Minimalist set up

robotunes · 2017-05-20T19:13:02.988Z

Well, you’ve had it a couple of days. What do you think? What are you using with your OT?

dotYOUTH · 2017-05-20T22:09:44.770Z

I’ve never been more in love or more sure of a hardware purchase

So far it’s mostly loops from sample packs and figuring out the machine … once I’m confident enough then I’m gonna try my hand at remixing some grime tracks

robotunes · 2017-05-21T07:41:06.991Z

Nice. I’m minimal too: OT + iPad. I love it so much that I have an OT avatar even though I’m not affiliated with Elektron.

If you’re like most of us, you’ll lose work or accidentally overwrite samples or wonder why you’re recording silence or run into any number of wtf moments. We’ve been there. Or maybe you’ve already become an OT genius!

dotYOUTH · 2017-05-21T10:40:48.296Z

Yeah dw plenty of wtf moments ha

I was curious about what apps you’re using on the iPad with OT and how you’ve got the two connected?

G0n35y · 2017-05-21T12:15:52.649Z

I had been hankering for an Octatrack after getting sucked in to some videos on Youtube (again…). One popped up on Ebay at a cracking price and I crumbled. Immediately got buyers remorse. Even after it arrived I was sitting thing “ffs, what am I doing…” haha.

But got things set up and spent a bit of time with it yesterday. Amazing how much you can remember having not used one for months. Really enjoyed myself! The guy I bought it from left stacks of samples on it so will live off them for a while. Still not sure how I will use it. I have the MPC Live on pre-order and I do think that fits my approach better but I think the OT actually shines more when you keep it simple. Like, it’s easier to do what it is amazing at and turn standard samples into something crazy.

Anyway, I think this will mark my last serious OTB effort. Will see where I’m at in a few months but quite excited about the OT-MPC combo.

Anyway, will stop blabbing on. @dotYOUTH - take your time and enjoy. Don’t get ahead of yourself thinking about things to add to the set up too soon. Stick to the minimalist ethos and you will love it.

dotYOUTH · 2017-05-21T12:25:01.178Z

I think the OT is best described as a needy girlfriend. Your relationship won’t go anywhere unless she’s the only thing on your mind.

Adding anything else can only be a temporary affair in efforts to spice things up between you two in the bedroom… studio

previewlounge · 2017-05-21T12:57:46.647Z

hmmm sounds like a somewhat inflated maintenance plan … how about a Digitakt?

as regards getting out of ruts, i think the sequencer on that is going to offer much.
also if you are keen for an Mpc Live then that would be doubling some of the functionality of the OT,
whereas the Digitakt is its own thing.

also carry a pocket tape recorder for conversation snippets, atmospheric rain sounds, and bird calls.

sample a few soft synths from the computer here and there.

variety is the spice of life in the interactive multiverse

sezare56 · 2017-05-21T13:15:01.845Z

Me + OT + A4 = awesome threesome !

robotunes · 2017-05-21T15:58:59.702Z

If you just want to sample loops and mangle them on OT, the free apps Blocs Wave and Launchpad offer cheap ($1.99) sample packs and trigger them Ableton Live-style. You’ll need the Live Link app to sync them to OT, with OT as the slave.

To create your own stuff to sample, Gadget has a great starter set of synths and drum machines. KRFT is another ingeniously conceived groovebox. Those two also are Link-enabled to sync with OT using Live Link.

Nave and Animoog are expressive and evocative synths that you can trigger with OT’s arp and/or chromatic keyboard. They respond to CCs as well for some p-locked and LFO-to-CC madness.

There are thousands of apps and more every day. These are my main apps.

For physical connections, I use:

Apple Lightning to USB3 Camera Adapter goes into the iPad to charge it while Octatracking:

A USB-to-MIDI cable connects OT to the iPad:
https://images-na.ssl-images-amazon.com/images/I/61Lrb%2BqxdXL.SL1105.jpg

xidnpnlss · 2017-05-21T16:44:39.237Z

That’s my setup too though didn’t know you could charge it with that device. Nice.

Anyway: setup works beautifully.

dotYOUTH:

I’ve never been more in love or more sure of a hardware purchase

I feel that. Often when I sit down to it and think over what I’m about to do with it I blow my mind without even having touched it. After I’m done I often think to myself, “Damn that was good. What a machine”

The lover metaphor is apt.

dotYOUTH · 2017-05-21T18:16:40.465Z

They sound pretty cool, I’ll have to grab a second hand iPad when I get some spare cash. Although the iPad pro looks pretty freaking nice!

Why do you need that device to charge though? also do you think that midi to usb cable could get the OT working as a midi controller for ableton on a regular windows laptop??

robotunes · 2017-05-21T21:34:59.155Z

dotYOUTH:

I’ll have to grab a second hand iPad when I get some spare cash. Although the iPad pro looks pretty freaking nice!

