Interface

Syne's project editor has a few main areas:

• The transport controls project playback and recording.
• The arrangement lets you schedule clips to create the structure of a track.
• The rack editor contains the instruments and audio effects that transform the output of clips in a rack.
• The MIDI editor is for adding & editing notes in a MIDI clip.

The transport is found at the top center of the project editor. It lets you start and stop playback, and change the project’s time signature and tempo.

Pressing play (or Space) will start playback from the last selected playback start time. If you hold Shift, playback will instead start at the current cursor position. Pressing pause (or Space again, with or without Shift) will stop playback in place, allowing you to either restart it or resume it later.

Close by the play/pause/record buttons you'll find the loop button. You can toggle playback looping with it, and it will be highlighted when looping is enabled. You can also toggle looping with Ctrl+Shift+L, and if you have a region selected in the arrangement it will become the new loop region.

Recording is toggled via the button in the transport with the recording icon (circle). If recording is started while the project is stopped, playback will start automatically. While the project is playing, recording can be freely toggled without stopping. When project playback stops, recording stops as well.

Syne supports recording both audio and MIDI.

Audio can be recorded from connected audio input devices, or resampled from various points in a project's audio graph.

Audio is recorded losslessly into a FLAC file, at the project's sample rate. If that sample rate is different from your input device's, the input audio will be up- or down-sampled to match. So some high-frequency content will be lost during recording if the project's sample rate is lower than the input device's.

MIDI can be recorded from the computer keyboard or a connected MIDI controller.

Currently only note values and velocities are recorded. When playing via the computer keyboard, all notes are recorded at full velocity.

This is the main timeline view, where you can arrange audio & MIDI clips to build your arrangement. It lays out your racks on a grid representing time in beats and measures.

There are several ways to get around the timeline. To zoom in and out, hold Ctrl and scroll with your mouse/trackpad.

Click on the timeline (or inside audio/MIDI clip previews) while playback is stopped to set a new playback start time. You can also use the arrow keys to move the playback cursor and start tim back and forth one line at a time. Hold Shift while pressing the arrow keys to adjust the timeline selection.

There are two ways to add an audio clip to a project: selecting an existing sample, and audio recording.

To add an existing audio file to a project, right click on the Arrangment timeline and select "Add audio clip", or press Ctrl+Shift+A. From there, you can upload your own file, or select one from Syne's built-in, curated sample libraries. Once you select a sample, it will be added to the project at the selection start time.

When uploading a new audio file it will be analyzed and uploaded to the cloud. Uploaded samples are always stored losslessy at the same audio quality as their source files.

Syne library samples do not apply towards your account's audio storage limit.

MIDI clips can be added to a project by recording, or by inserting any empty MIDI clip and creating notes in the MIDI Editor. Right click on the Arrangement and select "Add MIDI clip", or press Ctrl+Shift+M, and an empty 4-measure MIDI clip will be added to the project at the selection time. If you have a region selected, MIDI clips will be added covering all of the time and racks in the selection.

Drag in the clip handle (the opaque part) to move any clip forward, backward, and between racks. Drag the right or left edge of the handle to resize it.

Clicking anywhere inside the clip handle on a MIDI clip will open it in the MIDI Editor.

TODO: You can change the playback rate of audio clips by holding Alt and dragging the clip waveform. This will pitch shift the clip.

TODO

This is where you can edit a rack's instrument and audio effects chain. It's positioned at the bottom of the screen, and can be opened by clicking on the Rack Controls header.

TODO