
z Drag note
Alt+drag note The opposite of the current Snap To Beat Markers or Snap To Semitone
Guidelines setting is applied during pitch and time adjustment, so you can
toggle snapping without accessing the View menu.
X C
Ctrl +C Copy selected notes/time. If nothing is selected, selects and copies time in all
bars from the cursor position onwards.
X V
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Ctrl +V Paste cut/copied notes/time. When pasting to a different Rip, note selections
are auto-grouped.
Xx V
Ctrl+Shift+V Paste cut/copied notes and fit to destination tempo (BPM).
Xx T
Ctrl+Shift+T Mark selected notes so that they are not stretched when the BPM is changed.
Press again to unmark them.
X D
Ctrl+D Duplicate selected notes or time to the next visible beat marker, maintaining
the distance from the preceding beat marker. If time is duplicated, any notes
at the destination that belong to a layer that is selected in the Layers Panel
are deleted.
Xx D
Ctrl+Shift+D Duplicate selected notes or time to the next visible beat marker, adjusting for
any changes in tempo and maintaining the distance from the preceding beat
marker. If time is duplicated, any notes at the destination that belong to a
layer that is selected in the Layers Panel are deleted.
X G
Ctrl+G Group selected notes to edit them like a single object.
Xx G
Ctrl+Shift+G Ungroup selected notes.
z G
Alt+G Expand/collapse selected groups.
X J
Ctrl+J Join selected notes together.
Xx J
Ctrl+Shift+J Split selected notes/groups at the points where they cross the start and end of
a time selection.
Xx M
Ctrl+Shift+M Unmute all layers.
x Scroll Wheel
Shift+Scroll Wheel Scroll pitch.
X Scroll Wheel
Ctrl+Scroll Wheel Zoom time in/out.
Xx Scroll Wheel
Ctrl+Shift+Scroll Wheel Zoom pitch in/out.
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Right-click Rip Open a menu that includes various editing options and tools at the position of
the mouse pointer. Snaps to beat markers – hold down z/Alt to prevent this.
Click+drag
barline top Realign barlines with beats without changing the duration of notes.
X N
Ctrl+N Create a new empty Rip.
X W
Ctrl+W Close the currently displayed Rip.
X O
Ctrl+O Open Rips, CD tracks, MP3s, WAV, FLAC, OGG & MIDI files.
z Spacebar
Ctrl+Spacebar Start recording.
X E
Ctrl+E Export part or all of a Rip as a Rip, MP3, WAV, FLAC, OGG, MIDI, or Stem file.
Choose to export it as a single file or as separate stems/layers.
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Audioshop can be opened from the Panels menu and is located in the tool bar area below the menu bar and
consists of the tools described below. Each tool can be selected by clicking on one of the 9 buttons shown on
the left-hand side of the above screenshot. The area to the right of these buttons contains appropriate
instructions and options that vary, depending on which tool is selected. When the first tool is selected (as
shown in the above screenshot), this area contains an array of buttons for quick access to other useful tools
which are also described below.
We will often refer to these tools, including Audioshop as a whole, as RipScripts. RipScripts are tools
specifically written for RipX DAW with the Python 3 programming language. More information about them,
and how to write your own, can be found in PRO: RipScript Editor.
For convenience, Audioshop’s tools can also be accessed via a menu that appears at the location of the mouse
pointer when right-clicking within a Rip. They can also be quickly selected by pressing a number key as shown
in the menu.
Move/Resize Tool
Use this to click & drag notes up or down in pitch and to click & drag notes left or right in time. Click &
drag the edges of notes to resize them. When this tool is selected, a Fine Selection checkbox is shown
to the right of Audioshop. Check this box to select parts of notes when clicking & dragging a selection
rectangle over them (hold down z /Alt whilst doing so to select entire notes).
View and edit all unpitched sound in the Rip. Click & drag to select a region of unpitched sound and edit
it. Pitched sounds/notes are shown in the background for reference only and cannot be selected or
edited. RipX DAW automatically chooses an appropriate contrast with which to display unpitched
sound. This can be adjusted to a fixed setting by unchecking Auto and choosing a different contrast with
the slider.
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• RipX DAW automatically chooses an appropriate sound given the name of the layer (or Piano
if Master is selected). If you’d prefer to use a different sound, choose this from the Sounds
Panel.
• Choose any effects that you’d like to be applied (such as Level and Vibrato).
• Click & drag over the background of the Rip from left to right at the desired pitch.
Split Tool
Split a note or group into two by clicking on it at the point at which you’d like it to be split. Notes and
groups can also be split whilst other tools are selected by right-clicking on them and clicking Split Here.
Alternatively mark a selection and choose Split Selection to split at the ends of the selection.
