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Old 12-12-2015, 12:19 PM   #1
delpaso
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Default Quantize MIDI note length issue (SOLVED)

Been having this problem for quite a while now, whereby whenever I try to quantize the length of notes in the piano roll, it'll either not change the length of the note at all or change it to a weird length.

Even though the checkbox is checked to allow notes to both shrink and grow, they only seem to grow. For instance, if I try to make a 1/8th note 1/16th in length, nothing will happen. However, when I set the same note to 1/4th, it'll grow fine.

It's so strange because this all used to work perfectly. Hoping someone can help, it's driving me crazy! Thanks!

Edit: Added screen grab - in this particular example, you'd expect to see all the notes changed to 1/64th, however all of the notes are still as long as they were before.
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Last edited by juliansader; 02-04-2017 at 08:15 PM.
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Old 12-12-2015, 07:41 PM   #2
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Quote:
Originally Posted by delpaso View Post
Been having this problem for quite a while now, whereby whenever I try to quantize the length of notes in the piano roll, it'll either not change the length of the note at all or change it to a weird length.

Even though the checkbox is checked to allow notes to both shrink and grow, they only seem to grow. For instance, if I try to make a 1/8th note 1/16th in length, nothing will happen. However, when I set the same note to 1/4th, it'll grow fine.

It's so strange because this all used to work perfectly. Hoping someone can help, it's driving me crazy! Thanks!

Edit: Added screen grab - in this particular example, you'd expect to see all the notes changed to 1/64th, however all of the notes are still as long as they were before.
Yeah quantizing is tricky. It's counter-intuitive.
I think if you disable snapping to previous values in the MIDI editor's grid settings up top you might have some luck.

Personally, I find quantization of note lengths almost always destroys a performance an I hate both shrinking and growing and just prefer quantizing of note start positions only (preserving the durations).

That way, if you play legato, it's recorded legato. If you play stacatto, it's recorded stacatto. That only happens if you only quantize the position and not mess with anything else. This is especially important if you combine both legato and stacatto in the same phrases.

The shrinking and growing pretty much destroy what you played. I also don't really utilize the strength functions. Either I want to play on beat or I don't. It's not really a half-assed thing to me.

As you might guess, I'm kind of annoyed with Reaper's MIDI quantizing setup. It's really confusing with all these grids and grid settings and snap settings and quantizing parameters. And then there's different input quantizing settings per track! Too much really. And I don't like the defaults and how you can't edit them and have them stick.

If you look at a DAW like EnergyXT, it's really simplified, and the input quantizing is toggled on and off globally according to the timeline's grid functioning. There's no guesswork. Likewise, MIDI recording and editing is a lot easier. I actually started doing my MIDI recording in EnergyXT and freezing those tracks to audio for importing into Reaper for audio editing.

Reaper excells at audio editing, but I think it's still bothersome for MIDI editing. It's just not efficient. Luckily it imports and exports MIDI alright.
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Old 12-13-2015, 02:55 AM   #3
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I had this yesterday.

Definitely seems like a bug.

Just couldn't get the note length to quantize as expected.
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Old 12-13-2015, 04:00 AM   #4
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Without actually trying this (I dont usually quantise anything) but running on my usual Irish minesweeper instinct, have you tried changing grid settings and/or turning snap to grid off?

Apologies if it isnt related, but it is at least one area to try if you havent already.
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Old 12-13-2015, 07:05 AM   #5
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Yeah, Note lengths quantization seems buggy, i can't make the notes to shrink. Neither in Manual or Grid mode, neither with snap off or on. It was a sloppy testing, later I plan to make a licecap.
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Last edited by Pasajeromoronmoreno; 12-15-2015 at 07:31 PM.
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Old 12-15-2015, 07:31 PM   #6
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Here. (I had to use Imgur, the stash is down for uploads since morning).

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Old 11-17-2016, 06:51 AM   #7
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This is still an issue in 5.29pre4:

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Old 11-19-2016, 01:12 AM   #8
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others than "Grow",
the Quantize option "Shrink"/... Note length | initial/source length events | do not really work!

inclusive within newer 5.29pre x versions. Confirmed!

This seems to be an older bug(tested and confirmed also with 5.23 & 5.28)
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Last edited by ELP; 11-19-2016 at 01:26 AM.
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Old 02-04-2017, 06:24 PM   #9
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Fixed in v5.32 (or earlier)!

EDIT: Actually, "Solved" is more appropriate.

Last edited by juliansader; 02-04-2017 at 08:14 PM.
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Old 02-04-2017, 07:59 PM   #10
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I just had it pointed out to me, in another thread, that we might be looking at the "Length" parameter incorrectly here. It's not for setting the length of all the notes to 1/8, it's for rounding their lengths to the NEAREST 1/8. That is, a note 11/16 long would be quantized to either 10/16 (5/8) or 12/16 (6/8).

Now, having said that, I could swear I remember this tool behaving the other way at some point in the past - setting "Length" to 1/64 would make all the notes 1/64. Maybe I'm imagining it, like all those people who insist that they remember Mandela dying in prison even though he never did.

