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Midi CC to Different Plug ins


Rodney
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Hello,

 

I have recently bought a Korg nanoKontrol 2 to manually control different plugins in Logic Pro 10.4.8. for example channel eq and stock compressors.

 

I have already set up the channel eq to respond to the different knob, sliders and buttons. I also manually set up the transport controls with no problem.

 

The problem arises when I try to assign the same knobs, sliders and buttons to another plug in for example the compressor.

 

When learning the compressor assignments, the eq assignments disappear.

 

I was under the impression that when a plug in is no longer selected then midi cc would not affect it until it is brought into view again.

 

Does anyone have any guidance on how to assign midi cc to different plug ins?

 

Kind regards

 

Rodney

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Looking over the thread that you linked to it appears that the number of mapped plugins are limited to the number of physical mode changing buttons on a midi controller.

 

Is it possible to have two buttons on a midi controller that move up and down through a list of mapped plug ins? Thus not limiting the number of plugins that could potentially be mapped.

 

Kind regards

 

Rodney

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The approach is Simon is making is one approach, that suffers from some limitations like this (eg having to select a particular mode to control a plugin).

 

While it's *possible* to select and open plugins via a controller, in practice it's not very practical. If you have a control that tells Logic to open "plugin number 23 in the list", if you install/remove plugins, that control will now open a different plugin.

 

With the Mackie Control protocol you can indeed scroll through the plugin list to choose a plugin, and then open it, but the list is unsorted and rather randomly configured (this is a long time problem) which means unless you have less than a few plugins or stick to Logic only stuff, it becomes rather useless pretty quickly.)

 

Plugin selection in Logic is not great anyway (no plugin search, limited key commands), it's best done by the GUI imo. What you describe that you'd like to do basically is not that practical, albeit probably possible with some hackery - but the complexity and downsides outweighs it's usefulness imo...

 

If you attempt it, come back and let us know how you got on.

 

(This is at least more comfortable using the iPad Logic Remote app...)

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Hi Des99,

 

Thank you for the foresight. With that in mind, I think I will attempt to reassign some of the additional transport controls such as Cycle, Track and Marker selection buttons to bank or modifier buttons.

 

Along with the eight solo buttons as the main means of mode selection I could put the into some sort of category. ‘Solo’ buttons for EQs, ‘Track + Solo’ for Compressors, ‘Track - Solo’ for Reverbs etc.

 

By using the additional transport controls as modifiers then I could get up to 56 controller patches for plugins.

 

I am not going to rush into this as the schemata might change and once I have started, I really don’t want to go back to the beginning again.

 

Kind regards

 

Rodney

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Hi Des99

 

I am getting to grips with how the full set up is going to work, however there is one extra thing that I would like to know before I get started.

 

The value input message for example B9 50 7F is what I am trying to decipher. Especially the last two digits which appear to vary.

 

B9 is channel ten

50 is midi cc info

7F ? I don’t know

 

This also varies between three different values 7F, 00 and Lo7.

 

I am assuming that

7F is on

00 is off

Lo7 low bit info? as opposed to Hi7

 

Would you be able to clarify this for me as I will probably type these values in relation to the controller?

 

I think that knowing the difference between 00, 7F and Lo7 will help me to remove any bugs that may appear.

 

Kind regards

 

Rodney

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The value input message for example B9 50 7F is what I am trying to decipher. Especially the last two digits which appear to vary.

 

B9 is channel ten

50 is midi cc info

7F ? I don’t know

 

B9 50 7F is a MIDI Controller message on channel 10 (first status byte is Bn, where n is the MIDI channel).

50 is the first data bytes - for a controller message, that's the CC number (eg "1" is modulation, "7" is volume). 7 bit value, so can be 0 to 127)

7F is the second data byte, which is the value of the CC 50 message - again, a 7-bit value, so from 0-127.

 

So you have a CC50 message on MIDI channel 10 with a value of 127.

