Playing back a session

- [Instructor] Experienced users know how to control Pro Tools playback to hear what they want, when they want, and how they want. This skill lets you work with confidence. Knowing exactly what you're listening to. Let's cover some options in Pro Tools that will help you stay in charge during playback. We learned in an earlier video how to position the cursor for playback by clicking at the location where we want playback to start. I can click on the track playlist here where the audio and midi clips are displayed, which positions the edit cursor.

Or I can click in the ruler area above my tracks, known as the timeline, which positions the timeline location. Clicking on a track playlist positions both the edit cursor and the timeline location by default. (peppy music) During playback you'll see the stationary edit cursor flashing along with the moving playback cursor scrolling across your screen. Stopping and restarting repeats from the same start point by default. (peppy music) You can optionally activate the insertion follows playback button up here at the top in the edit window for tape transport control.

(peppy music) This allows you to stop and restart, picking up from where you left off. We'll leave that off for now. When you're zoomed in as we are you'll notice that the playback cursor may disappear off screen during playback. (peppy music) When this happens you can click on the playback cursor locator up in the main time base ruler to scroll to your playback cursor or you can set your scrolling options so this doesn't happen.

We'll do this under the options menu and select edit windows scrolling. We're currently using the no scrolling option, but other popular choices include page scrolling and continuous scrolling. Let's take a look at each one. I'm going to scroll the screen to my edit cursor by pressing the left arrow key. Now during playback you'll notice (peppy music) as the playback cursor reaches the edge of the screen the screen scrolls one page at a time (peppy music) to keep the playback cursor in view.

(peppy music) I'm going to jump back to my start location with the left arrow key. Lets take a look at the continuous scrolling mode. In this mode the play head stays centered on the screen while the session scrolls past it. (peppy music) I recommend using page scrolling for general purpose use to avoid motion sickness while keeping the playback cursor visible.

When working with selections playback will occur in the selected range only. This is useful to audition the same section repeatedly. (peppy music) Be careful here if insertion follows playback is enabled as this will cause your selection to drop at the end of playback. Controlling playback is a simple matter as long as you keep some basic principles in mind. You can use the edit cursor or an edit selection to control where playback will start.

Keep an eye on the playback cursor to know what is currently playing. Set your scrolling mode to keep the playback cursor visible on screen and check your settings for insertion follows playback in the edit window if you encounter unexpected behavior.