Subject:sensible, logical signal path

Posted by: shakey

Date:8/23/2009 12:37:10 PM

this is a picture of the sonar signal path

http://www.bluetrip.com/images/bb_img/Sonar6SignalFlow.gif

you will notice that the softsynth input is at the same time as the audio track input, before the mute/solo buttons, and also before the phase buttons

This is a logical, sensible signal path. Unlike the one in acid, which is in the help file. The whole thing needs reorganising to be the same as the cubase one, which is based on a standard mixer signal path.

What seems to have happened, and correct me if i'm wrong please, is that when they decided to put soft synth capability into acid in version 4 (i think) they simply bolted it on at the bus stage, and it has never been changed. Probably because not enough people have complained about it. Input buses by contrast were put in at version 7, and have been placed in the proper place at the start of the path, next to audio.

If you look before the first summing point, which is the + symbol after the audio tracks in the diagram, before track fx, this is basically the acid 2 signal path. Everything else has just been bolted on afterwards, presumably because they didn't want to spend the manpower on rewriting the code. The whole thing needs to be rewritten.

Subject:RE: sensible, logical signal path

Reply by: Geoff_Wood

Date:8/23/2009 1:59:38 PM

If everything was identical to Cubase, what would be the point of other apps existing ?

geoff

Subject:RE: sensible, logical signal path

Reply by: pwppch

Date:8/23/2009 2:12:41 PM

I completely disagree and it was not bolted on as you state.

It works just a like a mixing console would as if the Soft-synth was an external sound source.

What is it that you cannot do in ACID?

Peter

Subject:RE: sensible, logical signal path

Reply by: Bremen Cole

Date:8/23/2009 5:59:33 PM

Shakey, I also have to disagree on this one. Sonar may have a signal path you like, but for me the program is a mess. I left Sonar at SL3 and to this day could update to the newest for $100. If Acid 8 came out tomorrow I would pay $100 for the upgrade, but will never upgrade my old copy of Sonar. Sonar for me is a confusing mess of little buttons. Cubase is an excellent program, but if I want things to work like Cubase, I'll just buy Cubase.

VSTi's work great in Acid. Very easy to add a VSTi track, and yes the signal path treats the soft synth as an instrument, just as if you were on physical hardware. As someone who really doesn't use loops very much but uses soft synths, I find the VSTi integration "tight" in Acid.

Of course all of this is somewhat subjective, but I have zero problems with Acid's signal flow....

Subject:RE: sensible, logical signal path

Reply by: shakey

Date:8/24/2009 6:45:49 AM

you cant solo an audio track while rewire audio is coming in via a soft synth, you have to mute all the softsynth buses first

Subject:RE: sensible, logical signal path

Reply by: shakey

Date:8/24/2009 6:47:59 AM

soft synths dont have polarity invert buttons

Subject:RE: sensible, logical signal path

Reply by: shakey

Date:8/24/2009 6:50:50 AM

you cant send a soft synth to bus a and another to bus b, and then solo the two buses together, because the sound disappears

Subject:RE: sensible, logical signal path

Reply by: pwppch

Date:8/24/2009 6:52:51 AM

you cant solo an audio track while rewire audio is coming in via a soft synth, you have to mute all the softsynth buses first

I can see where this can be a problem, but this is not due to the routing but rather how ReWire works. It can be solved and will be considered in the future.

Peter

Subject:RE: sensible, logical signal path

Reply by: pwppch

Date:8/24/2009 6:57:31 AM

you cant send a soft synth to bus a and another to bus b, and then solo the two buses together, because the sound disappears

This looks like a bug, not a routing limitation.

You can solo at the synth bus level and it works as expected.

Peter

Subject:RE: sensible, logical signal path

Reply by: shakey

Date:8/24/2009 7:12:13 AM

yes, It does sound like a bug to me, i've got a tech support question on the go for that one, but i've not heard back yet. Thanks for your quick reply!

Subject:RE: sensible, logical signal path

Reply by: shakey

Date:8/24/2009 7:26:27 AM

Try this one.

1. set up a bus
2. route audio from an audio track to that bus
3. set up an fx send and send audio from the bus to the fx send, pre fader
4. solo the fx send
5. press play

you should now be able to hear the audio coming from the audio track, going through the bus and ending up at the fx send and going to the master, ok



Now try this one with a blank project

1. set up a soft synth and route the output to bus a. Draw some notes in the midi track.
2. set up an assignable fx and send audio to it from bus a, pre fader
3. solo the fx send
4. press play

you should now hear no sound, until you solo the soft synth track as well as the fx send

now try this, on the same project

1. add an audio track and put some audio onto it
2. route it to bus a
3. press play

you will not hear the audio track, because the soft synth is solo'd, but if you unsolo the softsynth you will hear the audio track, but not the soft synth

is this a bug or a routing issue?

