Loop slice jump (pre buying question)

I’m debating about buying an Octatrack and was wondering if this is doable:

  • load a loopable sample
  • chop the sample into a predefined amount of regular slices (4,8,16…)
  • when you press play the loop would start looping continuously
  • by playing notes you make the ‘play marker’ (loop play position) jump to the according slice (C2-sl1, C#2-sl2, D2-sl3 …), when reaching the end of the loop it would jump back to the the beginning of the sample (not the beginning of the currently played slice). so the midi note on command would move the play position, note off doesnt do anything.

sounds a bit complex but its awesome for making little remixes from smallish loops (got it set up in ableton). the idea is basically that instead of triggering slices individually (for example 1-2-1-2-5-6-7-8) you just need to store/edit/play the jump points (1—1---5------).

technical description would be: have loop-start at a different position than slice-start and loop-end at a different position than slice-end. (loop start = sample start, loop end = sample end)

I’m not sure what is the question but there is a loop point for each slice.
You can play slices in Ot but it’s trickier if you want to play them from another midi controller. I use an additional midi processor to do so, but it works very well.

This can all be done, as @sezare56 says, with some well-advised caution.

But you’re gonna do way cooler stuff with the Octa than that. Your ideas imply you’re already pretty creative with samples. And then, what you’re asking is just the beginning of where the Octatrack can take you.

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Thanks for the replies.
@sezare56: So the loop point can be before the slice in point? I dug through the manual but all examples had it later.

You mean slice loop point before slice start ?
I don’t think so but I never tried. I cannot test it before tomorrow, so I think someone will answer before. :wink:

I think the answer is no, but you can have the same sample loaded into many slots with all your different loop/start/slice points and play them that way.
Short answer is you can achieve what you discribed but maybe in a different way than your used to, using just the Octatrack.

So you are saying that if I load each slice as a separate sample, I can have my sample loop point earlier than the sample start point?
Thanks for the help!

I’ve never tried this, but I might have to…

Could you give us an audio example, explain again or differently what do you want to do musically?
So many different possibilities in Ot…
Do you want to play it live with a keyboard or pads, or sequence it with Ot ?
Because I would say it could be easy to sequence.
Played live, you can set different slices, as you like, with different slices points (start, lood, end), it can different from standard 16/32/64 divisions.

You can’t load slices as such. You have to either build them up from pieces or create them by cutting up a larger sample. If you wanted to load each slice as a separate entry in the tables and treat them as separate samples then you do have more flexibility on how to use them.

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@sezare56: cant give you an audio example right now (laptop is getting an overhaul and i’m at work). on a regular setup you’d have to trigger each slice separately, resulting in 8 steps to play a loop broken up into 8 slices, even if it’s not rearranged. having slice-ins at a specific position and loop-in/out covering the whole loop would save sequencer steps. (seq steps to play the whole loop: 1-2-3-4-5-6-7-8 vs just triggering 1 and it would continue to 8 and loop).

@oldgearguy: yeah sounds like it. but is it possible there to have have the loop-in at an earlier position than the play-in?

So you want to play a sample loop normally and play its slices over it ?

I think what’s being asked is that normally you might have:

start -> loop begin -> loop end -> rest of sample

The OP wants:

loop begin -> start -> loop end -> rest of sample

(I think)

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@sezare56
no. its about triggering the slices but then continuing the full sample/loop. (no polyphony needed/used)

@oldgearguy
yep, exactly. if that’s possible. thanks for clarifying.

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I meant play selected slices instead of the normal loop, not both. When released, you hear the sample looping normally, but not from the last slice you played…

Dude just forget they way you used to deal with samples and get a dam Octatrack.

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:smile:

Ok for the points but start is first, rest of sample when released ?
Still weird for me…

to put it into different words: you’d jump into a loop at another point than the in point. if its a 4 bar loop, you could trigger the loop at the 2nd bass drum and it would just keep playing nicely. (after that you could jump to the 3rd snare,…)

Ok… I still prefer to control directly the slices I want to loop rather than a back to the future loop…Or I need a convincing audio example. :wink:

Soooo? Could anyone do a quick check if its possible to have the loop begin before the (slice) start?