Recording a 128 step loop

Elektron Gear Octatrack
#41

Dang, I can’t sequence these loops. Plan was to make 9 patterns with 64 steps each, starting with a one-shot-trig locked to a 128 step DN pattern sample with a loop set in the middle that keeps on looping from step 129 onwards. But if I jump from pattern 1 to 2 now, the one-shot-trig of pattern 1 continues playing while the one-shot-trig of pattern 2 won’t start playing.

Any solution without messing with the scale or having to arm the track or spreading my samples to several tracks? Scale settings are not an option because I want to eventually sync the OT to my DT to perform live and scale settings mess up DT patterns. Spreading the samples to different tracks is not an option since I only have 7 tracks available and 9 samples, also bought the OT to be able to perform DN patterns with only one OT track and then add samples from other instruments or vocals on the remaining OT tracks. Don’t want to have to press buttons for arming tracks because it makes performing too intense, pattern changes like playing DN/DT/AF would be preferable. The OT really doesn’t seem to be made for sequencing samples longer than 64 steps with any releases …

Edit: Changing patterns as I have mentioned works when using slices. But as I cannot set the exact value for a loop, I would have to make 24 instead of 12 slices and then be able to make the sequencer start with slice 1 , play it for 128 steps and then play and loop slice 2 from then on. Any chance of doing this without messing with scales? I could double the patterns to 18 instead of 9 and only use one slice of 128 steps per pattern, but then making these slices loop correctly would still be extremely tedious to nearly impossible.

#42

Don’t bother with loop, set your pattern to 64 steps, then use trig condition to prevent sample retrigging on step 1.

So if you have a 128 step sample, set a trig on step one with trig condition 1:2, it will play on first step, on 65 step it will continue to play, until step 129 where it will retrigger.

Or you could use scale with per track scale settings, this won’t affect sync as long as master is set to 1 and master len is set to 128, set the track to 1/2, 64 steps, regular trig on step 1.

Try either of those.

4 Likes
Pattern Change and Loop Control
#43

Thanks again. Unfortunately, both of these methods don‘t work. Because the sample will start at the beginning instead of the middle of my sample after 128 steps.

Best solution so far seems to be to make 24 instead of 12 slices or 18 instead of 9 samples, increase scale to 4x and then using @deranger‘s method of setting a 1st condition trig with sample of steps 1-128 on step 1 and another trig on 33 without any condition of steps 129-257.

Unless I can solve the issue of pattern 1 playing after switching to pattern 2.

Thanks a lot again. I just find it hard to believe that this seems so complicated, I thought what I am trying is a pretty basic thing.

#45

You want the sample to play slice 1 the first time it is triggered and slice 2 every time after that?

1 Like
#46

Exactly, I want the sequencer to play sample/slice A first 128 steps and sample/slice B from step 129 onwards. Since looping a one trig shot means I then can’t jump to another pattern, I guess the only solution is to

  1. adjust scale so that the pattern sequencer runs at 128 steps (see explanations above)
  2. place a trig with sample/slice A on trig 1, place a trig with sample/slice B on trig 2 with lowest possible micro timing.
  3. add trig conditions to both trigs (1st for trig 1 and pre with line above it on trig 2?).

I‘m afraid this will still mess up looping due to microtiming, but I will try it out. Otherwise, I will just record long samples for every pattern and set the scale real high …

#47

The microtiming approach should work ok. I don’t see how it could mess up your looping.

There’s also the option to only use one trig and manually change the slice parameter after the pattern has started.

1 Like
#48

Just use 2 patterns, 1st to play 1-128, second to play 129 onwards.

3 Likes
#49

Thanks, second option is a good idea, but I want to avoid having to manually change trigs when I am performing.

So the above described approach is basically working. As I expected, there is some clicks on the micro-timed trig. But I can probably fix that by preparing a sample instead of a slice, add some fade in and out on a flex machine and then assign the prepared sample to a static machine.

I hope this will work for the future. Thank you so much again. It‘s been quite frustrating so far, but at the same time, I have learned a lot about the OT on the way, which should make life easier from now on.

1 Like
#50

Yeah I thought about that as well, but then I will have 18 patterns, actually reflecting 9 patterns. Would make performing quite stressful and/or confusing, but maybe I will revert to this solution for songs with less patterns.

#51

I guess you have to make a compromise with any gear, it can be done though.

#52

Arranger is your friend, you can loop one or several patterns, jump to any row, write remarks to find the good part…
Arrows + YES. Seems safer than pattern chains…

3 Likes
#53

Yep if you know you’re going to want to play pattern1 followed by pattern2 looping n times, then switch to patterns 3 and 4 with the same structure etc, this would seem like a good use case for the arranger.

1 Like
#54

Thanks, but I would like to change patterns myself so I don‘t have to follow the pre-arranged song and can adjust to the flow.

So I have nailed the method described above with putting a 1st trig on trig 1 with slice 1, a -23 micro-timed pre negative trig on trig 2 with slice 2 and a trig without any conditions with slice 2 on trig 32. In the next pattern, I then swap these slices to 3/4 etc. I also lock these trigs to the pattern, because I sometimes switch samples on one track.

However, playback is a total mess and the trigs often playback other slices than the ones I have assigned or start playing back another sample than is locked on the trigs after 4 bars. I have definitely locked the right samples and set the correct slices, when I manually listen to the slices in AED, it’s the correct ones that are assigned. Also often tracks that I didn’t recently edit don‘t ever start to playback any of the trigs I have placed there with different samples and slices (same method). Sometimes playback eventually works after restarting the pattern many times and listening to the slices in AED.

Is there some basic thing I got wrong? Does it have to do with arming? Or can the OT not really handle different locked samples plus slices on trigs of the same track when using a static machine?

#55

You can do that in the arranger. You would have Pattern 1 followed by an infinite loop of Pattern 2, then when you want to you can jump out of it to Pattern 3 which is automatically followed by Pattern 4 looping infinitely. Or if you decide to skip Patterns 3 and 4 you can go straight to Pattern 5 and 6.

OT should be able to handle what you describe no problem. My experience with this kind of unexplainable difficulties was that they appear less and less as you gain experience with the device.

#56

Here’s an idea I’m not completely sure will work but please try it out.

Say you have slice 2 of your sample as the one you want to loop, but you want slice 1 to be the first thing that plays. What you can maybe do is set an LFO assigned to the start parameter, with the rising waveform that starts out negative, use trig mode “sync one”, and some amount of depth. Then place a trig on step 1 of you pattern and just have the start parameter be 2. Now I think only when the track starts the LFO should make the start be 1. I don’t use the sync LFO modes so am not sure about what happens when you switch patterns.

#57

For this, and to save LFOs for other things, OP could use a 1st trig condition on step 1 for the first loop, then use not 1st on step 2 for the second loop with the trig microtimed back as far as possible. Trig 1 uses slice 1, trig 2 uses slice 2.

#58

He is having trouble with the conditions. Will the LFO approach not work? Imo it would be cleaner.

1 Like
#59

That‘s actually the method I‘m using right now, although with conditions 1st and pre-negative.

The LFO idea sounds really promising. I don’t need the LFOs for this track (yet?), so I will try that out later. Thanks again.

1 Like
#60

Another solution could be to apply an LFO that would basically do the job of a little amount of fade in and out without having to set these manually in AED. So the LFO should fastly increase volume from zero from step 1 and reduce it to zero towards the last step.

I can‘t quite wrap my head around the settings for such an LFO. Any suggestions?