Subject:RE: sensible, logical signal path

Reply by: pwppch

Date:8/24/2009 9:34:27 AM

We will review all of the solo behaviors for a future update.

Peter

Subject:RE: sensible, logical signal path

Reply by: kbruff

Date:8/24/2009 11:31:14 AM

r&*&(*& e#$#$%# a%<:":" p@#$@%$# e ?"}{:r

Subject:RE: sensible, logical signal path

Reply by: pwppch

Date:8/24/2009 12:37:27 PM

r&*&(*& e#$#$%# a%<:":" p@#$@%$# e ?"}{:r

What are you trying to say?

Peter

Subject:RE: sensible, logical signal path

Reply by: shakey

Date:8/24/2009 12:44:49 PM

much appreciated, thankyou

Subject:RE: sensible, logical signal path

Reply by: shakey

Date:8/25/2009 2:31:32 AM

Another one

You can send audio to a bus from an audio track, but not from a soft synth or a bus

Subject:RE: sensible, logical signal path

Reply by: pwppch

Date:8/25/2009 5:37:47 AM

You can send audio to a bus from an audio track, but not from a soft synth or a bus

This is by design. The requirement is that a sub bus is routed to hardware directly to be used as a send from another bus. The intention is to set up a cue mix. Allowing for any bus to send to another bus could introduce potential circular routings and a feedback loop.

The point of a send is to affect multiple sources the same. This is why we have Assignable FX busses that can be sent to - as long as no circular routing occurs.

Why do you want to send to a sub bus from a bus or a soft-synth?

What problem does it solve?

Peter

Subject:RE: sensible, logical signal path

Reply by: shakey

Date:8/25/2009 6:58:19 AM

I don't understand why you would want audio tracks to send to buses, but not softsynths. I use softsynth buses in exactly the same way as audio tracks, and I would like them to behave in the same way. I would also like to see phase buttons on them. These things are useful when undertaking complicated sound design. I might have a bus set up already with certain fx on it, and it would be easier to send to that than to save the chain and create a new fx send with those effects on. I might also want to blend a certain amount of signal with the other sounds on a bus, to compress them together or gate it with them, without sending the whole thing to it. I might have some drums on the bus and want to send some noise from a softsynth to be gated with the drums, but I would also like the unadulterated noise to come back on another channel for different processing. Presently if I wanted to do something like that, I would have to render the track to audio first, but I might not want to commit to the sound yet.

These are just some examples off the top of my head, but the point is the ability to send to all locations is very useful from a sound design point of view

Subject:RE: sensible, logical signal path

Reply by: pwppch

Date:8/25/2009 8:04:09 AM

I use softsynth buses in exactly the same way as audio tracks, and I would like them to behave in the same way. I would also like to see phase buttons on them.

Soft synth busses are not audio tracks. You are using them in a way not intended by ACID.

Tracks are not busses, and busses are not tracks. Tracks "feed" the mixer and its busses.

What it sounds like you want is Instrument tracks where the MIDI data and softsynth are treated as a single object. However, there would be limitations linked to the limitiations of VSTis.

The phase button on a bus would not be a big problem, and we have been asked for this in the past. Something that will be discussed and considered for a future version.

I appreciate what you want to accomplish, but, in general, you want ACID to do things it was not intended to do.

I will review your requests and make sure it is considered for a future version.

No promises.

Peter

Subject:RE: sensible, logical signal path

Reply by: shakey

Date:8/25/2009 9:04:48 AM

"Soft synth busses are not audio tracks. You are using them in a way not intended by ACID. "

Ah, but isn't this how technology is advanced?

Soft synth buses and audio tracks are the same thing to me, because I am bringing audio into the mixer from reason and have them working side by side doing similar things. Having them work in the same way facilitates better rewire integration.

I have been meaning to ask, are stereo rewire tracks on the agenda? Currently if I want to bring stereo audio from reason I have to create two softsynths, pan them hard left and right and then run them into a bus in order to put an fx chain on the stereo signal. This can get messy when you are bringing a lot of stereo audio into the mixer, especially if you give the bus it's own fx send as well.
Also, I would like to be able to create multiple softsynth rewire tracks at once, like you can in logic, rather than having to click the insert soft synth button 10 times in a row.

