I just recently got an R20 and discovered some things on my own. I'll list a few things here as I'm watching the video. --I give my montoring a bass boost by running a cable from the headphone jack to a bass amp. --I don't use the click track or the time grid, so I set "click" and "snap" to off, and slow the tempo way down for longer project time. Project time is limited by bars/measures (1450 bars) but not by time. --The full manual is only available as a PDF. The Quick Tour guide is pretty limited. --Although the Quick Tour guide says otherwise, my electronic (powered) keyboard needs the Hi-Z input boost. --My recording is all with live-played, non-virtual instruments, so the things I discovered are all for capturing live sound. --It is fairly easy to connect different kinds of audio inputs inputs at the same time. You can have condensor mics with phantom power on 2 or 4 input channels, dynamic mics without phantom on 2 or 4 channels, and a Hi-Z input for guitar, bass, or keyboard in Input 1 all at the same time to record a live band. I was mostly here for editing tips.
Really, for my purposes, I'd like to turn the grid completely off. That would turn off the time limit. But I think turning the matrix off is not possible with this machine.
The faders can be assigned to a different function, i guess thats not possible is it, as they deal with audio - in order to assign for instance the tempo to one of the faders or knobs (not the click button).. what you show, essentially makes it difficult to play with the tempo while having a track in playback mode..? Or could a midi controller do the job?
No, the faders are locked into controlling the levels of the designated tracks, that's it. I don't think I've been able to adjust the tempo via a MIDI controller...I'll have to try that the next time I plug a controller into it, but I doubt it will work. I think your only two options are to adjust the tempo with the touchscreen or you can tap tempo like I demonstrated in the video. Adjusting tempo while in playback is not possible, because you are laying down audio tracks. It takes way too much CPU power to time stretch audio files in real time. If it was all MIDI, that's not too hard, but since the R20 is primarily designed to record audio .WAV files, you can't adjust tempo in real time - it won't speed up or slow down the audio files, it only arbitrarily changes the timeline at the top.
No, the click stays separate from recording tracks and separate from recording during mix down. As a work around, I guess you could send the click only to the monitor out, and then like, use a 1/4" to a 1/4" cable to loop it back into one of the R20's inputs. Mute all the other tracks. Then record hit record and let it record the click for as long your song is. Then you'll have the click on a true audio track and you can then play around with the faders as you mix down to hear the click in your final mix. I think maybe that would work...?
Sadly, no. And it's one of my bigger gripes about the machine. I'm really hoping Zoom gives us more options for time signatures and click tracks through firmware updates. I'm assuming the R12 will offer the same metronome options upon launch, too.
Hi, Can I automate change of a tempo in the project? For example if in the song is a change of the temo and drummer need also change a temo of the click while playing live?
Sadly, no. You can only set one tempo per song. You can't change the tempo for like...the bridge part of the song or something. As an alternative, you could record a click as an audio file for a track, like on Track 8. And you could record it at 120 bpm for as long as maybe your Verse-Chorus-Verse-Chorus runs. Then perhaps you could record a second audio click that is at 108 for your bridge on a separate project. Then you could import the 108 bpm click into the 120 project and splice it at the end. Don't use the CLICK from the R20. Instead, use the audio track as your click for 120 for the first part of the song and then the 108 as the bridge to help your drummer lay down a full track for the full song perfectly in time. Obviously, substitute the 120 and 108 for whatever bpm times you are looking for. That's all I can think of, unfortunately.
@@GazRendar I understand, but, can I also for example send track 1 with playback to the main output and track 2 with recorded click to the headphones? This can be hard to change projects between parts of the songs while playing live. From Your movies I noticed I can only seperately split to the headphones a click from metronome, but can I use this with a different track?
No. If its' an audio track, it's going to go to both the headphones and the monitor OUT. You can't send like....Tracks 1-8 to the headphones and only Track 9 to the monitor OUT. In that scenario you would get Tracks 1-9 all going to both the headphones and monitor. You can control the click metronome volume in the monitor out and the headphone out. Those are independent of each other. But...like I sadly mentioned, you can only pick one bpm for a Project (song). So you can't have a 120 song with a 108 bridge. You would just pick a 120 metronome click and the bridge would be off. It kinda sucks and I'm hoping Zoom gives us the ability to set multiple time signatures within a single song through a firmware update, but I'm not sure if that's something that is on their radar or if it's even possible with the hardware.
@@GazRendar Thank You very much for help! I see in this case the Zoom L8 will be maybe a better solution, or maybe I will just wait for a firmware update. Keep going with the awesome music You are making! 😁
Thanks so much! And yeah, based on what you are describing, something like the L-8 might be a better fit for you because it provides far more flexibility with metronomes and audio track routing through various headphone and monitor outs.
