Making the Spacebar key pause or stop on timeline

paulrb wrote on 6/23/2008, 8:24 AM
Being the Vegas newby and coming from years of Avid I have a very strong habit of hitting the spacebar when I want Vegas Pro 8 to stop or pause on the timeline when I hit the spacebar, but instead it goes back to the original start point.

t seems I need to catch the cursor head and click on it or move the mouse or hit ctrl F to the pause button below.

Is there an easy way to map the spacebar to stop the cursor or an easy one button keyboard shortcut for this?

It seems like a little thing but it really messes with me.

Thanks!

Comments

Grazie wrote on 6/23/2008, 8:34 AM
Hi! Welcome aboard!

Go: Options > Preferences > CHECK "Make Spacebar and F12 Play/Pause instead of Play/Stop"

You may wanna start experimenting with the JKL keys too.

Personally, I got a Contour Shuttle Pro - nice!

Grazie

bStro wrote on 6/23/2008, 9:55 AM
Is there an easy way to map the spacebar to stop the cursor

Grazie gave you the answer for this particular issue, but FYI for any other customization you might want to do, you can set your own shortcut for pretty much any action in Vegas. Go to Options > Customize Keyboard and knock yourself out. ;-) (Just be careful in there.)

Rob
John_Cline wrote on 6/23/2008, 2:52 PM
The Spacebar stops playback and sends the cursor back to the starting point as you noted. Hitting "Enter" instead stops it where it is on the timeline, like you want. These functions can be swapped in preferences as noted above.

I use a Kensington trackball (with the large, 2.25" ball.) It sits right next to my keyboard. I've gotten used to tapping the "Enter" key on the keyboard's numeric keypad with the side of my thumb when I want the cursor to stop where it is. Although, coming from Avid, changing the spacebar behavior in preferences is what you want.
riredale wrote on 6/24/2008, 8:39 AM
For years I had my spacebar configured to stop in place. Nowdays I find I like the idea of replaying a particular section quickly, for various reasons, such as syncing up two audio tracks, so I've returned the spacebar to its original stop/return function, and for general-purpose timeline cursor control I now use the jkl keys (k stops playback in place). But there are lots of ways of controlling the cursor; this is just one technique.