Templates can be a really great tool for speeding your workflow. Personally, I don’t get much mileage out of the production oriented templates that ship with Live:
…but I do get great benefit out of working with templates for live performance. As I’m getting ready for the Hobo’s Ball, its really nice to be able to start with a set that contains no clips, but is fully configured with all of my MIDI mappings, effects, etc.
If you’re ready to turn your current performance set into a template, follow these steps:
1. Open your live set and use Save As… to make a copy of it
2. Delete all of the clips from the set
3. Save the set into the Templates folder in your Live Library, naming it something groovy like “DJ Set”.
Once you’ve saved the template, look at the title of the set you currently have open. It won’t be DJ Set or whatever you called it, instead it will be:
…which is what Live calls a new blank set. Live is smart enough to protect you from directly editing a template. Instead, when you open the template, a new unsaved copy is created.