Subject:RE: sensible, logical signal path

Reply by: pwppch

Date:8/25/2009 11:13:48 AM

Ah, but isn't this how technology is advanced?

What technology are you talking about advancing?

We are looking at exposing an instrument track model that would combine a MIDI track with a softsynth.

ReWire "instrument' tracks would be difficult and assume that you are using ReWire as a bank of soft-synths vs a tool that has its own projects that is merely sending audio data to the ReWire host.

Again, ReWire does not permit the host from knowing much about what the audio it is streaming is from or in what context it belongs. It is merely a bus that streams audio.

Soft synth buses and audio tracks are the same thing to me, because I am bringing audio into the mixer from reason and have them working side by side doing similar things. Having them work in the same way facilitates better rewire integration.

Tracks in ACID have conent - audio media or MIDI data - in ACID.

Busses in ReWire are opaque sources of audio. There is no content in ACID directly associated to them.

ACID provides "content" to a ReWire device as MIDI tracks. ACID sends MIDI to a ReWire MIDI device just like it sends MIDI data to a VSTi.

With most VSTi, MIDI from the host to the VSTi is a requirement. This model of working is well understood and the goal of VSTi in ACID. It is the same paradigm of using an external sound module.

I have been meaning to ask, are stereo rewire tracks on the agenda?

ReWire devices expose busses, not tracks.

A ReWire device can expose mono or stereo busses. (ACID when used as a ReWire device along with other ReWire devices expose both.)

If the ReWire device exposes stereo busses, ACID exposes them as stereo busses.

In the case of Reason 4:

It exposes a single stereo master bus and 62 mono busses. I don't believe there is a way to expose additional stereo busses from Reason - unlike in ACID as a ReWire device. This most likely due to how ReWire works. You cannot change the number of busses exposed dynamically in a ReWire device. A short comming of ReWire in my opinion.

ACID exposes a single stereo bus and upto 62 busses for each of the mono busses.

I take it that you want to have ACID combine two of the mono busses as a single stereo pair.

Also, I would like to be able to create multiple softsynth rewire tracks at once, like you can in logic, rather than having to click the insert soft synth button 10 times in a row.

You can create multiple ReWire busses for a single ReWire device using the Plug-in Manager View.

Select the ReWire Busses in the Plug-in Manager view ReWire Device folder and drag the selection to the Mix Console.

Note: It appears to be a bug that you cannot select multiple ReWire device busses and either right click and select "Insert ReWire Bus" or drag to the Bus Track Folders area on the main time line. I will make sure this gets entered as a problem.

On another note: You posted that the transport in ACID cannot be controlled by the Reason transport. I have tried this and have found no case where pressing play in Reason does not start ACID. Can you provide a specific example of when Reason's transport does not start ACID's?

Peter

Subject:RE: sensible, logical signal path

Reply by: shakey

Date:8/26/2009 2:27:34 AM

"What technology are you talking about advancing?"

music technology

I will just quickly explain the way I usually work. This is also the way that a lot of people who make electronic music work.

I start acid, and then start reason and rewire the main out from reason into acid.
I will then begin working on the drums using the nnxt sampler in reason, usually creating a kick and a snare first by layering, tuning and filtering different hits to create a basic beat.
I will then output these separately to different softsynth buses on the acid mixer, so that I can process them individually there.
I will then back this beat up with various processed and filtered rex loops, often sidechaining them to the main beat to make them sound like one drumloop. These will also be sent to the acid mixer to be processed separately.
I will then concentrate on making bass noises, usually starting with a synth, either a vst in acid or a synth in reason. Once I am happy with a sound, I will send it to acid and saturate it by putting various distortions and effects both on the main softsynth bus and also on sends. This creates a much larger and more analog sound. At this point I am probably running low on cpu, so I will bounce a few sequences of audio and then load it back into the sampler in reason for more processing and filtering. (If there is not yet any audio information on the arrange page in acid, this is where I would have to draw in a clip and turn the gain down in order to render audio from reason)

As the track progresses I will bounce down some things to audio and manipulate them there, but I will also have some tracks running in samplers in reason, for pitch modulation or filtering or some other processing.
The midi tracks are all kept in reason, I don't send midi from acid to reason, because I prefer the midi editing in reason.
So, seeing as my projects contain audio on tracks in acid, and audio on tracks in reason, I would like the strips on the acid mixer to have the same options available to them.