Join Tool
Click on the edge of a note or group where it touches another to join them together. Click & drag across
a sequence of touching notes or groups to join them all together.
Clone characteristics such as pitch variation (e.g. vibrato), sound (timbre with volume) & panning of a
chosen (X/Ctrl-clicked) note and apply them to other notes. Check From Start to keep the distance
from the start of the note unchanged. Change the duration of the brush with the slider to the right.
Apply fluctuations in pitch, formant, volume, and panning to selected notes. Choose the duration of the
brush with the slider.
Blend together the pitch, formant, timbre, volume and/or stereo panning of notes by clicking & dragging
over them. Choose the duration of the brush with the slider.
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Hover the mouse pointer over the title bar and click the + button to add a new RipScript to the panel. Click the
button to the right of it to open RipScript Editor and write/edit your own RipScripts. (For more information
about this, see PRO: RipScript Editor.) Right-click on the title bar and click RipScript Downloads & Forum to
download more RipScripts and visit our RipScript Forum. RipScript files can be opened with RipX DAW by
dragging & dropping them onto it.
Unlike the FX and Sounds panels, there are no sliders. Instead, clicking on the name of a RipScript will open a
dialog box or simply apply its effect to a selection. Click on the name of a RipScript again to close its dialog
box.
Clean Phase
Found within the Clean group, removes artifacts from selected notes by recalculating their phases. This
is useful for improving the sound quality of a note. Additional cleaning tools are available in the same
group.
Infinity Scale
Located within the Effects group, use this tool to create an infinitely rising or falling glissando effect
(based on the Shepard tone auditory illusion).
• The number of bars per octave determines how quickly it rises or falls.
• Select Up or Down to choose between a rising or falling effect and Double notes or Triple notes
to determine whether it uses two or three notes at a time.
Inharmonicity
Also located within the Effects group, this tool adjusts how much the harmonics of selected notes
depart from whole multiples of the fundamental. Higher values make notes sound more metallic. Some
instruments (such as the piano) have a higher inharmonicity than others.
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Harmonic Editor
Listed under Effects, use this tool to view the harmonics of selected notes and edit them in powerful
ways.
• Choose a tool by clicking on one of the buttons at the top. A description of the selected tool and
its keyboard shortcut is shown beneath the buttons.
• Choose the Select/Edit/Mask Tool to hear ranges of harmonics and time by clicking & dragging
over them, then press Up/Down/Backspace to increase/decrease/remove the selected sound.
This tool can also be used to place a cursor. Press Escape to remove it.
• Click the Play button to hear the entire note or only that part of it from the cursor onwards or
within the selection.
• You can change the duration and volume level of the brush with the sliders and choose which
harmonics to apply the edits to.
• The decibel (dB) level, harmonic number, frequency, and time at the position of the mouse
pointer are shown at the bottom.
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• When the button is selected, live edits such as formant adjustments for pitch shifts, plus
effects and repairs (made from the Repairs panel) are applied to the displayed harmonics.
• Click the button to the right of the Play button to undo all edits made to the note since it was
last opened in Harmonic Editor.
• Note: If edits are made to the currently displayed note with an Audioshop tool, Harmonic Editor
automatically updates to display the new harmonics. If for some reason a note is not updated,
it is necessary to click the Refresh button to the left of the Contrast slider in the top-right corner
of Harmonic Editor.
Beat Mapper
Select from the Swing, Sway and Custom presets to change the rhythmic feel of one or more bars.
• Ensure bar lines are correctly positioned before use by clicking & dragging them in the timeline.
(Subsequent bar lines update automatically so it is best to start with the first and work forwards
through the Rip.)
• When creating a Custom preset, click & drag to add and reposition a beat marker, click & drag
an existing beat marker to reposition it and click & drag it to the far left or right to remove it.
• Click Apply To Selected Bars or Apply To All Bars to apply the beat markers to the Rip as
appropriate.
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Pitch
• Use Audioshop’s Draw Pitch Tool to draw the pitch of a note by clicking & dragging over it, moving
the mouse pointer up/down to smoothly increase/decrease the pitch with respect to time.
o Tip: When editing the pitches of notes connected by a slide, use this to adjust the slide so
that it continues to connect them in a natural fashion.
• Use Audioshop’s Apply Pattern Tool to add vibrato whose speed and amplitude/strength varies
with time:
2. Set the amplitude/strength of the vibrato by clicking & dragging the slider button to
specify the number of semitones by which the pitch should vary;
3. Set the speed of the vibrato by clicking & dragging the slider button to specify the Period
in seconds;
4. Click & drag over part or all of the note to apply the vibrato.
▪ Tip: Create a vibrato of growing intensity by applying the sine pattern multiple
times across the same note, each time increasing the amplitude (e.g. from 0.2 to
0.3 and then to 0.4 semitones). If necessary, use Audioshop’s Draw Pitch Tool to
smooth out the transitions between each vibrato.
