Trackers / tracking

  On 1/20/2017 at 12:26 PM, mcbpete said:

 

  On 1/20/2017 at 11:12 AM, modey said:

rudimentary wave editor in trackers like FT2, where you could not only do the basic cut/copy/paste and set loop points etc, but you could also clip the fuck out of samples

There used to be a button marked 'Conv.' - No idea what it was *meant* to do (convert to/from something or other maybe?) but it'd do some crazy saturation to the sample - Like invert the sample or something so the zero crossings were at maximum peak, and the peaks turn to zero crossings. Used that button a lot back in the day !

 

 

If I remember correctly it converted the waveform from signed to unsigned and vice versa. The feature was probably because FT2 can load "raw" sample data that didn't have headers telling the bit depth and signedness.

 

For example if you have 8-bit unsigned values the value range is from 0..255 and if it's signed the range is -128..127. The conversion goes like: 255 = -1, 254 = -2, 253 = -3, etc..

 

So if you do it when it's not needed it adds a really heavy distortion.

are there any trackers that can do multiple time signatures in the same pattern view?

 

here's a mockup (also diff beat divisions shown)

 

 

i dunno like literally just looping those patterns in parallel with three diff progress bars, i'd like to mess with that and improvise over it - I'll prob have to make my own sequencer or something

Edited January 20, 2017 by Ragnar

  On 1/20/2017 at 6:23 PM, Ragnar said:

are there any trackers that can do multiple time signatures in the same pattern view?

 

here's a mockup (also diff beat divisions shown)

 

 

i dunno like literally just looping those patterns in parallel with three diff progress bars, i'd like to mess with that and improvise over it - I'll prob have to make my own sequencer or something

 

In Renoise you can have multiple time signatures played in parallel if you use phrase editor, but it's not in the same view.

I'm not 100% sure but Radium might be able to, you certainly can do fancy stuff in it anyway ...

 

http://users.notam02.no/~kjetism/radium/index.php

 

Well, doesn't that Radium thing look like the dog's bollocks. Python and Scheme extensions, microtonality.. Need to check that out.

  On 1/20/2017 at 7:12 PM, mcbpete said:

I'm not 100% sure but Radium might be able to, you certainly can do fancy stuff in it anyway ...

 

http://users.notam02.no/~kjetism/radium/index.php

 

 

thanx i forgot about Radium

I know this was asked a ways back but...swinging was done using alternating speed settings (which are somewhat antithetical to BPM) so.. speed 6 was true BPM (in FT2 anyway) and you put alternating speed settings in the effects column (F04,F06,F04,F06,F04,F06...ETC). You could get some weird sounding time sigs doing other things (three or more speed settings, different orders, mathematical equations, whatever). I learned a lot of tricks like that by visiting BBSs and FTP sites (AMINET!!) back in the day. Hope I didn't age myself too much here. Carry on.

  On 1/20/2017 at 7:02 PM, mokz said:

In Renoise you can have multiple time signatures played in parallel if you use phrase editor, but it's not in the same view.

If you don't necessarilly need to see individual hits and work with loops/longer samples, you can also sync sounds to different amounts of patternlines, layer these in the same view pattern and/or phrase editor.

  On 1/20/2017 at 11:12 AM, modey said:

.. and in my opinion, the number one thing that makes trackers sound great, was turning off wave interpolation so the samples were super aliased, giving a 'glassy' tone to pitch bends with certain samples, and allowing for ultra gritty distorted kicks for hardcore.

Hell yeah. Always turned interpolation off. Glad I'm not the only one using the word "glassy". There's some digital gear that has that same quality like the TX81Z too.

 

Also, you can do all kinds of wacky fx with trackers if you got the chops and are willing to do the data entry. You can use vibrato or subtle pitch slides to do flanging and phasing, you can use looping or volume commands + bouncing notes between channels for echo, etc. 

Yea always wondered about those phased/flanged amen breaks they used to do

i've pretty much only used sunvox so far. maybe i'll get renoise at some point, but right now i feel fine just using sunvox :P

Those that use trackers, u staying true to sample based aesthetic or using vstis?

I've always thought why bother with drawing a square wave when I can use a vst

  On 1/23/2017 at 7:32 AM, bendish said:

Those that use trackers, u staying true to sample based aesthetic or using vstis?

I've always thought why bother with drawing a square wave when I can use a vst

 

Mix it up here, but eventually everything gets rendered to sample, either through Renoise plugin grabber or render to sample options. I like the flexibility of being able to hook op the instrument editors modulation / fx section to macro's for possible automation and being able to bend it using pattern commands in the pattern editor and/or phrase editor. That last one has added a whole new dimension for me as well. 

Have you tried Ableton Djeroek, and if so how do u find it in comparison to tracker?

  On 1/23/2017 at 8:48 AM, bendish said:

Have you tried Ableton Djeroek, and if so how do u find it in comparison to tracker?

 

Think I've tried a crack back in the days of one of the first versions, but couldn't get into it so can't compare. I imagine a much more freeflowing, more jamming kind of workflow in Ableton opposed to a more planned / composed approach in Renoise, though people can use tools however they want. Might be cool to try again in combination with redux, being able to use the xrni instruments, basically Renoise sample/instrument editor inside Ableton, but I don't feel like learning a new daw. I have recently installed a demo of Bitwig though out of curiosity which is a ableton'y I hear, but again learning something new takes time and dedication.. not much of a daw-hopper.  

