Preventing data loss: SAVE FILES LIKE A PRO

"Now-a-days, a software-based studio is a common setup for many music producers. If you're like me, then you always have your favorite virtual studio up and running during your composing, mixing and mastering project sessions. The power to save all of the data from these sessions in typically very small file sizes is what makes this type software a highly convient and efficient way to work. Even so, software is prone to errors, and there's nothing worse than writing that break through melody just to lose it to some Windows error that shuts down your program (not to mention your music mojo). But we can't blame Big Daddy Gates for everything, as I know I have more than once recorded over a channel control change or forgot to save a present sound and lost the respective data forever. :'( We can't forget the infamous bane of file corruption either! Do not fret, though! There is a way to combat these 3 travesties.

The key to thwarting fate is in the saving process, and the best way I have found to combat against all three senarios above is to save my work in separate, sequential files as I go. It kinda works like this. At the start of your session, once you get your first ideas recorded hit CTRL+S (if yer usin' Windows that is) and name your file like this: 'Killer Track 03-10-07 s01.' The first part of the file name is the track title. This is followed by the current date and then the 'save number' for that day, which I represent as s01 ("save 1"). Having a track name is an obvious step as may be the date, but one thing you may not have thought about is that by adding the latter piece you can help prevent duplicate file names. Remember, there can be only one date. The save number, though, is really the crux of the matter. To prevent data loss, you have to save often, but if you're saving to the same file then you have no defense against file corruption. This is where the save number will...well...save you. You see, as you add ideas to the track during your recording session, save the file often, but don't overwrite your original save. Each time you save, tag a new save number on the end and retain all of the previous files. So the second save will be 'Killer Track 03-10-07 s02,' the third 'Killer Track 03-10-07 s03' and so on. Now, if your program crashes, if you overwrite some data on accident, or if your current file gets corrupt then you can go back to the previous save and only have minimal information loss! Now I don't know about you, but I'd say that's much better than starting from scratch!"

e-effect
01-24-08