▪ Tip: Make the vibrato more realistic by also applying the sine pattern to the
volume of the note. For this, the amplitude is in decibels (dB).
• Use Audioshop’s Clone Pitch/Sound Tool to clone pitch changes such as vibrato and slides from
one note to another:
2. X/Ctrl-click on a note at the start of the vibrato or other pitch variation you’d like to
clone,
3. Click & drag over the other note to apply the pitch variation to it.
Rhythm
• Draw new notes between the starts of existing notes with Audioshop’s Draw Sound Tool to
increase the speed of the rhythm.
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• Use Beat Mapper (available from the RipScripts Panel) to change the rhythmic feel of all or only
selected bars by changing the relative lengths of the beats within them. Choose one of the presets
(e.g. Swing) from the drop-down menu or follow the instructions to design a custom effect.
Volume
• Select Audioshop’s Smooth Region Tool, ensure that only Volume is selected, and then click &
drag over the note.
o Note: Any associated pitch vibrato can be removed with the Flatten Pitch effect in the FX
Panel – see Quickly flatten, slide, or add constant vibrato to pitch .
Unpitched Sound
• Use Audioshop’s Edit Unpitched Tool to view and edit all unpitched sound in the Rip. Click & drag
over a region to select, edit and apply effects (such as Level) to it. Pitched sounds/notes are
displayed in the background for reference and cannot be selected or edited.
a) If the unpitched sound contains the noise and nothing else, select it and press Delete.
b) If it also contains a sound that is needed, check if that sound appears by itself elsewhere.
If it does, delete the unpitched sound containing the noise and replace it with the other
noiseless unpitched sound by copying & pasting it across.
2. Quickly remove any background or foreground noise from a selection with the tools available in
the Repair Panel (opened from the Panels menu) – in particular, with Filter Background, Limit
Foreground, and Tones & Hum. See below for details.
1. Filter Background – Removes unpitched audio and harmonic slices below a given dB level.
2. Limit Foreground – Limits the dB level of unpitched audio and harmonic slices.
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3. Tones & Hum – Removes unwanted sounds like tones and hums, up to a maximum
bandwidth.
4. Purify – Evens out rough and random amplitude changes within unpitched audio and
harmonics, to create a smoother sound.
6. Fundamental Level – Decreases/increases the level of the fundamental (1st harmonic) within
pitched sounds. This can even be used to regenerate a fundamental that was filtered out
during a mixing/mastering process, adding more bass presence back to sounds like vocals.
o Tip: Experiment with different edits made with different tools, listening to the effects that
they have on the timbre of the note.
o Tip: Click & drag over part of the harmonics with the Select/Edit/Mask Tool to listen to
that part only.
• Use Audioshop’s Clone Pitch/Sound Tool with Sound selected to clone timbre (and volume) from
one sound to another.
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Note: Pro Tools version 12.2 (Windows) / 12.8.2 (macOS) or later is required.
1) In Pro Tools, select audio in a single track and choose AudioSuite>Other>Edit In RipX DAW.
3) RipX DAW will bring up the usual options for ripping the audio and then start processing.
If the clip has been previously ripped and is in the Rips Panel, RipX DAW will first ask whether you’d
like to open that instead.
5) When you have finished, click File>Update in Pro Tools (zXS / Ctrl+Alt+S).
Important: if you experience no audio playback within RipX DAW whilst Pro Tools is running, try the following:
• If Pro Tools is using ASIO4ALL as the playback engine, try changing it to another in Setup>Playback
Engine…
• Alternatively, close Pro Tools and select an alternative playback device not used by Pro Tools from RipX
DAW>Preferences… (macOS) or File>Preferences… (Windows). Then restart Pro Tools and try again.
• If no other devices are available, try installing and selecting ASIO4ALL, available to download from
http://www.asio4all.org/. ASIO4ALL is a widely used ASIO driver but as it is a third-party product,
Hit’n’Mix Ltd takes no responsibility for its usage.
VST3/ARA2
Installed with RipX DAW PRO is the RipLink plug-in for VST3/ARA2. DAWs that support this include:
Studio One (v 4 or later) Cakewalk (v 2019.05 or later)
REAPER (v 5.97 or later) Cubase Pro/Nuendo (v 11.0.30 or later)
Studio One
1) Split the sections of each track that you would like to edit in RipX DAW from the rest of the track by
using the Split Tool.
2) Switch to the Arrow Tool and click on one of the sections to select it.
3) Open the Inspector (if it is not already open) and, next to Event FX, click Enable.
4) In the Inserts panel that appears below, click on the + button.
5) In the search box, start to type RipLink and click on it when it appears in the search results below.
