Introduction to LibraryLoader

What is LibraryLoader ?

LibraryLoader is the quickest and easiest way imaginable to transfer a large library of Audio Sound Effects or Production Music CDs, into a fully digitised, named and described on line Sound Library. Once you have built your library with LibraryLoader, you can use it with a number of sound databasing systems, like Gallery's mTOOLS, or Digidesign's Digibase in Pro Tools 6.

How does it work ?

With LibraryLoader, comes a CDLink library which provides detailed information about the descriptions for every index of every track of virtually every commercial Sound effects library CD ever pressed. It also includes information about most of the popular production music libraries too. These CDLink files are used by LibraryLoader to document the Sound on the CD, as it transfers it to your hard disc.

The net result is a folder full of files, where each file represents one of the indexes from a given CD, and has a complete description of what sound it contains, firmly embedded within the file. Sound Effects databasing systems will 'scan' your library and read this description, as it creates its database for you to ultimately search and use.

Before you start, you MUST turn off any kind of automatic system action when CD's are inserted. Go to System Preferences -> CDs & DVDs and make sure it is set to 'IGNORE' when a music CD is inserted. Otherwise, iTunes may start up and interfere with the operation of LibraryLoader. Needless to say, you should NOT run iTunes or any similar app whilst LibraryLoader is in operation

Ripping your first disks.

LibraryLoader is designed with speed and simplicity of operation as its key goals. Most people will want to rip many disks in one go, perhaps a whole series of disks from one set, and LibraryLoader makes this easy with its CDLink batch queue system.
So, lets get started. We will assume that you have got some CD's in your hand, for example, the first 3 CD's from the Sound Ideas 6000 series. The first thing we need to do is to launch LibraryLoader, by double clicking the LibraryLoader application icon. Next, let's find the CDLink files you will need. Inside the LibraryLoader folder there is another folder called 'CD Link Files'. Open this up, and you will see many more folders. Each one represents a family, or set of Sound Effects CDs. In this case, we scroll down to 'Sound Idead 6000 The General'. Inside we find 40 files, named SI-6001 to SI-6040. These are the CDLinks for each of the 40 disks from the Sound Ideas 6000 library.

The CDLink files contain descriptions for all the indexes and tracks from disk they represent. There is no sound in the CDLink files, just descriptions of the sound. Similarly, there is no text on the Audio CD's SI-6001 to SI-6040, just the Sound itself. LibraryLoader combines the two elements as it Rips the CD, and ends up with a SoundFile containing BOTH sound, AND description data.

Drag and Drop CDLinks into the LibraryLoader Window.

So, to get started with our transfer, we DRAG AND DROP the first 3 CDLink files, from the Sound Ideas 6000 folder, into the LibraryLoader window. They will be added as entries in the batch list. You can sort them by Disk Number, if they have not arrived in numerical order (this will make the process simpler for you because they will then be ripped in order).

Select a file format for your Library.

Next, use the Pop Up menu in the LibraryLoader window to select the file format you want for your library. For now, we will use BWF (WAVE). We will explain the different options later, but for most people BWF will be a good choice. Note that your choice of file format can affect which SFX databasing systems can read your files. BWF is a well defined standard and so is widely supported.

Select a destination folder to build your library In.

Next, press the 'Change' button underneath the popup menu and navigate to the place you want to store your sound effects. It should be a very large drive with lots of free space. You should make a master folder called for example 'Sound Effects'. LibraryLoader will create sub folders automatically inside this for each CD you rip. Some people also like to create a master folder for each set, which you can do by resetting this destination into a new folder for each set you rip. You should also ensure that your drive is properly formatted for Mac, and that it is in 'Mac OS Extended' format. If not, use Apple's Disk Utility to format your disk prior to building your library. its a really good idea to make sure you have got PLENTY of drive space available before you start ripping your library. Although it's tempting to try and use all those old 9GB or smaller drives you have lying around (and perhaps copy them off later), its actually much better to set yourself up with some really big IDE or firewire drives right from the start. On average, each CD will need about 550 MB of disk space in AIF, BWF or SD2 format.

And we are off !!

Finally, press the START button in LibraryLoader. We are in progress !!! LibraryLoader will first prompt you to insert the first CD in your List, Sound Ideas 6000 - SI-6001 . It will first eject anything currently in the drive, even if it happens to be that disk. Pop in the disk and close the tray - You DONT have to press any of the buttons in the prompt dialog - it will automatically sense the new disk being inserted. Once it sees the disk, it will start ripping, and you will see the 'Disk Queue', and 'Current Disk' progress displays start up, showing you how far through the disk and the Queue we are. Shortly after the Rip begins, you will also see some activity in the 'Post Process' progress display. This is LibraryLoader doing some 'follow-up' work on the files it has ripped, for example embedding waveform overviews for mTOOLS.

Depending on the speed of your CD-Drive, and how long the CD is, the ripping process may take from 3 to 10 or more minutes to complete. Once it has finished, it will automatically move on to the next disk. It does this by ejecting the previous CD, and once again showing the Dialog, this time - 'please insert 'Sound Ideas 6000 - SI-6002'. All you need to do is take out 6001 and replace it with 6002 before closing the CD-Tray.

So, you can see that the process of ripping an entire library of CDs is very simple. All you do between CDs is to change the disk and close the tray. Many people start off very nervous about the amount of effort it will take to build a large library, but once you try it, you will soon learn that its about as quick and easy as anything could be, and absolutely nothing compared to the massive rewards it will yield once you are done.

Once your rip has begun, you can actually watch the files appearing in the Finder, inside the folder you chose, and inside a new folder created by LibraryLoader with the name of the CD. You can also see the descriptions of the files by selecting 'View Options' in the 'View' menu in the finder, and turning ON 'show columns - COMMENTS'. The descriptions are embedded in several different places in the sound files you are creating, but the OS X finder comment is convenient so you can see what's in the files, even without playing them, or using a database of any type.

We Are Done !!

So, once your Rip Queue is finished, you will have 3 CD's fully digitised on your hard disc. What you do with them next, depends on what sort of Sound Effects Database you are using, but for this example, we will assume you are using Pro Tools 6 Digibase. In Pro Tools, open the ' workspace' browser window, and navigate with it to your Sound Effects folder. As you open the folders, you will see the descriptions, sample rates, etc appear in the Digibase browser window. You can then audition them and drag them into your session.

For more information on using Digibase, or mTOOLS see the corresponding documentation for those products. Later on in this manual we will cover some of the considerations you will make when planning your Sound Effects Library.

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