Track selection/looper

General

Submitted by smunday on Mon, 02/21/2022 - 04:25

Control Surface Studio User

Hi,

I was wondering if anyone knew a way to select a track with a button, THEN use the same button to engage a device parameter, but only after the track is selected.

I have a Nektar Pacer set up so the bottom 6 foot switches can select tracks and the same switches are mapped to the looper multi button. At the moment, recording begins on selection. I would like to be able to select the track and only engage the looper following the track selection.

Sorry for repeating myself. I'm new to Remotify, so still getting my head around it all!

Cheers.

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General

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Control Surface Studio User

Wim - Mon, 02/21/2022 - 09:33

Hi smunday,

The first thing I think of is adding an "Action" when you press the button for selecting the track --> 'script' - 'set active mode' (set this as last "Action" in your "Reaction")

Copy the current "Mode" to a new one and in that "Mode" you change the script for that button to engage the device parameter you want.
By copying the "Mode" you will have the same functionality on all your other inputs. If you don't need that, then you can just create a new "Mode"

So for example:
- in "Mode 1", "Knob 1" is programmed to select a track and to change to "Mode 2"
- in "Mode 2", "Knob 1" is programmed to engage a device parameter, here you can also choose to go back to "Mode 1" by adding the "Action" --> 'script' - 'set active mode' again

Hope this makes sense to you.
Greetings!

Control Surface Studio User

smunday - Mon, 02/21/2022 - 20:08

Hi, thanks for your reply! It's now of the simplest things to do when manually mapping in Ableton, but I can't successfully generate a script to select a track. The foot switches are set to CC trigger. What should the 'active mode' be set to? Is there a reference chart somewhere for this?

Control Surface Studio User

Wim - Tue, 02/22/2022 - 02:50

Hi smunday,
I did not read the second part of your original post well enough, so I only answered the first part, I'm sorry for that.

If I understand it correctly, you first want to select a track to record to by tapping a foot pedal and then tap a second time on the same foot pedal to start recording (so activating the looper multi-button)

There might be another simpler way, but here is what I got this far..
So then you would need 7 modes;

"Mode 1" when pressing a pedal, it arms a track and another mode is chosen depending on track you have chosen.
"Mode 2" is the looper multi-button for track 1 (pedal 1).
"Mode 3" is the looper multi-button for track 2 (pedal 2).
"Mode 4" is the looper multi-button for track 3 (pedal 3).
"Mode 5" is the looper multi-button for track 4 (pedal 4).
"Mode 6" is the looper multi-button for track 5 (pedal 5).
"Mode 7" is the looper multi-button for track 6 (pedal 6).

Once in modes 2 to 7 you will need to be able to arm other tracks. When you are for instance in Mode 2 and press pedal 3, it should arm track 3 and change to "Mode 4".

I can imagine it is a little overwhelming.
Some tutorials that I recommend:
1. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MlJk4Qj9Y9U
2. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VOddX46Vtaw
3. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_gtgD9eExTo
4. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iYApczPkvm0
5. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SSfaVfDqt7M

After watching and trying out those tutorials, things will make more sense. I know it did for me! ;-)

I also prepared a script for three foot pedals (which I haven't tested with a looper yet), just so you can have a look around.

Good luck!

upload files:

foot_pedal_nektar_3_pedals.json

Control Surface Studio User

smunday - Tue, 02/22/2022 - 09:37

I had a breakthrough! I'd followed everything you said, modified the settings you posted to match my controller, still nothing. After much frustration and going through all the tutorials, I went back to absolute basics: One foot switch to just press play! Still nothing. You can imagine I'm getting pretty exhausted by now. I'm using Live 11 Intro.

So I decided to go back to a previous version (Live 10 Lite), and see if I had the same problem. Bang. First go, everything working fine.

It appears to me that something is wrong with Live 11 Intro? Can anyone shed some light on this?

Cheers!

Control Surface Studio User

smunday - Tue, 02/22/2022 - 19:52

UPDATE: Reinstalled Live 11 and all is working normally! Just need to get my head around the modes now. I tried those mappings you suggested but can't trigger the looper multi button.

Control Surface Studio User

Wim - Wed, 02/23/2022 - 07:59

Hi smunday,
Glad Live 11 is working as it should again.
You are right, I also can't get the multi-button to work..
I do think it is parameter 1 that should be triggered, but for now, I only get it to clear the looper, which is not what we are after.
Let me dive a little deeper into it.
Till soon!

