First post on the forum, I will try to be as clear as possible.
I am just starting to get into midi possibility of the octatrack.
My setup isn’t fix cause I am often playing with gears of friends.
Everything work well when I am doing linear midi connection.
But when there is a midiloop or if I use more than 2 THRU ports in a row.
I m starting to get strange behaviour even if channels are supposed to be spliting the informations for each gear.
I did face situations like no audio coming out of the master OUT of the OT, or Berhinger Neutron completly crash even after restart (had to calibrate it)
So I m feeling like I am missing a lot of crucial points about midi setup.
I know I should check:
Midi Channels
Midi Channel for audio track
Cc + note in setup
Autochannel for active traxk
MIDI cc and setting per track
MIDI cables
This was generic cause I did face multiple case.
But it’s always cause I m trying to control my recording trigs with the midi sequencer to be able to use trig conditions.
As I saw on multiple topics of this forum, a midi filtering gear or évent processor should be a solution.
So my main question is, what are the real differencies beetween “midi event processor” and “midi filtering/mapper” or even other “midi tools”?
I saw a lot of recommandations such as Iconnect midi4+ who looks perfect to connect anything (PC/Mac/iPad/Hardware).
But I didn’t got after looking at the manual and the specifications about both software “Oracle” and “Iconfig” what are the possibility of midi event comparing to something like the “midihub” from blokas or the “Event processor” from midi solution.
I wish to stay as flexible as possible in the choice or gear as I just get a quick idea of how I would like to connect my setup in the futur.
Hope it’s not to foggy for a first thread.
Thanks in advance.
(Btw sorry for my English)
You can understand “filtering” literally … filter out particular MIDI commands and don’t transmit them.
A “mapping” and a “filtering” is already what I would understand as a particular “processing” …
Processing MIDI can mean very different things.
filtering MIDI commands
mapping MIDI commands like: transform particular MIDI commands to completly different commands. Example transform a MIDI-note command on MIDI-channel-X to a MIDI-CC on MIDI-channel-Y
doing some “logic” like: “if incomming MIDI-CC-command on channel-X” is received, “do something” on channel-Y
doing some maths like: “add a value of 10 to each MIDI-CC-command on channel-X”
there are even scripted processes possible, which can be written by the user.
Event processor : Straightforward, simple, easy to grasp. No fancy tricks but does the job well. Relatively cheap exists in two versions, sta,dard and pro.Powered by midi. Midi din in out.
Bome Box : Powerhouse of midi processing, can do uber complex things. Manipulate sysexes, can even integrate computer keyboard keystrokes etc… Not so simple to setup, but common scripts are accessible for almost anyone.Works in network.A bit costly, add to that the price of Miditranslator software. powered by usb. Midi din in out, usb,ethernet wifi. Includes a midi monitor ( on computer only )
Lab4music Sipario : Extremely friendly tactile box with all the tools needed for most musicians.
A breeze to use, can name scenes, has a visual feedback of what is happening. Route, filter,split, program changes etc…Limited range of “processing feature”. ( Cannot convert midi notes to program changes for exemple ).Can act as a mini master arranger .Powered by usb. Dual midi din in out ( ports ). Costly.
Okay it’s getting clearer.
“Filtering” and “mapping” are specific sub possibility of the whole “midi processing”.
So the differences will be the complexity and the ergonomicity of each software/gear.
And that every midi software/gear got their own possibility and only some are able to do scripting, logic or specific advance midi event.
I think I will start with some simple midi software and take a lot of time to know what gear I need for which purpose.
I will seek some informations on Axoloti, Sipario and Bome Box.
And I will look closer to MAX and event processor.
Thanks for your clear answers.
Edit : Does Axoloti Core and Bome box have only 1 MIDI (5 brooch) IN and 1 OUT cause we are suppose to merge the midi signal before and Split it after with quadra thru/merging ?
Lab4music Sipario look friendlier but does seem a little bit less complete, as KaOsphere said
Iconnectmidi4+ look great but does not seem to provide some logic/math.
As you said SoundRider, “midi processing” or “advanced midi processing” seems to different level of possibility for each constructor/gear.
That is definitely the key to get the right gear. First make clear, what you want to achieve.
If it’s a simple task like filtering only, then an advanced midi processing unit might be an overshot. At least you would have to operate a more complex device and dig in deeper than needed.
Make sure yer not sending and the receiving back to itself.
It should all be pretty straight forward. I’ll have 8 diff thing ms running at the same time, straight, thru, whatever. No issues.
I DO fuck up sometimes and have a box sending out midi to something and inadvertently receive what’s being sent at the same time, in turn, get a mess or it hangs.
You can try bome midi translator, the software used to program the bomebox. You 'll get an idea of what is avaliable and how to program it. The only gripe I have with it, is the complex routing setup anytime you want to program it, I’m still not sure how to setup it each time I have to reenter the core ! Programing itself is quite accessible even for idiots like me. Tons of features I do not use though…
I like Sipario for “complex simple tasks” () because it can be programmed on the fly, while in use without any computer. Priceless !
MIDI is a sequencial language and protocol.
You can trust any tools as long as they are certified with MIDI. It’s also a standard which makes it widely compatible with the external world.
I use a Quadra thru to multiply the OUT signal from my OT to my 4 other slaves.
Cheap and reliable, it doesn’t need any external power, just the INPUT cable will be sufficient to use it.
