Controlling and slaving Drambo with Octatrack
I though this forum could be a good place for a thread on combining Octatrack & Drambo! After all, I think it's no secret where the main inspiration for the Drambo sequencer comes from.
From tests so far, Drambo hosted in AB3 syncs very well to the OT, great news! I doubt hosting in AUM3 would have as good sync.
I'm sure I won't be the only OT + Drambo user who wants to map the Scene switches on the OT to the Morph/Scene pads in Drambo, but this needs a midi remapping solution as Drambo requires separate CCs or notes to select each of the 16 variations. AFAIK, this is what's needed:
A script to remap CCs 55 and 56 values 0-15 to the same set of 16 notes, but also allow CCs 55 and 56 thru to switch between the 2 scene select buttons in Drambo.
Mozaic and StreamByter are available as plugins in AB3. I’ve never had a programming lesson and was very slow with my attempts with both! Midifire is straightforward, but unfortunately not available as a plugin in AB3. Is anyone up for scripting this in Mozaic or Streambyter? If not, I'll have to get my head down. (I bought Mozaic for remapping OT scene switches to a Nord G2, but then built an efficient patch in the G2 excluding the need for the iPad between the OT and G2.)
OT & Drambo = radical possibilities.... hope others diving in to this combo will chime in.
Comments
I dont owe Octatrack but Im listening to you :)
I just tried again: With scene select activated in Drambo, then turn on midi mapping, Send Scene select A from OT to Morph Variation A on Dram - pad A maps to CC55, do the same thing again for Variation Pad B on Dram, Pad A midi deactivated and CC55 moved to Morph Pad B on Drambo. So no cigar.
A way to map/ or remap specific CC values from same CC number to select different pads would be the solution! Or perhaps mapping of CC values to notes? 😀
Thanks @invisible man but I want the 16 variations in Drambo to switch in sync with all 16 (x2) of the scene select buttons on the OT. I can't see this can be done other than with remapping of CC values to notes. The midi the OT spits out (see above) cannot be reconfigured.
OT scene selection works like this: you press Scene Select A and 1 of 16 steps to select the variation for Scene A; CC55 and value 0-15 are transmitted. Scene B transmits CC56 and values 0-15 depending which of the 16 scenes / variations is selected.
I've mapped cc55 to Morph select switch A on Drambo and cc56 to the second. In toggle mode, I can select the Morph Select buttons 1 and 2 and toggle them on or off when selecting Scene Select 0-15 on the OT.
I've tried all the incremental measure options to see if they work to select Morph pads A to P to either the Left or Right slot with values 0-15 from CC55 and CC56 - no cigar. Have you got a single cc number to select pads A to P with values 0-15? I don't see this is possible! The
Thanks. Phew, I was beginning to think I'd lost it! The 16 scene select buttons on the OT do not send out separate CC numbers or notes when in Scene Select mode: they only send values 0-15 of CC55 or CC56, so as I thought, a remapping solution is required.
Yes you can, but I don't want to slave the OT to Drambo, if that's what your getting to!
I understand he's trying to use both... not OT as dedicated D controller... turning off local control would defeat the purpose.
You can create a simple mozaik script to handle it. It could be saved inside the host with the session.
No, they send triggers.
Thanks for chiming in @rec That's what I said in my first post in this thread with the caveat that it'll take me quite a time to get my head around!
Sorry, I haven't read the full OP. Now that's done... I'm happy to cook up something in mozaic... but first I need to do some real cooking... will post the script here once ready, unless someone else helps you out in the meantime :)
@sec My man, that would be so good of you! If MidiFire would be available in AB3 - I'd manage very quick, but Mozaic is way more convoluted for my non-programmer brain!
Hey Tom_LJ, can you not load midifire as an AU3 effect in AB? I don’t have midifire, just curious why it doesn’t work.
Oh, it’s a host, not a plug-in. Derp.
Can this be done in Streambyter maybe? Curious because it’s free. :-)
So, here's my take on this...
It's not fully customisable, but gives you enough room to fit it with the rest of midi mappings.
You can set output channel and cc offset (default is 100 on ch1). The two knobs at the bottom are dummies only to display values for the top ones. You can map everything without OT from Mozaic.
Offset 100 means scene A-P send out cc100-115. Hold SHIFT to map left/right scene selectors. (cc116, 117)
By default D assigns left/right selectors as toggles which doesn't sit well with OT scene switching so change that to momentary.
