Greetings, and LC emulation question

[leighke]

Firstly, greetings to all from a new one here.

I am totally new to midibox,....I had hoped that I wouldn't have to delve so far into electronics and the like, but, limitations of existing equipment lead me here!

OK, my question ('reasons for' at bottom for those who wonder why)...

I'm looking into the viability/possibility of building a control surface with 48 motorised faders and 48 Buttons. The only function of the faders would be to control the volumes of 48 tracks in LogicPro(7.2.1), and the buttons only function would be to Select Tracks.

I have looked a little at various documents here at midibox.org, and to be honest, feel a little overwhelmed by the sheer amount of information. Before plunging head first into the abyss, I wonder if anyone can maybe give me a few pointers as to where I should be heading.

You may ask 'Why such a limited surface?'.

Well, I have a Logic Control and XT, and have battled with them through more 'rebuild defaults' and 'quick, make a copy of control surface preferences before closing logic' situations than I care to remember.

The final straw was when I realised a few operating limitations of 'user' zones. For starters you get 8, and if you add more in the controller assignment setup, it can really mess up the referencing of zones, and quickly force a rebuild of defaults..furthermore, if you assign parameters for a 'selected' track all is fine on the lcd, should you try to assign to an 'indexed' track (i.e. - so that you don't have to have the track containing the parameter selected in order to change that parameter value with an encoder or fader) then then lcd only shows either the parameter name, OR the parameter value - nothing on the top row of the screen! arggh I said - many times.

(btw - if anyone in the world has had different results from trying this - please contact me!)

This led to me getting some doepfer encoder boxes (Pocket Dial). In the meantime my music creation moved to Max/MSP, with Logic becoming a lovely synth/sampler/mixer/big fx rack. Max does all the midi - logic makes the noises and mixes them.

With the help of Max i now have a setup ready to go (all but buying two more units!), 4 Pocket Dials giving me 64 parameters - I can choose within my Max app if I want them to follow the selected track in Logic or access a parameter without changing track.

I also have another control surface in development to control my Max app, but for this Doepfer kits are more than enough to get encoders/buttons and LEDs, and relatively simple to assemble/patch within Max.

The 48 faders are for controlling and displaying the position of the volume for 32 Audio Instruments, 8 Busses and a few auxilliary objects. I find this a visual and physical necessity for me - I do alot of live sound engineering and a volume fader for each instrument/channel is the only way to go according to my brain! I don't need them to do anything else, the necessity for motorised faders is because I often modulate volumes in real time from lfos etc.

If you should wonder 'why all this?'...I'm not running a studio, I'm working on a project for live electronic performance, where there is no prerecorded playback - sample banks yes - but no 'loop' type samples; synth sounds, hits etc only, and no prerecorded midi, so if I want a midiloop - I have first to play and record it.

Well - i hope this explains something....hmmmm

I'm not looking for a free ride to my goal - but any kind pointers would be most graciously received.

regards

leigh

[audiocommander]

Hi Leigh, welcome aboard!

a control surface with 48 motorised faders

I hope you have seen the prices for the motorized faders?

And the prices for one MF board – and how many faders you can connect to one module – and how many MF-modules you can connect to one Core?

(http://www.ucapps.de/mbhp_mf.html)

I'd recommend you'd start with just one normal MF-MidiBox-Project and then either combine new ones you'll build additionally or link them later on as you gain more and more experience. Or you'll discover that you can perfectly live with 8 Motorfaders (that would be me :))

Cheers,

Michael

[stryd_one]

Yeh AC's got the right idea. You'll only be able to do this by linking several cores, so you might as well start with one and grow it :)

It's great to see some fully live electronica beginning to emerge lately. I was beginning to think I was a crackpot talking about the difference between 'live' and 'live' for so many years and being the only one. I wonder why there's such a recent trend towards it when for years people have been saying it wasn't realistic? Anyway obviously I like the sound of the project, and I'd love to hear more about your max app!

[leighke]

Hi Michael / Stryd....

Thanks for your suggestions.

It does indeed make sense to begin with one core/MF....I'm quite sure I won't be content with 8 faders though, I've been using 16 on  Logic Control/XT for some time now.

Stryd, you mention 'linking the cores'....

Presuming i need 6 cores and 6 MFs to get 48 faders, where does the 'linking' bit fit in? I had presumed they would be sperate units (albeit in one physical casing), each with a midi in/out , necessitating a 6 in/out midi interface, so the units would appear in logic as 6 separate LCs.

i did a fair bit of reading last night, checked out the two shops suggested in the Wiki. Cores with all components and pic seem to be reasonably priced, as are MFs.

Is there any more up to date advice around on sourcing motorized faders? I'm really in no need of touch sensitive ones. I can't find any current link to the Panasonic ones suggested on the MF info page.

A further question of mine;

When building such a unit, i.e. one that doesn't have ALL of the faders/buttons/LEDs that are on the 'proper' Logic Control, are there any difficulties that need to be overcome (i.e. - does Logic need to 'think' there are all the buttons etc?).

On 'live' vs 'live' note...I have had this on my mind for some years now too Stryd! I used to limit myself to performances using maybe just one synth and effects, but HAVE in the past used a (deep breath)....DAT, Midi Sequences/Looped Beats...shame on me...I will never do this again. I have to say I really felt like I was cheating the audience.

Having said that - each to their own, and my 'moral' guides for what is 'live' are for me only. I've engineered some great live gigs where the basic course of the performance is sequenced playback stuff with a few live bits played over the top!

Thanks for your time-  and many thanks in advance for any information anyone can provide for reasonable priced (preferrably non touch sensitive) faders that work with the MF

regards

leigh

[audiocommander]

Hi Leigh,

you can read about linking here:

http://www.ucapps.de/midibox_link.html

Regards,

Michael

[stryd_one]

Some inspiration:

http://www.midibox.org/forum/index.php?topic=2699.0

http://www.midibox.org/forum/index.php?topic=761.0

and ahhh.... this.....monster:

http://www.midibox.org/forum/index.php?topic=2516.0

:D

[leighke]

Hi Leigh,

you can read about linking here:

http://www.ucapps.de/midibox_link.html

Regards,

Michael

aha.....thanks Michael

Some inspiration:

http://www.midibox.org/forum/index.php?topic=2699.0

http://www.midibox.org/forum/index.php?topic=761.0

and ahhh.... this.....monster:

http://www.midibox.org/forum/index.php?topic=2516.0

:D

......me is inspired! cheers both. i'm sure I will be back in the near future with many a more question!

regards

leigh