The MIDI event processor plus is something else. MIDIOX is a great tool to apprehend MIDI traffic and how to get how it works (CCs, Notes, Program Changes, Tempo,…)
Like others have mentioned, check what midi messages are sent by your synths.
Set up everything to send and receive only what is needed.
If a device sends and receives i.e. midi cc messages and you have a chain of midi ins, outs and thrus set up in which outgoing midi data comes back to that device, you get a midi loop each time you turn a knob on that device.
Or when you press a key and the note message is sent through the midi out and comes back again throug the midi in (with a tiny bit of delay due to the time it takes for the midi message to travel through the cables and to get processed by the synth engine), instead of one note, the synth gets a bunch of notes in rapid succesion when incoming notes also contribute to the loop.
Usually you don’t need a midi processor to connect a bunch of synths and sequencers, though.
16 channels for each midi port. Put every device on a seperate midi channel and only send and receive what you really need.
On some gear, you can’t change the midi channel. If you have two synths, that are both fixed on midi channel 1, you could use a midi processor or a midi interface like the Iconnectivity Mio or Midi+ with remapping capabilities.
Some synths with sequencer don’t allow seperate control of clock and transport, so if you want the synth to receive midi clock, but don’t want the sequencer to react to start/stop messages that’s not possible.
Again a midi processor or midi interface with midi filtering capabilities could be used to filter the midi start/stop messages while letting the synth receive midi clock.
Octatracks crossfader sends midi cc #48. By remapping cc#48 to another cc number, the crossfader could be used to control any parameter that is accesible by midi cc…
What kind of strange behaviour are you experiencing?
What are you using and how is your stuff connected?
AFAIK drawing power over the midi cable actually isn’t coherent with the midi specification. IIRC, there is a list on their website with devices that have been tested with their midi gear.
That’s actually something I’ve thought of while I’ve had issues on a previous post.
But at a friend’s place, the exact contrary brought him issues : using a powered MIDI processor got him receiving wierd MIDI signals adding more glitches to the existing situation
gather evey info together, scratch your head, separate the fluxes, untie the nodes, take your time.
@Sorole What other zörg did you get except the wierd Neutron’s calibration crashes and audio missing? Get a stereo jack and connect a headset to test every output if necessary. Maybe the soundcard could be faulty too?
@luktus Principaly no audio from the master OUT it’s an outcome who appears when I m trying to autopilot the OT to get conditional trig on Track recorder.
But it’s the case only when I had other gear (Neutron, O coast) in the chain.
I can’t split the signal cause I get absolutely no midi tool for that.
So I am trying with THRU which seem to be unstable.
So when a recorder trig triggers the sampling process on the Octatrack, the audio from the main out cuts off, but only when the Neutron is in the chain?
I‘ve checked with a midi monitor, placing a recorder trig and letting the sample process run does not send any midi messages.
How is your OTs main out connected?
Have you checked with headphones if it really happens on the Octatrack?
I m using simultaneously control of clock and transport in any case/configuration so that’s shouldn’t be an issue.
Never got this issue specificly hopefully.
Is possible to prevent this kind of behaviour by a correct gear correspondence per channels and appropriated channel.
Or does THRU mess with what you said after :
Yes I am able to do MIDI trig for track recorder.
But when the NEUTRON is in the chain some glitchs happens.
It’s definitely coming from MIDI messages.
I checked with headphones ans cue OUT, only the master is affected.
My OT main go to a Scarlett 4i2 in both IN.
I will try further experiment and post the results here.
OK I think I’m starting to get it.
Maybe Using the OUT and IN ports from your Scarlet Sound Card could help?
If connected to a DAW on your PC, it could monitor incoming and outgoing MIDI messages.
Once you figure out which MIDI messages are needed for this setup, you will need to change turn on and off what you’re going to play with.
example : You want a track recorder to be thrown from your OT step sequencer, the loopback will be needed, but I believe a splitter or a smart usage of INs and OUTs can make a proper chain/loopback. But in the loopback scenario, make sure everyone has its channel set up to avoid REAL MIDI loops causing the glitches.
If every piece of gear is on its own midi channel, you can use midi thru. No problem.
Each device will only use the midi messages that come in on their midi channel. Messages on the other midi channels just flow through.
I’ve had a midi thru chain of seven or eight devices (synths and rack fx) driven from my Octatrack for quite some time. Worked perfectly.
Using midi thru (especially soft thru, which you see on gear that has a midi input and a midi output, that can also function as midi thru.) can introduce latency (each thru has to go in and out, in case of soft thru afaik it has to be processed to be sent out), but that not really a problem with the number of devices, you’d usually put in a thru chain.
Afterall, the introduced latency isn’t very high.
Ah, ok, didn’t know you were triggering the track recorders via midi, sorry, must have missed that.
Octatrack track recorders are triggered with midi notes…hmm…Ok…I don’t know how your gear is setup and connected, so one way to check whats happening would be if you simply used a midi monitor software to check whats happening at the moment you trigger the track recorder.
Go from the midi thru of the last device in your midi thru chain into your audio/midi interface’ midi input to capture all messages.
OT track level can be controlled by midi cc 07 and 46. But that had to be sent to all OT tracks in order to cut off the audio…
Are the track levels down? Do you see anything happening there?
) because it can be programmed on the fly, while in use without any computer. Priceless !
