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  • Speed control for humanizing?

    Hello everybody

    Setting up a new template I can't figure out how to do this: I'd like to have an increasing amount of humanizing with increasing playing speed. Usually, the faster an instrument is playing the more blurred the intonation tends to get. I'd like to mimick this with my humanize settings.

    Let's take legato as an example. It's easy to fill one cell in VI Pro with perf legato, and another one with fast legato. Now you can just as easily set speed as controller to switch between these two cells. When playing fast, fast legato is chosen automatically. However, now I'd want to set a bigger humanize setting for the fast legato cell. Playing fast would then not only change the articulation to fast legato, but also increase the variety in tuning.

    The humanize scaler in the performance tab doesn't help, as it works globally for all cells. So it sets the humanizing amount for the normal legato as well as for the fast legato. Is there another way to achieve it? I really hope so, because for me this would be the intuitive way to set it up.


  • Hello Dominique, 

    You can create an own set of Humanize Settings or use already existing more extreme variations for the faster articulations. 

    This way the articulation on the slow end of Speed Control would get "normal" humanizing, and the faster you get, the more extreme the variation. 

    Personally, I´d still record the movements for Humanizing with automation....

    Best, 

    Paul


    Paul Kopf Product Manager VSL
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    @Dominique said:

    Usually, the faster an instrument is playing the more blurred the intonation tends to get. I'd like to mimick this with my humanize settings.

    ... works globally for all cells. So it sets the humanizing amount for the normal legato as well as for the fast legato...

    I don't know what's going there with you. The built-in setting has been the same every time? I am setting humanize intonation for individual cells with no problem, though.


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    @civilization 3 said:

    I don't know what's going there with you. The built-in setting has been the same every time? I am setting humanize intonation for individual cells with no problem, though.

    It's the same for me, but I didn't find out how to set the amount of humanizing for individual cells.

    Thank you Paul. I guess that's the way to do it, then.


  • I think Paul is stating a preference for a keyswitch over speed control to obtain humanized cells. But all you have to do is click on a cell and go to the humanize settings and select a particular preset, or create and save your own and now that belongs to that cell in your matrix.


  • Wondering if that'd be clear. To explain, 1) set up a row of patches for a single matrix, select speed as the switch parameter; 2) select patch 1 (all left in row), select the first slot (upper left slot) in advanced (because, oddly*, the humanize settings are locked to the particular slot); 3) performance tab, humanize, for each iteration of the humanize, turn the delay to a lower ms; 4) select patch 2 (and up) and do same, but increase the milliseconds. Voila.

    Anyway, I also thought about this, and do think there is something to be said for greater speed should result in worse tuning and perhaps timing. Would it be possible (i.e. implementable) to have the speed parameter which is available anyway, to work as a midi controller; one could then assign the speed in the same way to the humanize parameters as one could to the horizontal / vertical matrix switcher?

    Best,

    Michiel

    * oddly, because if you want to adjust dozens of patches, it doesn't always select the first and only slot in the patch, so I've ended up adjusting humanize presets for dozens of empty slots in cells before! (hint: can the first slot be automatically selected while editing?)


  • Thanks Michiel, it's quite clear. As much as I gathered that's what Paul suggested doing, and so far it seems to be the only option. But as you say, a speed parameter for humanization would be a great feature, at least in my eyes.


  • What mspape is saying is not clear to me.

    "oddly, the humanize settings are locked to the particular slot)" I don't understand this. It's odd? What would you have it do? "it doesn't always select the first and only slot in the patch"...

    Do you mean a cell in a matrix?  A patch is an articulation, which you put in a cell. A slot is something else, a cell fills a slot vis a vis other cells in the slot fader area. 'only slot in the patch', doesn't make sense. There is nothing to go to or come back from. It might be that this is odd out of your confusion. If you meet the terms for a switch of cells, it happens, it isn't broken. Now, sometimes the network or just the computer isn't quite responsive and a switch is missed, but this 'doesn't always select'... is not a real problem in itself.

    & then the 'can it be automatically selected?'

    Through the fact of 'it' being the first cell, it is a default, I guess you mean... Well, there are two ways of making, for instance, keyswitches: 1) is not latched, which means you have to hold that key down throughout the time you want that articulation, or it reverts (at note off) to a default. VSL is using latched. I think it has been determined that's what the end user prefers; in my assessment it's simpler.

    I don't know how involved a default speed to revert to per that paradigm is for a sample player, but it seems like a lot and I'm kind of not seeing any demand.

    If you want speed to bring more variance or error in intonation, it's quite simple. You go to the cell that's going to be triggered by a faster speed and put a humanize preset in it. You set the speed that selects that cell, you go to a next note in a measured amount of time that exceeds that and the cell is triggered, and there is your particular humanize setting if you have made one for that cell.

    Now, it may seem tricky in your expectations of 'speed control', but it works through calculations at Beats Per Minute. If your first slot is triggered by 'less than 40 BPM', this has to be the relationship from a note on to the next note on. I don't find it very useful myself, tbh. If, in fact, your change of speed is detectable this way, you have the humanize settings 'locked' to the cell and a way of working.

    There is no midi trigger to the humanize preset itself. That would be a different design and I don't think it is feasible to expect a rewrite. "the speed parameter ... to work as a midi controller", well speed is_not a midi controller. This is a design of this software; this, 'speed control', may be scripted into other interfaces as well, but speed is not part of the midi protocol. You already have what I think is possible; speed does work, you exceed the difference in terms of BPM from note on to note on and the new cell happens and it has the humanized intonations. :shrug:


  • civilization 3 a slot is actually a 'subgroup' of a cell, some kind of cells in the cell. Each cell has 8 slots (1a to 4b). So 'only slot in the patch' does make sense, eventhough the word patch should be replaced by 'cell'.

    These schoolmasterly discussion about terms put aside, I think we got it that you don't think that the idea is useful for you. That doesn't mean it won't be useful for others. Paul described how it can be achieved with the current VI Pro, and that's a good solution for now. This method needs some work to set it up  though (you have to define individual humanization settings for each cell that's responsive to speed). And I still think it would be a nice feature to have a global setting for faster speed=more blurred intonation, because that's the way it works in real orchestras.


  • Agreed with Dominique. I consistently use matrix, patch/cell and slot to not confuse these things. Anyway, when I write "speed control as a midi parameter", I know quite well it is not - I have done quite a lot of C programming and am aware it is not. To integrate it as in the way described here could of course be very difficult (since, as civ3 says, it's not a real midi controller), or reasonably easy (since, as I noted, VI already keeps track of speed and quantifies this as a parameter), and the demand could be big or small; I do not have access to the source code of VIP, nor to the marketing data of VSL, so these questions are best answered by people who do.

    In any case, the method as described by Paul (and myself) is useful, unless you, like me, already use different parameterizations for the current matrix in use (i use arco vs pizz for that now) and the XY axes within matrices and don't like spending many hours readjusting the carefully made personal presets. Likewise, some people (like me) make use of humanization presets, even though, strictly speaking, this could presumably also be achieved from within the preferred DAW. If it's not a ton of work, and there are at least 2 persons in favour, the requested feature would be greatly appreciated, but could safely be ignored by puritans.

    Cheers,

    Michiel