I opted for CCs instead of notes - so notes can still be played if needed. Also cc55 and cc56 are remapped as well - instead of passed through - to avoid collision when offset set to certain values, if needed for some other reason just set offset to 39, that'll give you cc55-56 for scene selectors.
From what giku hinted earlier on AB forum all this will likely be doable inside D once internal midi loopback is enabled.
Sure, if you have some time and patience to get used to how Streambyter works:
https://audeonic.boards.net/board/10/stream-byter
Haha, just spent the $8 to use @rec’s file. Works great! So far I have been using track 8 to map chromatic notes for pattern changes and using “instant pattern change” in Drambo. Has anyone figured out how to just make Drambo follow OT’s pattern changes like slaving any other Elektron device to the OT would work?
The only way to do that would be by pc messages... D only supports note and cc at the moment.
Though it can be included in this script...
@rec Thank you so much 👍️ Will dive in later in the day. This opens so many possibilities.
@mas_akala
I clearly need to get my head around Mozaic scripting.
@mas_akala Also look at this thread https://forum.beepstreet.com/discussion/466/is-midi-program-change-planned#latest
We're lucky that not only is @giku a genius developer, but he also listens and responds to users' feedback, ideas and needs.
Oops, noticed something that I missed... will post an update later.
So using the mozaic script I ended up needing a second midi channel In AB3 to use the cross fader cc48 and other assignable pots from the OT. Is that how others set this up? I assume the mozaic script is filtering out the non-addressed commands?
edit: turned Ss to Zs.
Yes, it makes sense to pass everything else through. I had AUM in mind where routing is more flexible.
-so far there is a mistake I made - midi message not specified, so f.e. note 55, 56 would trigger Mozaic too :D - needs fixing
-midi pass through for the rest of the messages
-recalling saved sessions with Mozaic properly when settings are different from default
If there is anything else... let me know!
Sure, can do but I don't have an account there yet... if someone can upload it feel free once it's confirmed working ok.
Now the things mentioned above should be included/fixed.
Let me know how it works or if there are any specific wishes.
Edit: Note - cc numbers that are used to control D (18 ccs starting from offset) are filtered out as well as cc55 and cc56, so set offset according to the rest of your OT controlling needs.
@rec Looks like I won't have the time to properly test this evening - work and other chores going on. Of course I'll be happy to post it on Patchstorage if some else doesn't before me. Thanks so much again!
@rec I tried your Mozaic patch last night (as plug in AB3). Left and Right Morph/Scene selectors/switches and crossfader mapped to Channel 1 CCs 55, 56, 48 as they should. But the only pad I got one Scene/Morph pad to map - to CC116. When I tried to map any others, they took over CC116. I tried the shift and pad select on Mozaic with Dram in , but got the same thing. Am i overlooking a set-up procedure in Mozaic? Thanks!
Last night I tried hosting Drambo in AUM (with AUM clocked to external midi via AB3) and the timing was all over the place - unusable). AB3 is clearly THE host for slaving apps to external midi.
Not sure what's going on there... just checked and it seems to be working as intended...
with default settings (offset=100, ch=1)
you map sceneA - cc100, sceneB - cc101 ... sceneP - cc115, left scene - cc116, right scene - cc117 (change last two to momentary). Once these mapped in D select cross fader and move fader on OT - cc48 assigned (latest version passes through any unused ccs).
I've been digging into Drambo a lot recently. Version 2 is ace. Again the question of controlling scenes with the OT arises, thus I'm resurrecting this thread.
Is it now possible to have a track in Drambo for controlling xfader and scene switches? I had a go using modulation into a Midi send module routed to Drambo (monitor confirmed modulation sent on CH1 CC12), set the xfader to receive on the same, but no movement. What I want to do is load Stream Byter into a Midi processor module to cut out the need for setting up Audiobus to host Stream Byter between the Midi in and Drambo. Is this possible? Thanks!
I believe you sent that to the Drambo virtual output port (you can see it in the AUM routing matrix), which is not connected to the Drambo virtual input port. You need an external app to route that output back to the Drambo virtual input port. You could do that with AUM. Or you can run a stand-alone app like StreamByter or FreEWI which links its own virtual in and out ports. So, you'd send Drambo output to FreEWI, and take Drambo input from FreEWI (or the same with StreamByter).
The problem is that Drambo does not have an internal MIDI Control destination like AUM, so only external MIDI sources can reach Drambo's controls.