No. At least as of v3.3 you cannot pick one of the R20's 16 tracks and use it as a metronome. Unfortunately, the metronome features are only built into the R20's global project settings, and not within the track settings.
Please tell me how to recover cropped tracks after changing tempo. I tried changing the tempo back to original but not sure exactly where it was. Btw, your videos have been super helpful!
To be more clear, I changed the tempo setting after recording as a way of trying to see more of the tracks on the screen. This crops the ends off and now they seem to be gone?
@@GazRendarI just discovered this also 🤦♂️ It seems that where samples start in a session is referenced to the bar number rather than seconds. The original files seem to still be intact in the folder but in the session it has cut them short. Resizing the clip doesn't restore the length, it just starts the sample again. Looks like I'll just have to load all the original recording files back into the session one at a time and drag them into place... Unless anyone knows of a quicker method?
Thanks! New issue: since there's no punch-in option, I record on another track in the place I need then split it and move it to the proper place. I've done this a couple times but last time I attempted this, as soon as I hit record, the time needle jumps to the beginning of the tracks. What am I missing? Is it a marker issue?
I am having trouble laying tracks and then adding with it. How can i sing with myself or add more instruments if I can't record while the tracks are playing?. I want to make an album of my own music. I used to dub over cassettes. It was easy. Why is there no video about this? Please make a video how to sing and add your own harmony. thanks.............Jane
Hi Jane, this should be fairly easy to do and it's what multitrackers excel at. It sounds like you already have some music you want to import into the R20, and then uses a mic to create new vocal tracks over the music that you are importing? First, this video will show you how to import music....you can import your music into a stereo linked track...say...tracks 5&6. ua-cam.com/video/JMmjrkenS8s/v-deo.html After you import the tracks, then you can plug a mic into say...input 7. Adjust the gain on Track 7 so you can hear your mic without it clipping. You just need to arm track 7 (hit the physical button above Track 7's fader, it will turn red) and the 7 on the screen turns red. Make sure your timeline marker is at the beginning. Hit the record button and you should be able to hear your voice recording to Track 7 while the music is playing on Tracks 5&6. Adjust the faders on Tracks 5 and 6 to hear the music. I hope that helped...
I have one question. There is a high probability, I did not figure it out from video, but I want to know, If I can create "change tempo markers". Can I work with a projects, where rythm is different on particular parts of the song?
At least on v3.00, the answer is unfortunately no. You cannot go from 4/4 time for the first half of the song, then throw it into 6/8 time for the bridge, and then back to 4/4. You can only pick one time, one tempo to use for the project (song). Now, that said, the multitracker's metronome and timeline grid are just there as guides. You can use it as a freeflowing recording device. So if you have a drum machine or something to sequence and then record the drum audio first for full 4-minute song, complete with time switches, then you can essentially use that as your metronome as you might begin to layer guitar, bass, vocals, synths...etc. Honestly, that works fairly well. The problem is that the grid won't make much sense, but you can turn off "Snap to Grid" in the settings and edit based on the audio tracks that you are creating, not bars or the grid. I guess the biggest problem is if you want to try to then record sequenced synths. You can make it work manually with editing directly on the R20, but it's going to take awhile to pull it off.
@@GazRendar Thank You for explanation. But that leads myself to ask another question. I am absoluitely okay with it, If clicktrack with my own tempo configuration will be uploaded just as the wav file to this machine. Then comes the trouble - Can I decide, which track is going to be played through output, and which will be played through the phones? I ask about this, cause I plan to use this device as the sampler at the concerts, and I want to give a click to my drummer, and also use backtracks at the show.
Ah....I see. If you want to play live shows as use the R20 to help you, this is a lot more complicated then and you'll have to think about what your specific needs are. I'm not sure the R20 is your best choice because the R20 is a true multitracker that focuses on recording and editing, not as much as a mixing board for live shows. If you record a track, say Track #8, that has something that acts as your click, you cannot route Track #8 through the headphones and say...Tracks 1-7 through the monitor out. You can mute and solo tracks on the R20, but whatever you choose to mute and solo, that audio all goes out of both the monitor and headphones out the same way. The only thing that you can choose to adjust between headphone and monitor out is the built-in click of the R20. One thing to maybe consider is the upcoming R12. It supposedly has Sequence Play, which will allow you to load multiple projects (songs) in a row that you can playback, much like a playlist. I'd like to think that kind of feature will arrive on the R20 as part of a firmware update, but who knows. Still, though, much like the R20 you'll have the problem that the R12 cannot route separate tracks to the headphones vs. the monitor out. If you need a recording device to assist with live shows, you might want to consider going with those hybrid mixer/multitracker units like Zoom's L-8 or L-12. They are true mixing boards, but will also record audio to SD cards. You can't really do the types of editing that you can pull off on the R20 or other multitrackers, but those hybrid mixing boards allow you to have some control over which tracks get routed to the monitor out vs. the 2-4 different headphone outs. Tascam also has it's Model 12 unit, which offers many of those same features.