Control Surface Studio User

Wim - Wed, 02/23/2022 - 17:43

Hello again,
I did get it working but there are some flaws..
First Ableton has to be in Play mode.
And then also: the multi-button doesn't work the same way via Midi Remote Scripting as it does in Ableton using mouse clicks..
The looper has 4 states, which means you would need 4 buttons to be able to use all of them.
The numbers for the states are:
0 = Stop
1 = Record
2 = Play
3 = Overdub
By using the adjacent numbers you can use 2 states in one button. So you can have "Stop/Record" on 1 button or "Record/Play" or "Play/Overdub"

In short, it is not perfect, alternatively you could also use a dummy clip and have the envelope of the looper state in it but that creates similar and other problems.

Anyway, in the screenshot hereunder you can see the settings for controlling looper's Record and Play in one button.
https://remotify.io/sites/default/files/community-forum-uploads/Capture0...

I really hope this already helps to some extent.
To be continued..

upload files:

Capture015.png

Control Surface Studio User

smunday - Wed, 02/23/2022 - 21:10

Thanks once again!

Yes I have seen that the Multi button has been an issue. Another configuration I thought about was having the bottom 6 pedals to simply select the track, and then use the top buttons as looper control for each track, using mode. So instead of using the multi button, assigning a button in the top row to control each parameter.

Is it also possible to just midi map directly in Ableton, and utilise LED feedback for the state changes? Because midi mapping the multi button at this point just seems more user friendly. If only I could select the track first before triggering the multi button....hmmmmm

Thanks again for the help, much appreciated! Learning every day.

Control Surface Studio User

Wim - Thu, 02/24/2022 - 18:58

Hi smunday,

Yes, having 4 dedicated pedals for each state is fairly easy to program. Although it has its pros and cons; you can very easily switch to any state! But you'll have to train more muscle memory in order to make no mistakes while performing live.

Your second solution is partially possible; you could exclude some inputs from your 'Controller Template' and use those for midi mapping but you won't be able to get feedback on those inputs via CSS because they will not be included in your script. You could use the LED feedback of the inputs that are included in your 'Controller Template'.

But I came up with something better!! A script that will let you loop through the 4 states of the looper's Transport Button :-)
Bear in mind though that Live has to be in Play modus in order for the looper's Transport Button to work..
I am not sure whether it is an Ableton API or CSS thing.

Anyway, you can try it out with the script hereunder. By default the script has the same state flow as the looper device, you can change that in the script if you want to. ;-)
EDIT: good to know: the script loops through the states with each press of the button.

upload files:

looper_multi-purpose_track_button_v3.json

Control Surface Studio User

smunday - Sat, 02/26/2022 - 21:01

#10

Ok, so I've tried incorporating that into the script, but I just can't seem to get the looper state to be triggered. Track selection is working fine, but nothing happens on the looper device with additional presses. I tried a similar thing with modes as per your suggestion, the modes were switching fine, but the looper was not triggering.....

Control Surface Studio User

Wim - Sun, 02/27/2022 - 15:40

#11

Hi smunday,

I copied the code to another controller and existing script, to test it out.
I changed some things so it should work now. Also the play button is now being triggered from the script, so that is one annoying thing less ;-)
A few things to double-check:

If your script already uses 'm1' then put another modifier (one which is not in use) in "Set start state to 'm1'". Also change the 'm1' modifier to that new free modifier in "Looper: Multi-Purpose Track Button v5"
In "Looper: Multi-Purpose Track Button v5" Button 1 is the trigger, if you want to change it to another button on your controller, you will have to change it in the 'Listener' and in 'Action Block 2'.

Hope this one helps you out!

upload files:

looper_multi-purpose_track_button_v5.json

Pro User

auralincarnation - Sun, 03/13/2022 - 13:17

#12

ok I think this might be a problem with having blinders on thinking that the solution is only one way… Here's a different solution that should work to help you with this because I was just using this kind of thing... If you use the web app designed by studio links to use a web interface to program your pacer you can make it so that a pedal press can have different media messages in sequence for each press… There by you can set up a single cc to arm the track and then another cc message to start the truck to record weather that through the loop or or just directly into the session view.

web addy for pacer programer... (use chrome ! firefox)
https://studiocode.dev/pacer-editor/#/

this should give a simpler solution to your issue

Control Surface Studio User

Wim - Sun, 03/13/2022 - 14:24

#13

Hello auralincarnation,
So cool! Thank you very much for your contribution!!
Sure thing there are always different ways to get to a solution, luckily so. We all work with the (limited) knowledge we have. ;-)
Your solution is very neat indeed!! I love it!
Thanks again

Track selection/looper

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