Avert Disaster!

[clawson]

This little workaround may not be news to some of you, but I recently tried it out and it saved a producer's butt.

When you're recording to a sound file using the record window, it's all too easy to hit "re-take" by accident when you mean to do something else. Of course, as soon as you do that, you've lost everything that you just loaded, right? Well, not quite.

If you accidentally hit that "re-take" button, don't fret. WITHOUT CLOSING THE RECORD WINDOW AND WITHOUT HITTING "Record" AGAIN (this is CRUCIAL), open Windows Explorer (the file manager, not the Web browser--you knew that already, I know) and find the sound file to which you have been recording. Immediately copy this file to different drive/directory. (Giving it a new name isn't a bad idea, either.) Now you have a safety of all that hard work. You may now close the record window without losing anything.

If you have just begun the project/sound file, you're basically home free and can create a new segment from the copy of the sound file that you've just made.

If you've been adding material to a default sound file, you're in a bit of trouble because now your elements will be separated. You can shrug your shoulders and just realize that you'll be using an additional sound file now (recommended) or you can try to update your default sound file. (I won't go into details about that procedure as it's somewhat dangerous--possibly leading to multiple entries in the Microeditor playlist, for example.)

In any case, you can use this little trick to recover from a potentially devestating accidental key press.

Of course, I'm sure that no other Microeditor user (save this poor producer) has ever made this mistake anyway... ;-)

Good luck.

Chas.

--
Charles Lawson
Senior Recording & Production Engineer
WETA Radio & Television