Qlab: cues that sometimes finish

Jay Ashworth

Well-Known Member
A common pattern for me, I've found, in Qlab (v2, cause I'm still poor :) is that I'll set up a sound cue, say, 2, and then have a 2.5 that fades it out, before I move on to the next cue, 3.

But, sometimes, the drama will work out so that I don't need to *fire* 2.5; the natural fade in 2 covers me.

Is there some magic I don't know about that allows me to say "if cue 2 ends naturally, skip over 2.5, and wait at 3 for a GO" , either from the cue 2 side, or the cue 2.5 side? Having to look at the screen is annoying. :)

I can't be the first person who noticed this, right? Is this Fixed In v3?
 
An interesting idea. I don't know how to make that happen (I'm running v3) but would normally prefer to have my SM call the same cues every time, so even if the fade out isn't always necessary we would run it anyway to preserve the flow for SM and sound op, and eventually I would end up adjusting cues/times to eliminate the issue prior to opening the show. You could just make cue 2 longer so you don't run out before 2.5 gets called. That's assuming you want to wait for specific dialogue or movement to take the fade out. If you don't need that specific of an execution, then just delete 2.5 and let cue 2 time out whenever, but if you want the effect to be precise then you have to be precise in your cueing.
 
An interesting idea. I don't know how to make that happen (I'm running v3) but would normally prefer to have my SM call the same cues every time, so even if the fade out isn't always necessary we would run it anyway to preserve the flow for SM and sound op, and eventually I would end up adjusting cues/times to eliminate the issue prior to opening the show. You could just make cue 2 longer so you don't run out before 2.5 gets called.

I apologize for being unclear; I was apparently a bit rushed: 2.5 *is a fadeout cue for 2*.

And the situation at hand here is: "amateur community actors act at the speed they act at, and I need to fade out at a certain point in the action"; I *can't* time cue 2 exactly, cause I don't know how long it has to be.

That's assuming you want to wait for specific dialogue or movement to take the fade out. If you don't need that specific of an execution, then just delete 2.5 and let cue 2 time out whenever, but if you want the effect to be precise then you have to be precise in your cueing.

Yes. But sometimes, there's a natural end to cue 2, and I have to let it happen if we get to it. Suffice it to say that if I thought it was a problem someone else could solve, I'd be happy to let them solve it. :)
 
I apologize for being unclear; I was apparently a bit rushed: 2.5 *is a fadeout cue for 2*.

And the situation at hand here is: "amateur community actors act at the speed they act at, and I need to fade out at a certain point in the action"; I *can't* time cue 2 exactly, cause I don't know how long it has to be.

Yes. But sometimes, there's a natural end to cue 2, and I have to let it happen if we get to it. Suffice it to say that if I thought it was a problem someone else could solve, I'd be happy to let them solve it. :)

Right. I guess I can imagine how this might not work in a certain situation, but generally if this is happening I will edit the audio cue (cue 2) to run much longer than I would ever need so that when the action dictates we should take the fade out cue 2.5, cue 2 has not yet ended and there is still something to fade. That allows for variation in the performance while still putting the fade out at a specific point in the action. This works best with atmospheres rather than, say, music that needs to fade out after a certain phrase/lyric in the track, but you can even do it in the latter case by adding an intermediate cue, say 2.2, that crossfades into the portion of cue 2 that you want to end with, and then proceeds manually or auto-follow style to the cue 2.5 fade out. In that case the crossfade just needs to be called at a graceful time in the track so it sounds natural enough, but you can still be fairly precise.

Or, you can just run 2.5 after the target cue 2 has ended just to preserve the cue stack flow. It won't do anything bad--there just won't be an audible change because the target cue is already silent. You could make 2.5 auto-follow 2 to automate that process. Then you can still execute 2.5 earlier if you want, but if you don't need to then it will happen as soon as 2 finishes. Or or, if cue 2 finishes early you can just manually load cue 3 to skip 2.5. Maybe less elegant in the end, but also maybe easiest.
 
Yes; the latter is my common situation, and the problem is me. Q2 has ended. & I didn't have to end it. So my brain thinks the cursor is on Q3, but it's actually on 2.5 and I hit the button and nothing happens. That's the problem that I'm trying to solve.
 
Get ready to bust out your Script Q's...

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Make sure your Fade in the second Q is targeting the entirety of the Group from Cue 1.
 
Aha. I figured there might be a way to do that. It seems a little cluttered, but I presume I can minimize those groups?
 
I only program in groups for ease, as is the standard up in NYC -- you don't need to use groups at all if it doesn't suit you. I would call this a very uncluttered workspace, if I encountered this setup without groups my first inclination would be to throw every Q into it's own group.
 
The script won't track -- you just need to go into the script and change the number 3 to whatever your Q ends up being.

"If I select a number of group cues, and say Renumber, what happens to the cue numbers on the group containers, and on their contents?"

Do cues inside a group *mandatorily not* have cue numbers?

The provided help-file documentation with Q2 is decidedly thin around grouped cues.
 
Oh no, in QLab 2 every Q inside a group gets Q Numbers, I just delete them all out. Unfortunately, Re-Number will add a # to every discrete element. I tend to not touch that at all, and use incremental Q Numbers when I have to go revise (2.5, 2.7, etc.)
 
Yeah; that's gonna drive me up three separate walls.

Ok, I'll just do it the hard way and pay more attention. Thanks anyway, Chris.
 

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