6) Repeat steps 3-5 for the other sections that you would like to edit in RipX DAW.
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8) RipX DAW will bring up the usual options for ripping the audio. Click Rip to start ripping.
(Note: If the section has been previously ripped and is in the Rips Panel, RipX DAW will first ask whether you’d
like to open that instead.)
9) Once all sections have been ripped, edit them as you would normally.
10) When you have finished, display each Rip and choose File>Update In Studio One (zXS / Ctrl+Alt+S)
to update the audio in Studio One.
Cubase Pro/Nuendo
1) Split the sections of each track that you would like to edit in RipX DAW from the rest of the track by
using the Split Tool.
2) Switch to the Object Selection Tool and click on one of the sections to select it.
3) From the menu bar, select Audio > Extensions > RipLink.
4) Repeat steps 2-3 for the other sections that you would like to edit in RipX DAW.
6) RipX DAW will bring up the usual options for ripping the audio. Click Rip to start ripping.
(Note: If the section has been previously ripped and is in the Rips Panel, RipX DAW will first ask whether you’d
like to open that instead.)
7) Once all sections have been ripped, edit them as you would normally.
8) When you have finished, display each Rip and choose File>Update In Cubase/Nuendo (zXS /
Ctrl+Alt+S) to update the audio in Cubase/Nuendo.
REAPER
1) Split the sections of each track that you would like to edit in RipX DAW from the rest of the track by
clicking on the track and pressing S.
3) At the bottom of the Media Item Properties dialog box that opens, click Take FX…
4) The Add FX dialog box opens. In the tree on the left-hand side, click on Hit’n’Mix under Developers.
5) Click on VST3: RipLink in the panel on the right and click Add (macOS) or OK (Windows).
6) Repeat steps 2-5 for the other sections that you would like to edit in RipX DAW.
(Note: If the section has been previously ripped and is in the Rips Panel, RipX DAW will first ask whether you’d
like to open that instead.)
9) Once all sections have been ripped, edit them as you would normally.
10) When you have finished, display each Rip and choose File>Update In REAPER (zXS / Ctrl+Alt+S) to
update the audio in REAPER.
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Cakewalk
1) Select the section you would like to edit in RipX DAW.
2) Right-click on the section and select Region FX > RipLink > Create Region FX.
3) Repeat steps 1-2 for the other sections that you would like to edit in RipX DAW.
4) Click on the RipX DAW icon in the RipLink plugin window.
5) RipX DAW will bring up the usual options for ripping the audio. Click Rip to start ripping.
(Note: If the section has been previously ripped and is in the Rips Panel, RipX DAW will first ask whether you’d
like to open that instead.)
6) Once all sections have been ripped, edit them as you would normally.
7) When you have finished, display each Rip and choose File>Update In Cakewalk (zXS / Ctrl+Alt+S) to
update the audio in Cakewalk.
Other DAWs
1) In your DAW, use its splitting tool to separate out the part of the track that you would like to edit in
RipX DAW
2) Add the RipLink plug-in (from developer Hit’n’Mix) to that section of track.
5) RipX DAW will bring up the usual options for ripping the audio. Click Rip to start ripping.
(Note: If the section has been previously ripped and is in the Rips Panel, RipX DAW will first ask whether you’d
like to open that instead.).
6) Once all sections have been ripped, edit them as you would normally.
7) When you have finished, choose File>Update In DAW (zXS / Ctrl+Alt+S) to update the audio in your
DAW.
Important: if you experience no audio playback within RipX DAW whilst your DAW is running, check whether it
has an option to disable audio when running in the background, or try using an alternative playback device in
RipX DAW from RipX DAW>Preferences… (macOS) or File>Preferences… (Windows).
Logic Pro X Version tested: 10. Select the File Editor tab from Logic Pro X > Preferences > Audio. (If
this tab is not shown, click Advanced from the toolbar, then Show Advanced Tools and
enable Audio, before returning to Audio > File Editor on the toolbar). Click the field next
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to External Sample Editor and locate and choose the RipX executable. Close the dialog
box.
Ableton Live Version tested: 10. Open the Preferences (Windows: Options > Preferences or macOS:
Live>Preferences) and select the File Folder tab. Click the Browse button next to Sample
Editor and locate and choose the RipX executable. Close the dialog box.
FL Studio Version tested: 20. Only worked on Windows. Open the External tools settings, found in
OPTIONS > File settings (FL Studio 20) or TOOLS > External tools (earlier versions). Click
the folder icon and locate and choose the RipX executable. Important: Ensure Launch
with file/sample is selected. Close the dialog box.
ACID Pro Version tested: 9. Open the Preferences (Options > Preferences) and select the Editing
tab. Click the Browse button next to Editing application 1/2/3 and locate and choose the
RipX executable. Important: Next, enter RipX DAW next to Name. Click OK to close the
dialog box.
