Importing with a Screen Reader

Smart Import brings in audio files that are named with a track name and a take number. The screen reader route is a spoken wizard with the same options as the sighted window.

Preparing the Files

Follow the file naming rules in Importing: the take number comes last, preceded by an underscore (cello_012.wav or morning_cello_T012.wav), and the part before it is split at underscores into an optional session name and the track name. Put the files in the project's media folder, or the recording path set in REAPER's Project Settings (P), and make sure you have already created a ReaClassical project.

Running Smart Import

Press Ctrl+Alt+Shift+I. ReaClassical announces "Scanning files in project media folder" and then "Scan complete". If the folder also contains multi-channel files, you are first asked to choose between Import Takes and Import Polywav, using ↑ and ↓ and Enter; otherwise it goes straight to the takes wizard.

The takes wizard offers, in turn:

  • Track name order: if the project's tracks have no names yet, this assigns the names found in the filenames to the tracks. The list is in the order the names will be assigned. Pick an entry up, move it up or down and drop it, as in Track Setup's Reorder Track; entries moved past the divider are "not used this run"
  • Distribution (vertical workflow only): One folder per take, Use current folder count, or Round-robin across a custom number of folders (you are asked for the number, with a minimum of 1), and the starting folder
  • Import only these takes (optional): a session name, and a list of takes such as 1-3,5,11-15
  • A final confirmation step before anything changes in the project

Material is inserted at the edit cursor, and files that are already used in the project are ignored. Afterwards, open Track Setup to add aux and submix tracks and adjust the routing.

Multi-Channel Files from a Portable Recorder

Choose Import Polywav to split multi-channel files into mono and stereo tracks. Name the files [sessionname_]Txxx.wav, and enter a channel composition pattern of the digits 1 (mono) and 2 (stereo), for example 221. See Multi-Channel Files from a Portable Recorder for how the pattern is applied.

Other Imports

  • Import DDP (Ctrl+Alt+Shift+D) and Import PMI (Ctrl+Alt+Shift+M) rebuild an album layout from an existing master in a fresh project with an empty destination folder
  • The Terminal command import= runs a Smart Import without the wizard. See The Terminal