I'd say it depends on what you are trying to record. If I'm trying to record guitar/bass/vocals for a song, I've been using a Boss DR-3 drum machine to create a simple beat and record that. Or, if I just need one time signature and one tempo for the entire song, I've been using some of the built-in drum loops of the R20 as my backing drum track to get the song started, then I'm figuring guitar and bass over that. From there I can go back and create the drums that I want to create toward the end of the song creation process, either with the DR-3 or with my Yamaha DTX electronic drum kit. If you want to lay down a track that will help you sync synthesizers, that's more complicated. I'm experimenting with several different things to try to be able to record sync'd Pocket Operators or Volcas, but I haven't quite gotten things to work perfectly. If I get something to work there, I'll definitely make a video about it.
No. Sadly, only one tempo and time signature per project (song). As a work-around for a song that is like, 4/4 at 110 bpm for the verses and chorus go to a bridge that might be 3/4 100 bpm, and back to 4/4 110 for the final chorus and outro you would need to record 3 separate projects...the first 4/4 110, then the 3/4 100, then final 4/4 110....and then mix them down separately and finally compile them on your computer or re-import those 3 stereo mix down files into a brand new project where you import place them back to back to back and disregard the R20's time signature. So you can sort of do it, but it's a pain...
I just recently got an R20 and discovered some things on my own. I'll list a few things here as I'm watching the video.
--I give my montoring a bass boost by running a cable from the headphone jack to a bass amp.
--I don't use the click track or the time grid, so I set "click" and "snap" to off, and slow the tempo way down for longer project time. Project time is limited by bars/measures (1450 bars) but not by time.
--The full manual is only available as a PDF. The Quick Tour guide is pretty limited.
--Although the Quick Tour guide says otherwise, my electronic (powered) keyboard needs the Hi-Z input boost.
--My recording is all with live-played, non-virtual instruments, so the things I discovered are all for capturing live sound.
--It is fairly easy to connect different kinds of audio inputs inputs at the same time. You can have condensor mics with phantom power on 2 or 4 input channels, dynamic mics without phantom on 2 or 4 channels, and a Hi-Z input for guitar, bass, or keyboard in Input 1 all at the same time to record a live band.
I was mostly here for editing tips.
Really, for my purposes, I'd like to turn the grid completely off. That would turn off the time limit. But I think turning the matrix off is not possible with this machine.
Your traing videos are very well done. Thanks for quality presentation.
You are most welcome. Thanks for watching!
The faders can be assigned to a different function, i guess thats not possible is it, as they deal with audio - in order to assign for instance the tempo to one of the faders or knobs (not the click button).. what you show, essentially makes it difficult to play with the tempo while having a track in playback mode..? Or could a midi controller do the job?
No, the faders are locked into controlling the levels of the designated tracks, that's it. I don't think I've been able to adjust the tempo via a MIDI controller...I'll have to try that the next time I plug a controller into it, but I doubt it will work. I think your only two options are to adjust the tempo with the touchscreen or you can tap tempo like I demonstrated in the video. Adjusting tempo while in playback is not possible, because you are laying down audio tracks. It takes way too much CPU power to time stretch audio files in real time. If it was all MIDI, that's not too hard, but since the R20 is primarily designed to record audio .WAV files, you can't adjust tempo in real time - it won't speed up or slow down the audio files, it only arbitrarily changes the timeline at the top.
makes sense@@GazRendar
Is it possible to hear the click on a recording? I had the click on during the mixdown, but I didn't hear it on the recorded audio. Any ideas?
No, the click stays separate from recording tracks and separate from recording during mix down.
As a work around, I guess you could send the click only to the monitor out, and then like, use a 1/4" to a 1/4" cable to loop it back into one of the R20's inputs. Mute all the other tracks. Then record hit record and let it record the click for as long your song is. Then you'll have the click on a true audio track and you can then play around with the faders as you mix down to hear the click in your final mix. I think maybe that would work...?
@@GazRendar Thank you!