Digital Performer Version tested: 10. Click Audio > Use External Waveform Editor and locate and choose the
RipX executable.
Mixcraft Version tested: 8.1. Open the Preferences (File > Preferences) and select General from the
left-hand side. Click the Browse button in the External Wave Editor section and locate and
choose the RipX executable. Click OK to close the dialog box.
Ableton Live Double-click the title of the audio clip to edit, then right-click the waveform in the Sample
Display/Note Editor (bottom of screen by default) and choose Manage Sample File from
the menu. In the Replace Files pane (right of screen by default) the audio clip will be
selected – click Edit next to it. Note that this also takes the sample off-line within Live.
FL Studio Double-click the sample to open the Sample settings. Right-click over the waveform
display and choose RipX DAW from the menu.
ACID Pro Right-click the sample in the timeline and choose Event Clip > Edit in RipX DAW from the
menu. (Alternatively, select the sample and use Tools > Edit in RipX DAW from the menu.
Digital Performer Click the sample and choose Audio > Edit in Waveform Editor.
Mixcraft Right-click the title of the audio clip to edit, then choose Edit In External Editor…. In the
dialog box that appears, choose either to Edit A Copy Of The Sound, or Edit Actual Sound
and then click Edit. Note that RipX DAW automatically makes a copy of the audio before
updating it.
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When you have finished, choose File > Update Source (zXS / Ctrl+Alt+S). RipX DAW will check that you
want to update the file before exporting it in the same file format as the source.
As a precaution, RipX DAW will also create a backup of the original file alongside it, with [Original]
appended to the filename. This can be deleted using Finder/Explorer when you are sure you no longer
require the original.
Let the DAW Know About the Update (only required for the following DAWs)
Ableton Live Click the Edit button next to the sample once again so that it is no longer highlighted.
FL Studio Right-click the waveform in the Sample settings to bring up the menu and choose Reload.
Pro Tools, Studio One, Cakewalk, Logic Pro X, Ableton Live, Logic Pro X, Digital Perfomer, ACID Pro, Mixcraft, Cubase, Nuendo & REAPER are trademarks or registered
trademarks of their respective owners.
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Right-click Rip Open a menu at the position of the mouse pointer that includes various
editing options and tools plus all of Audioshop’s tools.
X T
Ctrl+T Open Harmonic Editor to view and edit the harmonics of a note.
7 Select the Clone From Time Slice tool within Harmonic Editor.
x 1
Shift+1 Select the Reduce By Time Slice tool within Harmonic Editor.
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How To…
The following section explains how to perform a number of common tasks with RipX DAW.
2. Press the Up/Down arrow key a number of times to shift the selected notes up/down by that number
of semitones.
• Tip: For best results, shift the notes in the direction that requires the smallest shift. For example,
shift the notes down one semitone to change the key from C major to B major instead of up 11
semitones.
3. If any notes are now too high or too low, select them and press XDown/Ctrl+Down or XUp/Ctrl+Up
to shift them down or up an octave.
4. To change the mode of the key from major to minor or vice-versa, click Scale at the bottom-left of RipX
DAW and then select the appropriate scale from the menu.
• Tip: Click Detect to find the key of the Rip and then change it from major to harmonic minor or
vice versa.
• Select Auto Pitch To Scale and RipX DAW will automatically shift notes to the nearest semitone for
the selected key and scale.
A/B
The best way to A/B between before and after edits, is to click File>Save Copy (XxS / Ctrl+Shift+S)
before making any edits to the Rip, then press ^/Ctrl+Tab to quickly switch between the edited and
original copy (which are both shown in the Rips Panel).
2. Under File Format, choose MIDI - Simple (.mid) and click Export. (This format is designed specifically
for transcription and contains just the overall pitch and amplitude for each note.)
• Tip: If the Rip contains quiet notes that do not need to be transcribed, select the region in which they
appear (e.g. by clicking & dragging a selection rectangle over them) and then use the Filter Notes
effect in the FX Panel to filter them out. Alternatively, quickly apply the effect at 50% to the entire
MIDI file by selecting Filter Notes in the Export dialog.
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Copy & paste notes between different Rips and different parts of the same Rip
• Create harmony or layered textures by copying & pasting vocal/instrumental notes or sound effects on
top of themselves then shifting them up or down in pitch. Improve the effect by reducing the volume
of the harmony notes with the Level effect and (PRO only) adding subtle variations in pitch with
Audioshop’s Draw Pitch Tool. Note that harmony can also be added more quickly (but with less fine
control over the pitch of the notes) by applying the Harmony effect.
