My Acid midi sequencing limitations -ACID Product Family

ACID Product Family

Subject:My Acid midi sequencing limitations Posted by: Rednroll Date:10/28/2004 1:20:00 PM 1. Step Recording/Song arrangement mode: I often write songs in sections, like INTRO, VERSE, CHORUS,BRIDGE and OUTRO, then assemble them into a song arrangement. So in Vision I would create 5 seperate sequences and title each. Each sequence would have it's own assignable sequence length and also would have a PC keyboard letter assigned to it for the Step record function . I would then create a new sequence and go into Step record mode and enable record on a single track. I'll call this sequence MASTER SONG sequence. I would press "a" which would be assigned to my INTRO sequence and that entire sequence would be displayed as a single block on that track and that block would be the length I assigned it to be. Next I would press "b" and my Verse sequence would drop in as another block directly following my INTRO block. Therefore I could put my entire song together on a single track by step recording enabling that track and pressing "a,b,c,b,d,c,e". If I wanted to do futher editing or recording on one of those blocks, alls I had to do is double click on that block and the original seperated tracks would pop up where I could edit or record, and the original sequence got unaffected by these changes. Also, if I wanted to add additional musical parts to the arranged song, I would just record enable another track within my MASTER SONG sequence. Linked Piano Roll Editor, List Editor, and musical Staff note view/editor- Let's say I want to edit the Attack of a particular note, because I didn't get the playing just right, where I want that note to be accented a little more. When I highlight a note or notes in the Piano Roll editor and select "Open List Editor", those notes would be highlighted in that tracks master list editor, where it would display the ATTACK, DURATION, RELEASE and NOTE numerical values, where all these parameters could then be edited. I could also play the track in the LIST EDITOR view and a little speaker would show which note was currently being played. I could do the same type of thing in the Staff View/Editor, but now the midi data got displayed as musical notes on a staff. I could add notes on the musical staff by using a pencil tool, or delete a note. When I did this the piano roll editor got updated, along with the List editor. I could even have all 3 views open and see them playing together when I hit play. The Staff View/Editor also allowed me to print up my sequences as music sheets. Therefore, if I wanted to hand the song off to say a guitar player, or bass player to later have them add additonal parts, they could read the music to see what the song is doing and follow along by reading the sheet music. 3. Input Quantization I am no keyboard player, I'm actually a drummer. So ofter I like to enable input quantization for my lack of keyboard playing abilities. So I could enable input quantization and my notes got quantized to whatever note value I assigned to it, and this would be done in realtime recording/playback. 4. Assignable Punch-in and Punch-out recording points, Loop Record functions with either overdub or note replace modes. Hopefully self explanatory 5. Note Selection with cut and paste options to other midi tracks. Often I receive external sequences with drums recorded onto a single track. With this function I could select say all the notes recorded on "C3", which might be a snare drum. I could select all the C3 notes and cut/copy them and then paste them to a new midi track. The notes would be pasted into that midi track into the same positions they occured on the original track. Therefore I could easily split the single multiple drum sound track into seperate tracks, where they could easily then be soloed and muted to lay my midi tracks off as audio very easily. 6.Master Keyboard/Patch selection Without having to create and record enable a track, I could select a specific keyboard/sound module/external FX processor that I wanted to control from my master midi input controler. Then when I selected that particular keyboard/sound module it would list all their available patches in the patch selection window. This made auditioning multiple sound modules and patches on them very quick and easy. Also I could select an external FX's processor and easily change a preset from within my midi sequencer, without having to physically get up and start pushing buttons on the FX's processor. Along with the patch selection, I could import sound module premade patch selection layouts and I could also edit the patch layout with the patch editor if I made my own presets or added an expansion card to my external keyboard/sound module. 7. Midi bulk dump sysex message record/playback I have many hardware modules that I alter various presets and parameters. After altering them I will do a midi bulk dump from them and record enable a track in my sequencer and all that data gets backed up. I could save those tracks in my sequence associated with the session I was working on and later be able to recall all the adjustments that I made to the external hardware device. I use this alot when creating mixes on my external digital mixer, my TC Finalyzer when I make adjustments on it for mastering jobs, and when editing patches/presets on my external FX processors and sound modules. 