My genre of music requires me to create very experimental and convoluted sounds and these require complex routing combinations and processing. I often use one project to create a single sound so that I am free to use all the processing power on it, and then bounce it out to use in another project.

That reminds me. In logic you can copy and paste tracks and clip sequences, well anything actually, from one project to another. This would extremely useful to me because I use acid as a live midi sequencer at gigs. and I will have project files up to 2 hours in length, containing up to 30 songs. This would enable me to copy one of those songs into another live project. Currently I have to use the same project and edit out what I dont want and then create new songs ontop of that. This would also enable me to easily copy arrangements from new tunes into the live project file, instead of having to recreate them in the project.


"I take it that you want to have ACID combine two of the mono busses as a single stereo pair."


Yes, that would be fantastic, that must be how logic does it.

"Note: It appears to be a bug that you cannot select multiple ReWire device busses and either right click and select "Insert ReWire Bus" or drag to the Bus Track Folders area on the main time line. I will make sure this gets entered as a problem."

Yes, that makes sense

"On another note: You posted that the transport in ACID cannot be controlled by the Reason transport. I have tried this and have found no case where pressing play in Reason does not start ACID. Can you provide a specific example of when Reason's transport does not start ACID's?"

Yes, I haven't got an example to hand but I will try and dig one out. It seems to occur when acid is running high cpu load.

Subject:RE: sensible, logical signal path

Reply by: shakey

Date:8/26/2009 2:57:46 AM

Here are a few automation mods which would make my life easier.

I would like to be able to right click on an automation envelope and manually hide it, currently you can only show all or hide all, which can make things difficult if you have lots of different parameters being automated at the same time on the same track. Basically, I would like checkboxes next to them like in the "show envelopes" menu in the track context menu. Maybe a sub menu in the show envelopes menu, just for plugin automation envelopes. Or even make a similar screen to the configure midi controllers screen, except for fx automation. That would also enable you to set the default fade type for each envelope, very handy.

Also, I would like to be able to ctrl click different envelopes to select them in the envelope tool. Currently if I want to copy automation envelopes from one part of the track to another, I have to copy them one at a time. If I have a lot of automation on that track, this can take some time, being able to ctrl click on each to select multiple envelopes would resolve this.

Another issue is that if you copy automation from one end of the track to another, the envelopes will sweep from the end point of the first set of automation to the second, changing all your parameters in between in the process. The way reason solves this is quite clever. When you insert an envelope it has a slider at the start of the track which sets the value you want it to default to when there is no automation present. All the automation is held within regions, and when there is none present It leaves your sound unchanged. This makes it very easy to copy sections of automation around the track, without having to worry about what it will do to the surrounding automation.

One last thing, only loosely related to automation. Double clicking on a clip used to bring up clip properties, but now sets the loop region to the clip boundaries. This can be pretty annoying when you have set up a loop around a section and are zoomed quite far in making precision automation edits, like making custom lfos. This is because if you double click on an envelope to add a point and miss and double click on the clip by mistake, the loop selection will be changed and you will have to zoom out again and reset it. An option to change this to what it used to be would solve this.

Thankyou,

david

Subject:RE: sensible, logical signal path

Reply by: shakey

Date:8/26/2009 3:00:59 AM

"ReWire "instrument' tracks would be difficult and assume that you are using ReWire as a bank of soft-synths vs a tool that has its own projects that is merely sending audio data to the ReWire host"

I dont mean for you to create rewire instrument tracks, since I keep all the midi info in reason anyway, just to have the same routing options on the mixer

Subject:RE: sensible, logical signal path

Reply by: shakey

Date:8/26/2009 3:10:10 AM

Just a quick one, when will you be implementing sidechaining into acid. I have lots of plugins which have multiple inputs but acid cant send audio to them. Currently I use the tc sidechainer and compressor combination, this works by placing a sidechainer plugin on the source track eg the kick, and then placing the compressor on the thing you want the kick to effect. The sidechainer then sends the kick signal to the key input on the compressor. This works ok, but I have plenty of synths and effects other than compressors which have this facility but it is not possible in acid. Also the compressor only supports two channels of sidechaining across the project, which can be a problem sometimes.

Also there is a bug with the tc native compressor de esser which means that it does not save the state of the key input button when you leave a project. This means that when you start up the project again, you have to press the key input button again other wise it will not be accepting the sidechain signal.
I don't know if this is an issue with the plugin or with acid. I will check it in sonar to see if it still occurs.

david