AutoSync Window
The AutoSync Window is the home of most of AutoSync's more advanced functionality, including preset creation & management, module setup and batch processing. You can open the window from AutoSync > Open AutoSync Window in the Clip Editor's top toolbar.
The AutoSync Window was redesigned in version 1.53 of LipSync Pro. Older tutorials or guides may mention specific interface features that have moved or changed in the new version, but all functionality has been retained.
Interface Overview
The AutoSync Window is mainly made up of two lists - the Clips list and the Modules list - and the Edit Module panel. The Preset Toolbar at the top provides access to presets, and the lower panel houses a few general options and the Output Summary.
Preset Toolbar
The Preset Toolbar is the quickest way of getting up and running when using the AutoSync Window. The Load button displays a drop-down list of all the presets found in the project. Selecting a preset from this list will load all its modules with their saved settings, and display the name of the preset to the left of the toolbar.
Presets are often included with modules when they are downloaded for ease of use, but if you want to make a custom one you can click the Save As New button to the right - this will bring up a Save As dialogue to choose the location where this preset will be saved. The newly created preset will contain all the modules currently in the Modules list along with their current settings.
Finally, if you've loaded a preset and made changes to it, you can save these changes for all future uses of the preset by clicking the Save Changes button. Be aware that this is a permanent change: if in doubt, save a new preset instead!
The Clips List
This is the list of clips that AutoSync will process when the Run AutoSync button is pressed. It can contain any number of AudioClips and/or LipSyncData clips, and optionally one Clip Editor Contents item. If using existing LipSyncData clips, any data that wasn't created or modified by AutoSync (Phonemes, Emotions, etc.) will be left as is. The Clip Editor Contents item references all the data currently contained in the Clip Editor.
By default, the Clips list will contain just the Clip Editor Contents, but additional items can be added by clicking the + button at the bottom of the list - this will give you a drop-down to select the kind of item you want to add, and additionally an Add All Selected option. This option lets you select any number of AudioClips and/or LipSync Data clips in the Project panel and add them all in one click. You can also remove any item from the list (including the Clip Editor Contents item) by selecting it in the Clips list and clicking the - button. Clips can also be re-ordered by dragging the item up or down using the handle on the left.
Once an item has been added, you can click the large icon to the left to toggle between AudioClip and LipSyncData input modes. The drop-down to the right of the input clip field changes the output mode, which controls what happens to the data after it has been processed by AutoSync. There are 4 options:
To Clip Editor - outputs the data back to the Clip Editor. You can only have one of these per batch, as otherwise subsequent clips would just overwrite previous ones. This is the default value unless it has already been used.
To LipSyncData - outputs the data to a LipSyncData asset in the project. This mode shows the Output field to customise where the output file will be saved. This is the default value if To Clip Editor is already taken.
To XML - outputs the data to a text-based .xml file in the project. This mode shows the Output field to customise where the output file will be saved.
Append To Previous - this is a special mode that allows you to create a single output clip from multiple inputs. For this to work, there must be at least one earlier clip in the list with a definite output mode, and all the clips destined for the same output must have audio clips with the same format, channel count, sample rate and bitrate. A new audio clip will be created for the final output, made up of the input clips appended together, and all phonemes, emotions and gestures will keep their positions relative to their original audio. The transcripts will also be merged together.
When using LipSyncData or XML output modes, the output path field will be displayed underneath the input field. This is a project-relative path that is set to the same as the audio clip's path by default, with the correct file extension for the output mode chosen. You can press the ... button to browse for a new path, or press the D button to reset the path to the default, based on the current input clip.
Note that Input from the Clip Editor and Output from the Clip Editor do not have to match. You can have the Clip Editor Contents output to a file, and output data from another file back into the Clip Editor if you wish.
The Modules List
This list displays all the currently loaded modules. You can think of these as individual tasks to be performed on each of your input clips.
This list will be populated whenever a preset is loaded, though you can also add to it by clicking the + button, and selecting a module from the drop-down list. Modules can be re-ordered by dragging the handle on the left. When a module is selected, its settings will appear in the Edit Module panel below the list and it can be removed by clicking the - button.
Edit Module Panel
This panel shows all the settings for the currently selected module.
When a preset is loaded, settings for each module are loaded too, and these will be shown here. When adding a new module manually, it will have a set of default options.
Output Summary
The lower panel of the window gives you a few basic options:
Skip Failed Clips - provides the option to keep going when processing a clip fails, and skip to the next one in the list instead of failing completely.
Auto-Load Transcript From .txt - when enabled, AutoSync will attempt to load a transcript from an identically-named text file for any AudioClips added to the Clips list in much the same way the Clip Editor can.
Close Window When Finished - toggles whether the AutoSync window will be closed or stay open once the AutoSync process is complete.
Overwrite Output File If Already Exists - if enabled, any LipSyncData or XML output files that already exist will be overwritten with the new versions when AutoSync completes. Otherwise a new file will be created by appending a number to the filename.
Below the options is the Output Summary. This sums up all the various outputs the current Clips and Modules should create, allowing you to double-check you have everything configured how you want before starting the process. It shows the file name and filetype of the files to be created, along with the input clips used to create them, which is especially helpful when appending clips together.
Errors & Debugging
As explained in the AutoSync Modules page, each module has a set of requirements that need to be fulfilled in order for it to run. Similarly, they also provide a list of requirements they themselves will fulfil. This allows modules to determine if they can run based on the modules that came before them in the list.
When there's an issue with these requirements, or another aspect of the current setup would prevent AutoSync from running as expected, the AutoSync window has a system of displaying errors.
The first thing to look out for are red error icons to the left of items in the Clips list. These indicate that there is an issue with that specific clip - in the image above, if Run AutoSync were pressed now, these clips would be skipped and only the third would be processed. This is reflected in the Output Summary:
If you hover over one of these error icons, a tooltip will appear with more information on the error. Let's take a look at the first one:
This first error is due to having the output mode set to Append To Previous without having a previous clip available in the list to append to. Changing the output mode or switching the order of the clips will fix this issue. The second error is due to missing requirements:
This error is a little harder to fix, so you may want to get more info on the the problem. To do this, select the clip causing the problem - this will then display error icons next to the modules in the module list that don't have their requirements met.
As you can see, the first and last modules have errors here. Again, you can hover over the icon to show a tooltip listing the missing features in each module. Selecting one of the modules will also show a more detailed error helpbox in the Edit Module panel.
In this case, the problem is that the Clip Editor doesn't have an audio clip or a transcript set. The solution here would be to either remove the Clip Editor Contents item from the list or close the AutoSync Window, select an audio clip, then get a transcript for the clip - either a pre-written one loaded from a .txt, a manually-added one in the Clip Settings window, or an auto-generated one by adding a transcription module to the Modules list after re-opening the AutoSync Window.
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