8. Program changes record/playback I've use this often on my external FX processors. Sometimes I run out of FX processors during a mix, but some FX's are only used for a short part of a song. I therefore can play my mix and record a patch change where I can change to a different preset on the FX's processor and use multiple FX's on that external device. I can also use this for doing realtime patch changes on my keyboards if I want a particular track to change sounds. 9. Wait note record and count in metronome. I can record enable a track and the enable the metronome. The metronome will continously count off, while the track is in a wait note record mode. As soon as I press a key on my keyboard, the then record will start beginning, recording that first note struck and subsequent notes thereafter. Also if I don't wish to use the wait record function I can set a count in time that the metrone will count-off for and then the sequencer will start recording after the duration of the count-off has expired. I can set this count-off duration to however many measures I wish the count-off to be. 10. Assignable midi note metronome sound For my metronome sound, I can either select the sequencer's internal click sound, or I can assign this to midi notes on an external keyboard, where I can assign an Accent (beat 1) note and a seperate clicks note for the rest of the metronome count sounds. Therfore if the programs internal click sound tends to clash with the song I'm working on or if I just don't like that particular sound. Then I can assign the metronome to any of my keyboard sounds. I can use the same sound and note for both the Accent note and the click note and then just alter the Velocity of the note for the Accent note, to better extinquish what is beat 1. 11. Multi-input record mode If someone brings in a keyboard and already has a sequence assembled and it's seperated on different midi/tracks and channels. I can put my midi sequencer into multi-input record mode and set it to follow external beat clock. The sequence therefore already assembled on the external keyboard is easy to dump into my sequencer, where I can then edit it and lay each track off as audio later. It automatically records the external midi sequence and places the midi data onto their seperated tracks as they where in the external sequence. 12. Independant individual Track loop mode For each track I can assign the measure duration of that track. I can then also enable looping on that track. Further more the sequence has a seperate duration and loop enable function. So if I want track1 to be 3 measures long and contiously loop, while Track2 is 4 measures and continously loop, and Track3 is 9 measures long and I don't want it to continously loop, while the entire duration of the sequence is 32 measures long and I want those 32 measures to loop, this ability is very easy without any cutting and pasting. So anyways those are 12 of the major ones I can think of right now that Acid doesn't have but my midi sequencer that's been discontinued for over 6 years now does have. So jumping to Acid as my midi sequencer, is too long of a jump for me at this point. I consider these 12 to be eccentials in my workflow. With discussions on these forums of requests of being able to have "nested timelines" and "folder tracks", I was hoping that I could accomplish my song arrangment mode as outlined above in feature 1. I was hoping that I could save individual Acid projects and save them as VERSE, CHORUS, BRIDGE, etc. Then create a folder track where Acid projects would appear in a media pool, where I could drag each project onto a single track and arrange my song, keeping the GUI display very minimal to a rather complex project. They would then just appear as block events that could be trimmed, looped and faded. No such luck in AP5.
Subject:RE: My Acid midi sequencing limitations Reply by: Rednroll Date:10/28/2004 2:17:45 PM Now that I've listed some of the things I'm looking for in a midi sequencer, is anyone here using Ableton live? and what do you think? Sorry, butTraxtion doesn't cut it for me. I've heard good things about Live and am totally against Sonar after my recent experience with Cakewalk.
Subject:RE: My Acid midi sequencing limitations Reply by: DKeenum Date:10/28/2004 4:06:13 PM I've probably told you this before, but I'm old enough to repeat myself: I miss vision as well. I used it on a mac classic for many years. When I discovered acid I gave up midi for a couple of years and only went back with acid 4 and soft synths. I would love to find a sequencer like vision (I too think of sequencing as verse/chorus/ etc with some long tracks), but I wonder if I need to give it up and learn a new way. I think I can live with recording midi and audio in another app if I have to, I just need to find a midi/audio app I can enjoy.