 

This also varies between three different values 7F, 00 and Lo7.

I am assuming that

7F is on

00 is off

Lo7 low bit info? as opposed to Hi7

 

The received message is what Logic is looking for. If you have B9 50 7F in the received message, Logic will *only* match that entire message (ie only CC50 messages on channel 10 with a value of 127).

 

If you replace the 7F for "Lo7", it's a kind of wildcard, so now Logic matches CC50 on channel ten *for any data value* - ie it will match all CC50 messages with a value of 0 to 127. "Lo7" indicates the 7-bit data value, but there are other values too - Lo7 is what you'd mostly use as most MIDI messages have 7-bit values.

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Hi Des99,

 

After a few more days of midi mapping plug-ins, I have found that when mapping on/off buttons, Lo7 is the way to go. If a parameter in the plug-in is an on state, Lo7 gets an instant reaction.

Whereas, if a button is assigned 00 (0), or 7F (127) it has a chance of temporarily being mismatched to the plugin parameter. For example if a plug-in filter is on, and I want to turn it off a values of 7F (127) will give a redundant message.

 

Lo7 appears to be working the best with toggle on/off parameters with no redundant state switching.

 

Regards

 

Rodney

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There is no one-size fits all. It really depends on the application. Sometimes you want to match a specific value, sometimes you want to capture the whole range, and so on.

 

For example, sometimes you want a toggle button, which will usually send alternately a value of 0 and 127. Sometimes you only want to match an on state (eg, to change modes while you hold down a button (127/on) and then change modes back when you release a button (0/off). Or you want to know when a button is pressed (127/on) but don't care about it sending a value of 0/off when it's released, so you only want the 127 message to match an assignment.

 

The key is understand what the options are, so you can choose the appropriate settings for your application.

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Brilliant! This is the kind of stuff I really want to get to grips with.

 

I will have to read a bit more of the Logic Pro X manual now that I have gained a bit more insight into these functions.

 

Do you know of any online classes that teach these types of midi functions? Preferably video.

 

Kind regards

 

Rodney

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I don't, but then I'm not the kind of person who would be looking for that kind of content, as I had to figure it out myself long before there was YouTube etc.

 

If anything, I'm the kind of person who would be *making* that kind of content - for the ten or so people that would be interested in it! ;)

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Hi Des99,

 

I am looking at my navigation scheme now and I am able to create modes (pages) and move up and down the modes with two controller buttons. This has been somewhat of a revelation.

 

However...

 

Now that I can scroll between modes easily, I am trying to find out how to scroll between Zones.

 

Perhaps my thinking is off but this is my general view of how I want to set up my controller

 

If I treat Zones as if they are chapters in a book for example Editors, Faders, Synths, Midi FX, Channel Strips, EQ, Compressors etc

 

And the Modes of each Zone (the pages of these chapters) for example (Zone) Editor (Modes) Audio Editor, Piano Roll, Step Editor, Score Editor etc

 

Then I could navigation my whole system with four buttons. Two for Zones, Up and Down and two for Modes, Up and Down. This would make navigation extremely quick and efficient.

 

I have managed to set the Up and Down buttons to navigated the Modes. What I am struggling with is how to use the Controller to navigate the Zones. Is this possible?

 

Kind regards

 

Rodney

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I think I understand....

 

So I could assign four buttons to no mode (modeless) under the Zone of my controller (nanoKontrol2).

 

Of those four buttons two could be assigned to moving one mode at a time up and down at a time. The other two buttons would change modes with a greater value of 9.00 to move ten modes at a time.

 

Regards

 

Rodney

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I'm not sure offhand if you can increment/decrement modes etc depending on the value, it's not something I know offhand without trying. From memory a Mode change command has a specific mode you choose in the menu, I don't think you can say "Choose a Mode that's ten options on from the current mode in the menu."

 

All part of the fun of developing your own solutions... sometimes it works out, occasionally you go up a few blind alleys and have to try a different approach... :)

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