  On 1/23/2017 at 7:32 AM, bendish said:

Those that use trackers, u staying true to sample based aesthetic or using vstis?

I've always thought why bother with drawing a square wave when I can use a vst

I use a mixture of things.

 

Renoise controls my HW synths through MIDI, then I record it back to Renoise and add some VST effects if needed.

 

I also use field recordings I've done as samples. And sometimes some VST instruments.

I use equal mix of samples and vst synths. The benefit of using samples is that you can do all of the cool precise pitch bend stuff that trackers seem to excel at. I've never been happy with drawing/playing pitch bend data in to automation lanes..

  On 1/23/2017 at 9:15 AM, Djeroek said:

 

  On 1/23/2017 at 8:48 AM, bendish said:

Have you tried Ableton Djeroek, and if so how do u find it in comparison to tracker?

Think I've tried a crack back in the days of one of the first versions, but couldn't get into it so can't compare. I imagine a much more freeflowing, more jamming kind of workflow in Ableton opposed to a more planned / composed approach in Renoise, though people can use tools however they want.

 

I'd been using trackers from '96 till about 2014 but switched to Ableton after getting stuck in a rut with my workflow. On and off it took me around a year to get up to the speed I was working at before but I think I enjoy composing this way more than back in my Fasttracker/Modplugtracker Jeskola Buzz days - Seems more immediate maybe. Envelope automation is definitely easier than with trackers that's for sure !

  On 1/23/2017 at 12:27 PM, mcbpete said:

Envelope automation is definitely easier than with trackers that's for sure !

 

haha, sadly I have the opposite experience.. at least in Reaper, most of the time I have to settle with inaccurate automation because I don't have the patience to edit each point individually.. I find it easier to type in all of my settings and then just interpolate between them :D

  On 1/23/2017 at 1:07 PM, modey said:

 

  On 1/23/2017 at 12:27 PM, mcbpete said:

Envelope automation is definitely easier than with trackers that's for sure !

 

haha, sadly I have the opposite experience.. at least in Reaper, most of the time I have to settle with inaccurate automation because I don't have the patience to edit each point individually.. I find it easier to type in all of my settings and then just interpolate between them :D

 

 

 

That's pretty much how I automate in reaper.  Points for start and end values, and point curve shape to adjust how it interpolates.

 

 

Although I usually use clip gain and crossfades rather than automation for level moves, unless I really need it to happen post-fx.  It just seems faster and more self contained.

I use Ableton for composing and Reaper for mixing down, the very slight difference in creating and editing automation points (and the keyboard modifiers for each process) tie my brain into confused knots ! Always takes about 10-15 minutes to make the transition in my mind that I've moved DAWS ...

I started using Octamed around 91/92!!!

 

Once I realised Cubase was a tracker on its side I moved over to that :) - when it became Cubase VST with the big parallel port dongle!!

 

That was a real mans copy-protection - try sticking your printer into one of them fancy usb dongles and see where it gets you......

  On 1/24/2017 at 6:30 PM, Grain Bastard said:

I started using Octamed around 91/92!!!

 

Once I realised Cubase was a tracker on its side I moved over to that :) - when it became Cubase VST with the big parallel port dongle!!

 

That was a real mans copy-protection - try sticking your printer into one of them fancy usb dongles and see where it gets you......

Yeah boi - Tried to copy my version of Cubase Score from school (on just one floppy) but didn't realised it had that cheeky parallel beast hidden in the back of the machine

 

p.s. remember this demo - This was my tracker introduction:

 

I can't remember what my first tracker was.. some time around 1993. I remember making something on Scream Tracker 3, but I moved to Fast Tracker 2 pretty early on and stayed with that for a long time. Then came Jeskola Buzz and after that I took a long break. Then when I started to make tracks again I quickly settled to Renoise.

 

I've tried to work with Ableton Live but I just don't like the interface, I particularly hate the piano roll, and all I tried to do sounded very Ableton-y. Hard to put my finger on it but at least the early versions of Ableton seemed to have this certain recognizable sound. This was years ago so might be different now.

  On 1/24/2017 at 6:35 PM, mcbpete said:

 

  On 1/24/2017 at 6:30 PM, Grain Bastard said:

I started using Octamed around 91/92!!!Once I realised Cubase was a tracker on its side I moved over to that :) - when it became Cubase VST with the big parallel port dongle!!That was a real mans copy-protection - try sticking your printer into one of them fancy usb dongles and see where it gets you......

Yeah boi - Tried to copy my version of Cubase Score from school (on just one floppy) but didn't realised it had that cheeky parallel beast hidden in the back of the machinep.s. remember this demo - This was my tracker introduction:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9fQgCLQH2ZU

Ha ha!!! Yeah. I actually bought Octamed and it came with two disks - disk 2 had samples on it. I've still got them in the loft but i lent my mate my tv-modulator so couldn't fire it up. I got a StereoMaster sampler and upgraded to Audiomaster 4 editor so i could time stretch :)

 

I absolutely hammered a couple of 303 samples from a cover disk that you could program fake filter tweaks with by offsetting the sample start. The 'silent' sample to stop clicks and stop samples was also a staple. Robbing samples from shareware demo disks was also fun....