Rivendell uses a system of cue points within audio cuts, referred to as markers. Markers can be used to specify a number of parameters for a piece of audio. Consult Table 3.1, “Rivendell Marker Types” to see what markers are available, their purpose and their corresponding color.

Markers are set in the Edit Markers Dialog. To access the Dialog, open an audio cart, select the cut to open on the cut list and then touch the Edit button.

The Dialog is divided into three areas: the waveform area in the upper half, consisting of the waveform display and Amplitude and Time buttons; the transport controls area in the center, consisting of Start, Pause, Stop and Loop buttons along with an audio meter; and the marker button area in the lower third of the window, consisting of controls for selecting and positioning markers.

The Edit Marker Dialog

It's possible to 'zoom-in' on the waveform in various ways by clicking the Amplitude and Time buttons. By default, the waveform is displayed fully 'zoomed-out', thus showing the entire length of the audio cut. The GoTo buttons can be used to jump directly to the current play out cursor position, start or end of the waveform.

Audio can be played one of two ways: either by clicking on the waveform to indicate where play out should start and then clicking the left-hand Play button, causing play out to start from the selected position, or by clicking the right-hand Play button, which will cause play out to start from the Start Marker (just as it would in RDAirPlay). Clicking the Pause button while playing will cause audio to stop and the play out cursor (a thin vertical black line in the waveform area) to freeze at its current position, while pressing the Stop button will stop the audio while resetting the play out cursor to the position it was in when Play was started. Clicking the Loop button will cause the audio to play out continuously, looping from end back to start, until either the Stop, Pause, Save or Cancel buttons are clicked.

To set a marker, click on the corresponding marker button and then left-click on the waveform area to indicate where on the audio the marker should be placed. (NOTE: With the exception of the FadeUp and FadeDown markers, all markers in Rivendell are assigned in pairs. For example, placing a TalkStart marker will also cause a TalkEnd marker to be placed.) Markers that have already been placed can be moved by selecting the appropriate marker button and then dragging the marker to the desired location. It's also possible to specify the position of a marker in the form of hh:mm:ss.s (relative to time after the Start marker) by entering the desired value next to a selected marker button. It is also possible to remove a set of markers that have already been placed, either by accessing the marker menu by doing a right-click on the waveform display, or by touching the Remove Marker button and then touch the marker button corresponding to the marker to be removed. (NOTE: the exceptions to this are the Start / End markers, which are always present and hence cannot be removed.)

As an aid for accurately setting the Start and End markers, it's possible to use the Trim Start and Trim End buttons to automatically set the markers to the first and last instances of the level specified by the Threshold field, respectively.

It's possible to make copies of existing an audio cut on the system by opening up the cut's parent cart in the Edit Cart Dialog, selecting it on the cut list and clicking the Copy button. To paste the copied audio, simply select the desired destination cut (within the same cart or a different one) and press Paste.