Edit: I was right; it used to do this (.gif is from 5.0pre1, end of 2014):

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Old 02-05-2017, 03:28 AM   #11
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The way it works now is a lot more logical, IMHO. Perhaps "length" should be renamed to "Round to" (easy enough with a langpack), but it makes sense to round to nearest of the selected note length. Otherwise if you need shortening all notes to a particular value, just select them all and use Event Properties to set them to the same length...

Last edited by EvilDragon; 02-05-2017 at 03:34 AM.
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Old 02-05-2017, 09:31 AM   #12
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There's a separate option for Note End though. To me, that one would make sense with the current behavior, and Note Length should have the old one. Slightly different wording would be helpful too.
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Old 06-27-2017, 11:31 PM   #13
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Lokasenna View Post
There's a separate option for Note End though. To me, that one would make sense with the current behavior, and Note Length should have the old one. Slightly different wording would be helpful too.
Yeah. If this truly is the intended behaviour of 'Note Length,' there's no reason for 'Note End,' so this must be an oversight or mix-up.

I really miss the feature. It was a key part of my workflow, and I've wasted a lot of time trying to figure out what I'd changed that stopped it working.

(I've since found the 'set note lengths to grid size' action, so I can get the intended effect even quicker, but old habits are hard to break, and I still get caught out by this.)

I don't think this counts as a solved issue: we've got a list of five options, and two of them serve no purpose.
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Old 05-12-2020, 08:31 PM   #14
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I agree that quantise note length should be setting the note length to that value rather than rounding to the nearest. That is indeed what note end quantise should be for. Please address this one, it is still not possible in v6.10 to set it via quantise.
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Old 07-20-2020, 07:21 AM   #15
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Originally Posted by bcslaam View Post
I agree that quantise note length should be setting the note length to that value rather than rounding to the nearest. That is indeed what note end quantise should be for. Please address this one, it is still not possible in v6.10 to set it via quantise.
Agreed please :-)
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Old 10-16-2020, 04:48 PM   #16
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Pasajeromoronmoreno View Post
Here. (I had to use Imgur, the stash is down for uploads since morning).

It's the first problem I have run into with Reaper since starting to use it. But I am currently having this exact problem when trying to set midi note length (or note end) to 1/32 or 1/64 it actually gets larger.

any ideas or alternative ways around this? I have tried all the suggestions found so far but to no avail.

EDIT: checked playback rate, it is set to 1
also checked other projects and it is the same. I cant actually quantize midi below 1/16 even if grid setting is 1/128. I must be missing something but cant figure it out.

Last edited by mdkb; 10-16-2020 at 05:17 PM. Reason: add info and set this to email when if it gets a response
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Old 10-16-2020, 08:56 PM   #17
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As mentioned above, I’m pretty sure that it is setting the note length to the nearest multiple of what you’ve entered. Unlike what folks above were saying, I don’t think it is exactly redundant to note end. If a note does not start on a grid division, and you quantize length, the note will not end on the grid, and if you quantize note end, it will not be a multiple of the grid in length.

You are looking to SET the note length, NOT quantize. There are other actions for that, but you can also just type the desired length into note properties.
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Old 10-17-2020, 02:50 AM   #18
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Originally Posted by ashcat_lt View Post
You are looking to SET the note length, NOT quantize. There are other actions for that, but you can also just type the desired length into note properties.
not sure I understand. There is the option for note length or note ending that can be set in the Quantize section. Any other DAW I have ever used works to that terminology and you can shorted notes to lengths using Quantize. Even with the note is beginning on the start of the bar it does not extend properly.

If I can't do it there, where can I do it? It's pretty necessary for editing midi, surely. I cant be editing each note individually. The thing is it works for quantizing the note at 1, 1/2, 1/4, 1/8 but then using 1/16, 1/32, 1/64, 1/128 just doesnt work, in fact it gets larger.

Even a work around or seperate script editor would do me, anything to solve it tbh.

EDIT: I now figured out the issue but not a solution. If the original note is larger than 1/16th it wont reduce it, so if a note is smaller than 1/128 then Quantize works on all sizes, or if it is 1/8th then you cannot reduce it further only enlargen it (yes I tried shrink option checked).

This is an issue for me as I need to be able to resize notes across a song with setting their length to the desired amount not a restricted amount based on original size, maybe an alternative script, any suggestions? so far I am failing to find one by searching.

EDIT OF THE EDIT:
Found a work around - in actions there is "Edit: Set note lengths to grid size" among other various option, but this means I can set the grid size I want, select the notes I want changed, and effectively Quantize them that way.

Last edited by mdkb; 10-17-2020 at 03:31 AM.
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Old 10-17-2020, 09:25 AM   #19
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If you have a note that is exactly 1/4 long, and you quantize length to 1/8, it will not change because it already is quantized to the nearest 1/8. If you want it to be 1/8 long instead of 1/4, then you want to set the length. Honestly, if other DAWs work differently, then they work wrong because this is how it’s supposed to go.
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Old 10-17-2020, 03:50 PM   #20
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Quote:
Originally Posted by ashcat_lt View Post
Honestly, if other DAWs work differently, then they work wrong because this is how it’s supposed to go.
It is totally possible that I tweaked it in other DAWs or did something to force it and wasn't aware of that change I had made. Thanks for the insight, I'll re-read the discussion here on it because it had me baffled on that side of it.
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Old 02-28-2023, 12:47 PM   #21
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The sheer fact that the tool's terminology causes confusion merits addressing.
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