You may know this already, but the oldest iPad you should get is the iPad Air or iPad Air Mini. They have a 64-bit processor. Older iPads can’t run many of the newer 64-bit apps.[/quote]

Why do you need that device to charge though?

Depends on how long your OT sessions are, but for me they can go up to 2 hours. That drains the iPad battery, so I like to charge the iPad while OT abuses it.

[quote]also do you think that midi to usb cable could get the OT working as a midi controller for ableton on a regular windows laptop??
[/quote]
Definitely. It does. Be wary of cheap ($5-ish) cables. Some are unreliable.

Of course, you don’t need anything but the OT. Use the trick @sezare56 mentioned above to sample some of the OT’s noise then apply the comb filter to create basses, strings and drums:

Using the comb filter:
◦ load any sample, including noise. Different samples yield different tones
◦ reduce the AMP page’s HOLD and REL parameters to turn the sample into a blip
◦ load comb filter in fx slot 1 and filter in fx slot 2
◦ in the comb filter, mix 127, fb=nearly all the way up. set lpf to taste
◦ in fx slot 2, set filter to taste.
◦ p-lock the comb filter’s pitch, or live-record knob twists.
◦ alter the tone with START, the comb’s LPF, and retrig+rtim. FUNC+RTIM changes the pitch in semitones
Turn any sample into a C by using the Audio Editor:
◦ shorten the sample to a length of 169 samples.
◦ while in the Audio Editor, use the A knob to scroll through the available tones.
◦ filter to taste.
◦ caveat: you can’t use p-locks and LFOs to automatically create shifting tones the way you can with the comb filter.

You could even connect the OT’s MIDI out to its MIDI in and turn it into a 2-octave 8-oscillator complex synth with p-locked oscillator waves per step.

I love this black magic box.

dotYOUTH · 2017-05-21T21:40:00.323Z

Thanks that was really helpful. Would’ve ended up getting a useless iPad, I guess I was just wondering why you couldn’t use the regular charger provided and needed a camera adapter but that might be due to ignorance on my part

I’m gonna try those out, never even thought about feeding its midi in to its midi out, are there any videos of this done? so many tips and tricks out there ha!

sezare56 · 2017-05-21T22:10:56.581Z

Just sample air, instead of iAir shit.
Sorry, not very nice for iThings users.

robotunes · 2017-05-21T22:44:11.830Z

dotYOUTH:

I guess I was just wondering why you couldn’t use the regular charger provided and needed a camera adapter.

The camera adapter has a USB input so you can connect the USB-to-MIDI cable. The adapter also has an input for the Apple Lightning cable that connects the iPad to the charger.

Before this $40 device came out last year, you couldn’t simultaneously charge your iPad and connect it to the OT unless you bought a $100+ box such as the iConnectMIDI2 or a StudioConnect or Alesis ioDock, etc. Hope I’m making sense.

I’m gonna try those out, never even thought about feeding its midi in to its midi out, are there any videos of this done?

Maybe this one? I didn’t watch it because I don’t like video tutorials: They’re too long and rambling for me. But if that video doesn’t help, search YouTube for “Octotrack Monolith.”

so many tips and tricks out there ha!

You … have … no … idea! I have pages and pages of tips from the old Elektron Users forum, from this forum and lots of tricks I’ve stumbled upon. Maybe one day I’ll make a long, rambling video tutorial ha!

robotunes · 2017-05-21T22:49:15.661Z

[quote=“sezare56, post:39, topic:39432, full:true”]
Just sample air, instead of iAir shit.[/quote]

I do this too. With my phone I’ll walk through the park and record the sounds of children laughing and playing, bits of conversation, the wind rustling the leaves, the sound of construction equipment, the sound of a spoon tapping a water glass, the sound of me playing piano on my creaky old piano bench.

I put them into OT and pitch them up/down and chop them up to add atmosphere and breath to my music (or at least that’s what I hope I’m doing!!!)

There are many ways to use a sampler, which is why I greatly prefer samplers to synths. Because with a sampler, the world is my oscillator.

dotYOUTH · 2017-05-22T05:37:46.431Z

Beautifully put

Open_Mike · 2017-05-22T16:05:41.982Z

robotunes:

Because with a sampler, the world is my oscillator.

xidnpnlss · 2017-05-22T16:10:46.646Z

sezare56:

iAir shit.

Wuuuhhhhhaaaatttt. Man some of those apps are beautiful.

dotYOUTH · 2017-05-25T14:29:49.896Z

IMG_20170525_161702_718.jpg1944×1944 1.26 MB

my idea of minimalism