• Create a dialog between two singers, actors, instruments, or sound effects by copying a single line or
sound of one of them and pasting that between two lines or sounds of the other. Upon pasting, notes
are auto-grouped so that they can be easily adjusted to fit. Click & drag the start and end of the group
to find the desired timing, aligning the guidelines shown in its title bar with the Rip’s beat markers.
Alternatively, paste with Xx/Ctrl+Shift+V to automatically fit to the destination BPM. Use the Stereo
Panning effect to make the different performers or sound effects come out of different speakers.
• Add repetition at regular intervals by using Edit>Duplicate (X/Ctrl+D) on a selection or by copying &
repeatedly pasting it at other rhythmic intervals. Notes can then be shifted in pitch to create scales or
arpeggiated effects. Alternatively, the Delay effect can be used to create an echo effect.
2) Open one of the Rips and mute each layer that you’d like to be removed from the song (by clicking M
to the right of the layer’s name in the Layers Panel) or delete all of its notes (by right-clicking on its
name in the Layers Panel and clicking Delete). If there’s only one layer that you wish to keep, you can
simply solo it instead (by clicking S on that layer).
3) In the Rips Panel, click on the arrow to the left of the name of one of the other Rips to display a list of
its layers inside that panel.
o Tip: If there are any that you are unsure about using, you can select them and drag them onto
the other Rip’s name, adding them to that Rip’s list of layers so that they’re stored in a
convenient place for use on a future date.
5) Drag any layers that you’d like to use onto the currently displayed Rip.
o Tip: Entire Rips can also be dragged onto it from the Rips Panel.
6) The contents of each layer are automatically turned into a group for quick and easy editing.
o Click & drag it vertically to fit it to the key of the Rip.
o Click & drag it horizontally to choose where it starts.
o Click & drag its ends to adjust its timing, aligning its guidelines with the beat markers in the
Rip.
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7) To delete, apply effects/sounds to, or alter the timing/pitch of any of its individual notes, click the
arrow on the left side of the group to display its contents.
2) Click File>Open or press X/Ctrl+O to import the MIDI file and convert it into a Rip.
3) Sounds are automatically applied to the notes but other sounds can be applied to them by selecting
the notes and clicking on one or more sounds in the Sounds Panel.
o Tip: All notes assigned to the same layer can be selected at once by selecting the layer in the
Layers Panel and pressing X/Ctrl+A.
4) If you applied to notes an instrumental sound that differs from the one they had in the MIDI file,
change the layer they are assigned to by selecting them and clicking on the arrow button to the right
of the appropriate instrument name in the Layers Panel.
o Click & drag the starts of notes so that they are no longer strictly in time. (If Snap to Beat
Markers is checked in the View menu, hold down z /Alt whilst clicking & dragging.)
o Add the Vibrato effect from the FX Panel or with Audioshop’s Apply Pattern Tool.
o Add pitch slides and vibrato by hand with Audioshop’s Draw Pitch Tool or clone these from
other notes with Audioshop’s Clone Pitch/Sound Tool.
o Adjust the volume across notes by applying the Level effect to them and using the automation
lane.
6) Copy & paste notes into other Rips that you are working on.
o Tip: When pasting, press Xx/Ctrl+Shift+V so that the pasted notes are automatically
adjusted to fit the destination BPM.
2) Select the notes that you would like to put onto a different scale.
o Tip: If the notes all belong to the same layer, select that layer in the Layers Panel so that you
can quickly select the notes with a selection rectangle without worrying about selecting notes
in other layers.
3) Click Pitch To Scale in the Adjust/Effects menu to snap the selected notes to the scale.
o Tip: If you need to set different scales to notes in the same layer that are overlapping in time,
first set the scale for one set, then click Audio>Render Effects & Sounds or press z /Alt+R to
set their pitch in stone. Then continue to set the scale for the other set of notes.
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Creative Ideas
Recording (see Recording):
• Replace a vocal/instrumental part with your own performance by muting/deleting its layer in the
Layers Panel then recording your own performance over the remaining parts.
• Record backing harmonies over an existing recording, applying Level and other effects as you record.
• Use the wheels on a MIDI keyboard to add vibrato to a layer by recording only the wheel movement.
• Create new sounds that merge from one instrument to another (e.g. piano to synth strings) or that
transition through several different sounds.
• Design new types of reverb and delay by combining them in combos with other effects.
• Use combos to replace notes with just their reverb.
2) Copy & paste it to the point at which you would like the infinite glissando to start.
3) If desired, shift the pitch of the note up or down (e.g. to the tonic of the key).
4) Click & drag the end of the note to stretch it over several bars.
5) Apply the Level effect to the note and use the automation lane to make the start of the note fade in.
6) Open Infinity Scale from the RipScripts Panel and choose the Up and Triple notes options.
