Dear Mark,
after having completed a first BCR2000 preset that I hope to post in the near future on your website (for the micro chiptune synth "YM2149") after some necessary tweaking, I designed a preset for the Akai AX73 synth (with Tauntek mod, which allows to pilot the synth with CC messages) which I now want to program with BC Manager. Of course when ready I'll post it here.
But already I stumble on a first problem : I'd need some encoders to send values which would "jump" / "skip" through a fixed "step"while incrementing or decrementing. I could elaborate, but in short, the Akai AX73 can't handle a flow of successive CC values 0-1-2-3-4-etc. whereas only a few of them are "meaningful". The perfect way to accomplish what is needed, following the"useful" values defined here (CC mapping to the synth parameters, by Tauntek), would be to add a "step" or (inc/dec jump/skip value) knob on the "Standard Output" tab when the Mode is set to Increment/Decrement, much like the knob provided on the Standard Output tab of the Buttons window.
I have the feeling the BCR could handle this, am I right ? And... Do you think you could implement this welcome addition to the already powerful BC manager, or point to another solution to accomplish this ?
With many thanks,
all the best from France
Sylvain
Hi Sylvain,
First of all my apologies for my extremely late reply, but I've been ill (flu).
As far as I know, the BCF and BCR don't have such an option.
All I can think of is setting Resolutions (on the General tab in BC Manager) to a big value: an encoder has 96 physical positions, so if Resolutions is set to a multiple of 96, each successive position skips the corresponding number of values.
So for instance if Resolutions is 384 (=4*96), the BCF/R should output 0, 4, 8, 12 etc.
But unfortunately in practice this doesn't work correctly: for some reason the BCF/R sometimes outputs 0, 3, 7, 11 instead (particularly after reversing direction?), though I haven't been able to pinpoint the actual mechanism yet.
So I can't see how it can be done.
Unless there is an undiscovered method similar to the one that user "burningreggae" discovered for Program Change on buttons, cf. Allow Program Change Increment on Buttons.
Mark.
Dear Mark, many thanks for your reply, I hope you are now in better shape !
I must say that, in the meantime, I tried to think about what I could do if the behaviour I was hoping for wasn't possible, and I also imagined that, maybe, the resolution parameter could be a valid parry. I am happy you seem to confirm this !
About the un-trusty or slightly dodgy behaviour of the BCR2000 and the sometimes unexpected values sent that you described (=with a variation of +/-1) :
Rob Grieg (the author of the Tauntek firmware for the AX73), in his great wisdom, has rightfully devised ranges of values for the parameters which originally accept only two, three, four or five values. For example :
So, I would guess at first sight that such "somewhat imprecise" values sent by the BCR2000 wouldn't be a problem at all, provided they fall into the right range. Therefore, I am looking forward to try and complete my template using the resolultion parameter calculated with this formula then : Resolution = “STEP” x 96 . Am I right ?
I will absolutely try this and report back !
I still have to determine if :
- I should just specify my calculated resolution, and the full range (value1 and value2 being 0 and 127 respectively) or, taking the "LFO Wafeform" parameter as an example (with a step value of 25 = a resolution of 2400), determine a smaller range (between 20 and 110) for the sent values to fall unmistakably in the required range.
- I wonder also if I should specify a "default value" (in the middle of one of the ranges). But I seem to understand that defying a default value would then send this value when selecting the BCR patch, right ? So, if I want to use the BCR to MODIFY an existing sound (and not start from scratch), I'd better NOT specify default values, right ?
(But defying such default values would prove useful to initiate a "INIT PATCH", am I right ?)
Last question : In which mode should I set the encoders : Absolute ? Relative ? Increment ? My aim is to modify whatever is sent by the synth :
The Tauntak upgrade is designed so that ONLY when pressing "EDIT" on the synth, it "opens" the connection beetwen the receveid CCs and the internal synth parameters. So, after selecting a sound I'd wish to modify and having pressed "EDIT" on the synth, which MODE setting would allow to modify the corresponding parameters without hearing a "jump" in value ?
MANY MANY thanks for your replies to this much too long message,
All the best, Sylvain