Is there a way to make the click be unaccented? Or have like a 1/4 or 0/4 time sig
Sadly, no. And it's one of my bigger gripes about the machine. I'm really hoping Zoom gives us more options for time signatures and click tracks through firmware updates. I'm assuming the R12 will offer the same metronome options upon launch, too.
Hi, Can I automate change of a tempo in the project? For example if in the song is a change of the temo and drummer need also change a temo of the click while playing live?
Sadly, no. You can only set one tempo per song. You can't change the tempo for like...the bridge part of the song or something.
As an alternative, you could record a click as an audio file for a track, like on Track 8. And you could record it at 120 bpm for as long as maybe your Verse-Chorus-Verse-Chorus runs. Then perhaps you could record a second audio click that is at 108 for your bridge on a separate project. Then you could import the 108 bpm click into the 120 project and splice it at the end. Don't use the CLICK from the R20. Instead, use the audio track as your click for 120 for the first part of the song and then the 108 as the bridge to help your drummer lay down a full track for the full song perfectly in time. Obviously, substitute the 120 and 108 for whatever bpm times you are looking for. That's all I can think of, unfortunately.
@@GazRendar I understand, but, can I also for example send track 1 with playback to the main output and track 2 with recorded click to the headphones? This can be hard to change projects between parts of the songs while playing live.
From Your movies I noticed I can only seperately split to the headphones a click from metronome, but can I use this with a different track?
No. If its' an audio track, it's going to go to both the headphones and the monitor OUT. You can't send like....Tracks 1-8 to the headphones and only Track 9 to the monitor OUT. In that scenario you would get Tracks 1-9 all going to both the headphones and monitor.
You can control the click metronome volume in the monitor out and the headphone out. Those are independent of each other. But...like I sadly mentioned, you can only pick one bpm for a Project (song). So you can't have a 120 song with a 108 bridge. You would just pick a 120 metronome click and the bridge would be off. It kinda sucks and I'm hoping Zoom gives us the ability to set multiple time signatures within a single song through a firmware update, but I'm not sure if that's something that is on their radar or if it's even possible with the hardware.
@@GazRendar Thank You very much for help! I see in this case the Zoom L8 will be maybe a better solution, or maybe I will just wait for a firmware update. Keep going with the awesome music You are making! 😁
Thanks so much!
And yeah, based on what you are describing, something like the L-8 might be a better fit for you because it provides far more flexibility with metronomes and audio track routing through various headphone and monitor outs.
Hello, Gaz. Can an R20 track be used as a metronome? This can be assigned in the R8, but I don't know if it can be assigned in this device.
No. At least as of v3.3 you cannot pick one of the R20's 16 tracks and use it as a metronome. Unfortunately, the metronome features are only built into the R20's global project settings, and not within the track settings.
@@GazRendar It´s a shame. Thanks for your answer.
Please tell me how to recover cropped tracks after changing tempo. I tried changing the tempo back to original but not sure exactly where it was. Btw, your videos have been super helpful!
To be more clear, I changed the tempo setting after recording as a way of trying to see more of the tracks on the screen. This crops the ends off and now they seem to be gone?
If you haven't done more editing or extra recording, you can usually get it back if you put the tempo back to what it was before.
@@GazRendarI just discovered this also 🤦♂️
It seems that where samples start in a session is referenced to the bar number rather than seconds.
The original files seem to still be intact in the folder but in the session it has cut them short. Resizing the clip doesn't restore the length, it just starts the sample again.
Looks like I'll just have to load all the original recording files back into the session one at a time and drag them into place...
Unless anyone knows of a quicker method?
@@DaveyMulholland thanks! Found the missing files!
Thanks! New issue: since there's no punch-in option, I record on another track in the place I need then split it and move it to the proper place. I've done this a couple times but last time I attempted this, as soon as I hit record, the time needle jumps to the beginning of the tracks. What am I missing? Is it a marker issue?
I am having trouble laying tracks and then adding with it. How can i sing with myself or add more instruments if I can't record while the tracks are playing?. I want to make an album of my own music. I used to dub over cassettes. It was easy. Why is there no video about this? Please make a video how to sing and add your own harmony. thanks.............Jane
Hi Jane, this should be fairly easy to do and it's what multitrackers excel at. It sounds like you already have some music you want to import into the R20, and then uses a mic to create new vocal tracks over the music that you are importing? First, this video will show you how to import music....you can import your music into a stereo linked track...say...tracks 5&6.
ua-cam.com/video/JMmjrkenS8s/v-deo.html
After you import the tracks, then you can plug a mic into say...input 7. Adjust the gain on Track 7 so you can hear your mic without it clipping. You just need to arm track 7 (hit the physical button above Track 7's fader, it will turn red) and the 7 on the screen turns red. Make sure your timeline marker is at the beginning. Hit the record button and you should be able to hear your voice recording to Track 7 while the music is playing on Tracks 5&6. Adjust the faders on Tracks 5 and 6 to hear the music.
