Forum: Mix lessons - Topic: Any tips on how to easily beat-match?

So I've been messing around with some basic mixing and beat-matching with some house and dnb tracks and this is by far the most prominent problem I've faced so far.

http://i.imgur.com/nGTQl.png

I set up a loop on the second track to transition into when the first finishes up through my headphones, but once I have the loop ready and try to beatmatch the second track to the first, it's always just a little bit off. If I get the beats to fully match up fully it was because I got lucky. Yes the bpm is the same on both tracks.

Are there any easy ways to sync those beats, guys? How do you do it?

Press the Sync button.

pitch bend the tracks so they are in phase. It is the two arrows underneith the pitch sliders on the default skin.

this video is really good at explaining how beatmatching is done

That video was very helpful, thank you!

Dont use the sync button because it wont beat match properly. You need to manually match the waves together. For example, when mixing dnb, make a loop of just a drum pattern. Make sure you loop the entire drum pattern, dnb usually isnt a 4/4 beat. Then mix in the drum pattern of the 2nd song. Manually match the waves, the Highest waves should be on top of each other (for the most part, sometimes one or two of the high (bass) waves dont line up perfectly, but its still ok). You'll hear that the everything is matched perfectly. Once you get that down, you should be able to beat match dnb, hip hop, dubstep, or anything else thats not house. Remember, the hitting the sync button anytime during the blend will ruin it, so if the bpms are a little off, you will have to adjust that manually too.

The Sync button does not always accurately match the beats of a song together, but it is erroneous to suggest the sync button isn't worth working with, or that it even has a high failure rate.

And if you're re-syncing during a song, it is important to understand that the sync button isn't a panacea, and that there's a learned skill with using the sync button at the right time as with any other beat matching technique

That being said, certain genres of music do coordinate better with the sync than others.

Electronic Dance Music, which comprises a majority of the top 40 and "club" music today responds well to the sync button because the base lines are consistent and fit neatly in a 4/4 time signature.

Rap conversely can have a very wonky baseline, but the influence of the electronic genre has heavily influenced the the bass lines of Rap music, and will still more often than not work properly.

However, that being said it is important to practice alternative beat matching techniques (waveform matching, or the quintessential (original) now turned hipster "only by ear" method, tap stutter technique etc) in the even of a failure, but by no means should anyone purport that the sync button is "bad".

haha Im a hipster... map the sync button to "match_bpm" if you play broken beats,, then it wont lock the grids just the bpm...

http://youtu.be/rcdLNq3rSdg

This is a link to a video that I upload on YouTube with a link for download my keyboard mapping and with description of how to run my mapping in VirtualDJ.
I create a keyboard mixer that helps me to improve my mixing.

Nice video thank you!

I am new to this computer mixing. I last did mixing in the late 1980s using turntables and a basic mixer. Things I could easily do with turntables I have not yet been able to do.

Am able to mix house music but no luck with the old 1980's freestyle and hip hop music. Tried using the automix feature. Here is one example of what I was trying to do. In the old days, I would mix NWAs Gimme Something to Dance To with Debbie Debs When I hear Music. Where NWA song goes to Let the Base Kick, I would cut in the beginning of Debbie Deb at the beginning. I didn't fade it. Just cut right in. Haven't figured out how it is done on Virtual DJ.

Also, how does the headphone feature work. Where do headphones plug in?

Sorry for my dumb questions. Any help greatly appreciated!

rgranel, you could plug your headphone to the external mixer headphone jacks only when it comes with a soundcard (Mostly does), if not you could buy soundcard such as maya44 or djio etc. go google em (:

hy guys its pam de 1 i wanna know , how i can match the older and the rocking beats
pleas any suugg. post pls

thanks