Subject:RE: My Acid midi sequencing limitations Reply by: Rednroll Date:10/28/2004 4:14:16 PM Dkeenum, If you find one, be sure to let me know immediately. I tried Logic Audio, Cubase, and Cakewalk back in v9.0. I've just have come to terms that I've been spoiled by Vision and still can't pull myself away from it. It's pretty much how I am with the Sony apps, I'm spoiled by Sony's user interface and can't pull myself away from it to try another app for more than 15 minutes before I become totally frustrated. If you're interested in getting a PC version of Vision, then let me know. It's pretty much identical to the MAC version except it never developed as far with audio features and it only made it as far as Windows98 support, so it doesn't work on XP or 2K. Hit me up at Rednroll AT hotmail.com
Subject:RE: My Acid midi sequencing limitations Reply by: DKeenum Date:10/28/2004 4:26:03 PM Red, That is very good of you, but I think it would just make me more miserable. My problem is that because of acid I've moved to soft synths and I can't look back. So I guess it looks like I have one foot firmly planted in the past and another in the present/future. Somehow I've got to move that foot in the past. So I will begin my search and continue to use acid in the meantime. Who knows, I may just end up figuring out ways to make acid work for everything I do.
Subject:RE: My Acid midi sequencing limitations Reply by: Cquence777 Date:10/28/2004 5:49:24 PM Hey Red, I know we've had our differences in the past, and if you choose to not respond, I will understand. I am curious however, if the new "groove quantization technology" in Acid Pro 5 is any sort of a quicker way to quantize your originally played midi tracks? I know you said there's no realtime quantize which was huge for me personally, so I was wondering what that groove aspect actually brings to the table. Thanx.
Subject:RE: My Acid midi sequencing limitations Reply by: Rednroll Date:10/28/2004 6:19:16 PM I'm not sure if this answers your question, and I'm not all that familiar with the midi features in Acid, but basically let's say you quantize your notes to straight eighth notes. Then you can drop a groove like a hard swing groove template onto that track and make the track have a hard swing feel to it. Applying the groove pattern to the track doesn't seem to actually physically move the midi notes, but I may be wrong on that point. I guess my only analogy for it, is if you've ever used Rebirth and adjust the Shuffle control on a pattern, it works alot like that except way more powerful in it's flexibilty, where you can even edit the groove pattern and create your own custumizable grooves. You can also put multiple groove patterns onto a single track. I've mostly tried it out on audio loops and here it truly amazes me, where you can take a straight rock loop and turn it into a blues shuffle if you wish.
Subject:RE: My Acid midi sequencing limitations Reply by: Cquence777 Date:10/28/2004 7:32:16 PM Ok, I think I'm with ya there. I really just want to be able to lay down a straight 16th midi drum track (or other variations as well) and have it quantized in realtime....without having to go into piano roll and select the notes, then align the notes. I guess I was just thinking or wondering if that groove feature might be a quicker way to quantize your midi tracks (stock templates of various settings...16th, 16triplet, etc, etc). That does sound cool to use it on the loops though...and make different stuff outta the loops.
Subject:RE: My Acid midi sequencing limitations Reply by: Rednroll Date:10/29/2004 8:52:01 AM I think this will meet your expectations, I haven't personally tried it out that much, since for me to start using Acid as a midi sequencer it has to first start making improvements in the 12 features I consider eccentials listed above first. There is a "Straight note/quantize" groove pattern that I think might work for you. I don't know, I've only used this groove on audio, after I've added another groove pattern, to get the loop back to where it started with no groove. Once you add a groove to a loop, there's currently no way to bypass it, therefore no way to do an A/B comparison. So I've been using the "Straight note/quantize" groove to be able to do an A/B comparison, by dragging that on the track, and then dragging another type of groove over the top of that. It's either that or I have to use the Groove tool erase tool, which works the same as the Acid media erase tool, which isn't very effective for a quick "get you back to where you started" function. The groove appears like an event under a track when you add it. The problem is that it doesn't get treated like a media event so you can't easily just right click on it and delete it or mute it, and you can't just trim the edges or slide it around on the timeline, like you can a media event. It's a great feature, but there is room for improvement in my opinion.
Subject:RE: My Acid midi sequencing limitations Reply by: Cquence777 Date:10/29/2004 11:15:36 AM I gotcha. Will have to toy with it to see how deep the rabbit hole actually goes I'm sure. Thanx for the info Red.

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