I hope that helped...
I have one question. There is a high probability, I did not figure it out from video, but I want to know, If I can create "change tempo markers". Can I work with a projects, where rythm is different on particular parts of the song?
At least on v3.00, the answer is unfortunately no. You cannot go from 4/4 time for the first half of the song, then throw it into 6/8 time for the bridge, and then back to 4/4. You can only pick one time, one tempo to use for the project (song).
Now, that said, the multitracker's metronome and timeline grid are just there as guides. You can use it as a freeflowing recording device. So if you have a drum machine or something to sequence and then record the drum audio first for full 4-minute song, complete with time switches, then you can essentially use that as your metronome as you might begin to layer guitar, bass, vocals, synths...etc. Honestly, that works fairly well. The problem is that the grid won't make much sense, but you can turn off "Snap to Grid" in the settings and edit based on the audio tracks that you are creating, not bars or the grid. I guess the biggest problem is if you want to try to then record sequenced synths. You can make it work manually with editing directly on the R20, but it's going to take awhile to pull it off.
What would you recommend to use so that I sequence the click track?
@@GazRendar Thank You for explanation. But that leads myself to ask another question. I am absoluitely okay with it, If clicktrack with my own tempo configuration will be uploaded just as the wav file to this machine. Then comes the trouble - Can I decide, which track is going to be played through output, and which will be played through the phones?
I ask about this, cause I plan to use this device as the sampler at the concerts, and I want to give a click to my drummer, and also use backtracks at the show.
Ah....I see. If you want to play live shows as use the R20 to help you, this is a lot more complicated then and you'll have to think about what your specific needs are. I'm not sure the R20 is your best choice because the R20 is a true multitracker that focuses on recording and editing, not as much as a mixing board for live shows.
If you record a track, say Track #8, that has something that acts as your click, you cannot route Track #8 through the headphones and say...Tracks 1-7 through the monitor out. You can mute and solo tracks on the R20, but whatever you choose to mute and solo, that audio all goes out of both the monitor and headphones out the same way. The only thing that you can choose to adjust between headphone and monitor out is the built-in click of the R20.
One thing to maybe consider is the upcoming R12. It supposedly has Sequence Play, which will allow you to load multiple projects (songs) in a row that you can playback, much like a playlist. I'd like to think that kind of feature will arrive on the R20 as part of a firmware update, but who knows. Still, though, much like the R20 you'll have the problem that the R12 cannot route separate tracks to the headphones vs. the monitor out.
If you need a recording device to assist with live shows, you might want to consider going with those hybrid mixer/multitracker units like Zoom's L-8 or L-12. They are true mixing boards, but will also record audio to SD cards. You can't really do the types of editing that you can pull off on the R20 or other multitrackers, but those hybrid mixing boards allow you to have some control over which tracks get routed to the monitor out vs. the 2-4 different headphone outs. Tascam also has it's Model 12 unit, which offers many of those same features.
I'd say it depends on what you are trying to record. If I'm trying to record guitar/bass/vocals for a song, I've been using a Boss DR-3 drum machine to create a simple beat and record that. Or, if I just need one time signature and one tempo for the entire song, I've been using some of the built-in drum loops of the R20 as my backing drum track to get the song started, then I'm figuring guitar and bass over that. From there I can go back and create the drums that I want to create toward the end of the song creation process, either with the DR-3 or with my Yamaha DTX electronic drum kit.
If you want to lay down a track that will help you sync synthesizers, that's more complicated. I'm experimenting with several different things to try to be able to record sync'd Pocket Operators or Volcas, but I haven't quite gotten things to work perfectly. If I get something to work there, I'll definitely make a video about it.
Can you program multiple tempos and time signatures?
No. Sadly, only one tempo and time signature per project (song).
As a work-around for a song that is like, 4/4 at 110 bpm for the verses and chorus go to a bridge that might be 3/4 100 bpm, and back to 4/4 110 for the final chorus and outro you would need to record 3 separate projects...the first 4/4 110, then the 3/4 100, then final 4/4 110....and then mix them down separately and finally compile them on your computer or re-import those 3 stereo mix down files into a brand new project where you import place them back to back to back and disregard the R20's time signature. So you can sort of do it, but it's a pain...
@@GazRendar 😵💫😵💫😵💫…You think they would figure out how to make that easier.