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Old 04-28-2018, 05:00 AM   #11
alextone
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Originally Posted by Sju View Post
Hey guys. Doing a bit of research on articulation switching methods, and thought this would be a good place to get knowledgeable answers.

I'm wondering if key switching has any advantages compared to channel switching?

As I understand, the advantage of key switching is real-time playability, but a sampler using channel switching could operate in the same manner with an preprocessor that switches the MIDI output channel with keyswitches?

Channel switching sampler would then have the sole advantage of being able to play multiple articulations at the same time (impossible with keyswitching as far as I understand).

Am I missing any other pros/cons?

Thanks in advance.

PS. thank you tack for that script, it looks really useful!

There are SWS actions for changing channel input, even if your midi input device/keyboard transmits channel one by default. (includes CC data as well.)

SWS actions "Map Selected tracks midi input to channel 1"
and so on for the other channels.
I use keystrokes 1-0 for Mcha 1 - 10, and logo (Win key) + 1 to 6 for the rest.
So let's assume you have legato on channel 1, and Staccato on channel 2.

You press 1, and you hear the legato when you play your input device.
You press 2, and you hear the Staccato, even though you are inputting from your midi device which is transmitting on channel 1.
This is important as a "preview" mechanism, as you might for example prefer spiccato over staccato after trying them both for a particular passage, in tempo, and alongside any legato you've already recorded.

I work like this and it functions well, and importantly, is fast. (with sufficient practise).



A couple of caveats.

If you have the track FX window open, then the keystrokes won't work, because the arrange (main) window is not in focus.

I don't know if this is a caveat as i find it to be an asset, but if you have channel 2 selected, then any CC data you transmit will be for channel 2. So you can vary volume, velocity, expression directly for each articulation. I find this useful because most of the staccatos i have across my libs are a little "bright" compared to the legatos, so i'm likely to adjust them by default.
And, if you have more than one artic playing at once (because you can, using channels) then you can balance them really effectively.


If you wish to add the same CC data to all channels at once then there is another action to "Set selected tracks midi input to all channels." (Which i have mapped to Logo + 7)


This is all in the main window. I have the same keystrokes mapped to switch the same channels in the midi editor, if i wish to manually input notes out of tempo, for example.

Remember that CC data can be written per channel, but if you wish to edit the data in the ME, you need to select the correct channel to do so. (Which is entirely sensible.)

Hope this helps.

Keyswitching is a decision made by sample companies in the assumption that users will find it to be the most friendly way to handle artics that may seem like they're breeding in large numbers.

It is NOT the only way to work, and i suggest you set up a test track, assign the actions, and then practise channel switching for an afternoon, and draw your own conclusions.

I have 2 1st violin tracks to handle artics from my various sample libs, with all the "popular" artics on the first, and the less used artics on the other, saved as a 1st Violins track template.
As soon as we have some sort of track notes (text window) docked next to the track list that will save listed artics per track, as part of a track template, you'll have no need to open the FX window if you can't remember which artic you assigned to which channel, as it will be listed next to where you're working. We have the track notes window already (thanks again SWS), and it can be docked on the left, changing with selected tracks which is really cool imho, but they can only be saved with the project, for the moment.

If you have your tracks preloaded in a project template, then you're good to go.

Alex.

Last edited by alextone; 04-28-2018 at 05:16 AM.
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