7) The best effect is achieved by choosing a number of Bars per octave that makes the glissando rise
slowly yet fast enough that there is enough time for the effect to go through multiple cycles of
glissando (slide).
PRO: Replace an instrumental phrase with a vocal phrase that has the exact same pitches & timing
(vocal transplant)
1) Select all notes belonging to an instrumental phrase (e.g. part of a guitar riff).
2) Join them into one note (X/Ctrl+J) and, if necessary, assign them to the appropriate layer with the
Layers Panel.
3) For best results, find a vocal phrase that is not greatly different in length or pitch. (It need not be from
the same Rip.)
4) Select all notes belonging to the vocal phrase then copy & paste them to the start of the instrumental
phrase.
5) Whilst still selected, join the vocal notes into one (X/Ctrl+J) and, if necessary, assign them to Voice
with the Layers Panel.
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6) Click & drag the end of the vocal note so that it is in time with the rest of the music.
In particular,
• Fit the rhythm of the words to the drums, rhythm guitar or piano accompaniment,
• Aligning the shapes of the phrases (e.g. their peaks) can sometimes be a quick way to find a
good result,
7) In Audioshop’s Clone Pitch/Sound Tool, check Pitch Changes, Pitch and From Start.
8) X/Ctrl-click the instrumental note and then click & drag over the entire length of the vocal note to
reshape it.
9) Select and delete the part of the instrumental note that overlaps the vocal note plus any part of the
vocal note that does not overlap the instrumental note.
10) If necessary, make fine adjustments to sync the voice to the music by selecting parts of the vocal note
and moving their starts and ends.
11) Use the Level effect to adjust the level of the voice to fit with the rest of the music.
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Please email RipScripts to [email protected]. The most useful ones will be featured on our website.
Indents RipScripts run in a computer language called Python 3. It requires that code uses
indentation rather than brackets for grouping instructions, and each indent can be
either 4 spaces or 1 tab. The RipScript editor enters 1 tab each time the Tab key is
pressed, which particularly for beginners, prevents any confusion that the correct
number of spaces has been entered. It is however possible to enter spaces using the
Spacebar instead, although they cannot be mixed with usage of tabs in a RipScript.
Code indented using spaces copied & pasted into your RipScript will be automatically
converted to use tabs if it already uses tabs for indentation.
Auto-complete As you type, the editor will predict what you want to enter and offer a list of
selections. The more you type, the shorter the list will become. Click on an item to
enter, or use the keyboard Up & Down arrows and press Enter.
Object descriptions As you move through different predictions in Auto-complete, RipX DAW will also show
you a description of the function or attribute and often provide sample code which
you can insert into your RipScript. To do this, click & drag over the code snippet to
select it. Then, on macOS, copy by right-clicking over the text and choosing Copy from
the menu; on Windows, press Ctrl+C. Finally, paste into your RipScript by placing the
caret at the position you’d like to insert, and using Edit>Paste from the menu bar or
X/Ctrl-V. Descriptions are also shown when you hover the mouse pointer over
function names, attributes, and some Python keywords in RipScripts.
Placeholders After selecting a function (followed by brackets) from the auto-complete list, it is
entered into the RipScript and, depending on the function, will be followed by a list of
arguments to fill in. Press Tab to jump to the next argument to fill (for example, if you
are finished with entering one, or do not need to enter a value). Shift-Tab jumps to
the previous argument. Enter finishes entering of arguments and places the cursor
after the final bracket.
Arguments that must be filled in are followed by the equals sign: =
Arguments that are optional are followed by this sign: ≈
RipScript reference For a tree diagram showing how various RipScript objects are related to each other,
with links to a complete online reference of the full API: When the RipScript editor is
open, choose How To Create RipScripts from the menu (macOS: the menu bar Help
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menu; Windows: the pop-up menu, by right-clicking over the editing section of the
editor window).
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Glossary of Terms
Amplitude Amplitude is related to Volume. However, it does not describe how loud a note
sounds, but is a physical property of how audio is constructed and defines the height
of a wave for a slice in a harmonic. In a RipScript it is a value between 0 (silent) and 1
(full volume). In a 16-bit WAV file it is measured between 0 and 32767.
ASIO driver A Windows audio device driver, which can be selected from File>Preferences…. ASIO
is a trademark and software of Steinberg Media Technologies GmbH.
Decibel (dB) A decibel (abbreviated to dB) is a relative unit of volume. Adding 10 dB to a note
makes it sound twice as loud. Taking off 10 dB halves the volume. +/- 1 dB is seen as
the lowest perceivable change in volume for an average person.
Formant A formant is a grouping of strong harmonics that define different sounds in speech.
Transposing the pitch of a note without altering the frequency of its formants allows it
to stay more natural sounding.
Frequency Frequency, measured in Hertz (Hz), is related to Pitch. It is a physical property of how
audio is constructed and defines the number of wave cycles per second for a slice in a
harmonic.
Full-mix track An audio track that has had all the separate instrument recordings (stems) merged
into one, requiring software such as RipX DAW to separate them to make them once
again individually editable.
Loudness A measure of how loud a note sounds, different from Amplitude (see above).
MIDI Number MIDI is a standard for playing notes using electronic instruments. The MIDI number is
a scale of note pitches between 0 and 127 which each have a unique number. For
example, middle C is 60.
Panning Panning is the apparent position of a sound, for example between left and right
speakers.
Phase Phase is an angle which determines where in a wave’s cycle a particular slice
represents.
Pitch Pitch determines how high or low a note sounds. Also see MIDI Number and
Frequency.
Python 3 An easy-to-use and popular programming language used for running RipScripts.
Rip A Rip is an audio file that has been source separated into individual notes, harmonics,
frequencies, amplitudes, phases and slices by the Ripper.
RipList A RipList is a collection of Rip files, akin to a playlist, shown in the Rips Panel. Right-
click on the title bar to create or open a different one.
Ripper The Ripper uses sophisticated algorithms to split audio into separate notes,
harmonics, frequencies, amplitudes, phases and slices, creating a Rip file.
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RipScript A RipScript is a script (or small computer program) written in Python 3 that can
automate audio processing and provide a user interface in RipX DAW.
Slice A separate value for pitch, volume, panning and phase is stored by RipX DAW at
regular intervals of time, just under 1/100th second. Each interval of time is called a
Slice.
Timbre The character of a note that is unique to the voice, instrument or sound that
performed it.
Volume Volume determines how loud a note sounds. Also see Amplitude, Decibel and
Loudness.
Wave For example, a sine wave, is a simple regular to and fro motion which notes are
generally comprised of at the most basic level. Waves are stored in traditional audio
formats and represent the movements a speaker needs to make for air to vibrate so
that sound can be heard by a person.
Waveform An audio file containing the speaker positions needed to recreate a recorded sound.
Widget A user interface item such as a button, check box, combo box, or slider that can be
added to a window in a RipScript.
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© Hit’n’Mix Ltd 2009-2024
Addendum
Created by Martin Dawe, Richard Cheng, David Dawe, Chunhua Hu and Jeremy Lloyd.
Copyright
RipX DAW © Hit’n’Mix Ltd 2009-2024
MPEG Layer-3 audio coding technology licensed from Fraunhofer IIS and Thomson.
GPAC (github.com/gpac), FFmpeg (ffmpeg.org) and libsndfile licensed under the LGPL.
GCC runtime library licensed under the GCC Runtime Library Exception.
Tcl/Tk © Regents of the University of California, Sun Microsystems, Inc., Scriptics Corp et al.
jedi, parso and typeshed ©2013-2019 David Halter and others, licensed under MIT/Apache.
PIL © 1997-2011 Secret Labs AB, 1995-2011 by Fredrik Lundh, Pillow ©2010-2019 by Alex Clark et al.
PyTorch © Meta, Inc, Idiap Research Institute, Deepmind Technologies, NEC Laboratories America, NYU.
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LICENSE
(c) 2022, Steinberg Media Technologies GmbH, All Rights Reserved
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Redistribution and use in source and binary forms, with or without modification,
are permitted provided that the following conditions are met:
THIS SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED BY THE COPYRIGHT HOLDERS AND CONTRIBUTORS "AS IS" AND ANY EXPRESS OR
IMPLIED WARRANTIES, INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, THE IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY
AND FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE ARE DISCLAIMED. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE COPYRIGHT OWNER OR
CONTRIBUTORS BE LIABLE FOR ANY DIRECT, INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL, EXEMPLARY, OR
CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES (INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, PROCUREMENT OF SUBSTITUTE GOODS OR
SERVICES; LOSS OF USE, DATA, OR PROFITS; OR BUSINESS INTERRUPTION) HOWEVER CAUSED AND ON ANY
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© Hit’n’Mix Ltd 2009-2024
Terms of Use
RipX DAW is not intended for use by users which would infringe the copyright of any piece of music owned by a third
party and is intended for lawful use only; Hit’n’Mix Ltd in no way authorizes any user of RipX DAW to carry out an act in
contravention of the provisions of the Copyright Designs and Patents Act 1988; and Any use of RipX DAW in conjunction
with such music should only be carried out with the permission of the copyright owner in question.
Trademarks
RipX, RipX DAW, Future Audio Workstation, Audioshop and Hit’n’Mix are trademarks or registered trademarks of
Hit’n’Mix Ltd. See hitnmix.com for more information about Hit’n’Mix Ltd and its products.
VST and ASIO are trademarks and software of Steinberg Media Technologies GmbH.
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