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Old 03-11-2012, 07:30 AM   #1
Aira
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Default Ninjam Session Mode - Reaper over net

Hola,
i am trying to understand and make use of the collaborate feature of ninjam, the SESSION-mode, and how to use it with Reaper as host.
Unfortunately, i cant seem to find much on session-mode, only AndyMC's short tut, wich gets the session implemented and basically working, but nothing elaborated on how to actually get an online session being done...
im thinking about serious studio-work overnet, isn't the session mode in ninjam meant to do so? please correct me if im wrong...
i couldnt find anything in the reaper-docu, nor via google, so im kinda helpless lol
any hints about how to use the session-mode sensemakingly would be appreciated!
thank you!

PS, i hope this post is acceptable in this forum, if not i might migrate to ninjam-forum... just lemme know pls...

Last edited by Aira; 03-11-2012 at 09:37 AM. Reason: -
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Old 03-11-2012, 09:42 AM   #2
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Default more info... more questions...

ok, in a testsetup with 2 PCs i found out that session mode plays the playlist of the PC1 on PC2 via ninjam in synced project time. so far so good...
i did experience though that it only broadcasts/xmits up to a certain point, till about 1.45mins or so... then nothing until 4mins, and then i can hear again whats on the other PCs playlist at 4 mins.
first two questions:

1. is this a bug? or did i mess it up and am clueless about it?
2. how do i actually get those tracks on PC 1 over to PC 2, and how to do that with more than 2 stations? like 5 peeps playing some, recording it, and id like to have ti ALL on my PC for further mixing / producing?

anyone? thanks!
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Old 03-14-2012, 04:02 AM   #3
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Default noone knows... ?

seems noone knows what the session mode it truely about... ?
is it possible to get the guy who coded it and have him say a few words what he concepted / coded for this mode?
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Old 03-14-2012, 06:20 AM   #4
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You would have much better luck in the 'ninjam' forum (further down the page).

Hopefully the mods will see this and move it.


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Old 03-14-2012, 07:05 AM   #5
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Aira View Post
seems noone knows what the session mode it truely about... ?
is it possible to get the guy who coded it and have him say a few words what he concepted / coded for this mode?
The one thing to remember about session mode is that all audio needs to be played into the server in order to exist there. This means that if you have a 4:15 long song on PC1 that you would like to collaborate with on PC2 then you need to at some point have the transport on PC1 play every part of that 4:15 or there will be silent gaps when playing back on PC2. It's kind of like the ninjam server is a time-synced dubbing machine that will keep the last played in layer of sound for each ninjam track. This includes sound being recorded into said tracks (it could make a great competitor for source connect when used in conjunction with the talkback channels).

My one feature request in the past for this was for the ninjam server to buffer the state of a particular project from when all participants have logged out to when they log back in again.
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Old 03-14-2012, 10:01 AM   #6
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Originally Posted by plush2 View Post
The one thing to remember about session mode is that all audio needs to be played into the server in order to exist there. [...] or there will be silent gaps when playing back on PC2.
that actually makes sense and answers my first question, thanks plush!

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My one feature request in the past for this was for the ninjam server to buffer the state of a particular project from when all participants have logged out to when they log back in again.
hell, YESSS !!!
lol, that would be THE thing... a bit like the ultra-pricey sek'd sequoia (now magix)
even if it would only work on private servers, like e.g. store the audio in a local folder to be accessed later on... how cool would that be lol...

although, there ARE workarounds for this, not as nice, but would work as well...

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Originally Posted by plush2 View Post
[...]it could make a great competitor for source connect when used in conjunction with the talkback channels
what do you mean? sry, im lost...

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Originally Posted by bluzkat View Post
You would have much better luck in the 'ninjam' forum
you might be right with this... i was thinking about opening a thread in ninjam as well, but if the mods want to move it, go ahead

Last edited by Aira; 03-14-2012 at 10:06 AM.
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Old 03-14-2012, 10:20 AM   #7
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Source Connect is a product from a company called Source Elements that allows for ISDN-like connections between DAWs. It also allows for locking the transports of the local and remote machines as well.

To my thinking an enhanced version of ninjam session mode would be superior even though it's not strictly a semi-real-time stream. The ability to track, scrub and edit through the content as it's being created in a remote location would be excellent. The enhancement I'm suggesting is that once audio is played into the ninjam server it is preserved even after all parties have logged out. Currently all audio disappears from the current state of the server once the last user logs out.
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Old 03-14-2012, 10:25 AM   #8
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ah, right... i only worked once with that connection... in a foreign studio lol but yea, i remember that "wonder-machine" haha... i think its 7 or 8 years ago that i did that...

anyway... ill explore the session mode a bit more and see if theres ways to use it for some serious work...

edit:
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Originally Posted by plush2 View Post
Currently all audio disappears from the current state of the server once the last user logs out.
do you mean all audio stays until the last one logs out? like all material from all participants?
then youd only have to keep one machine logged on, do i see that right?
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Last edited by Aira; 03-14-2012 at 11:00 AM.
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Old 03-14-2012, 11:13 AM   #9
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It's been almost a year since I did serious looking into Ninjam so I may have that wrong. I'll try to do some checking.

The upshot is that the server, and all local hosts optionally keep a ninjam log file/folder which contains all audio in timestamped folders from the session. This might be enough in itself but it requires some 'regurgitation' since the user needs to load the ninjam log file into Reaper to recreate the last useful server snapshot...and then log back in to continue collaborating. I think it would be easier if that is what the user gets when they log in.
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Old 03-14-2012, 01:20 PM   #10
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man, i start to love you haha... finally someone who even has a CLUE how session-mode works!
the logfile actually is a very helpful thing, and might solve a bunch of problems i saw.
i shall check and see what the logfile really does... do you know if its having single tracks in it? or is it "bouncing" the master of each ones project? i will do some testing if you dont know, but in case you do, youd save me hours of work lol... much appreciated!

edit: to clarify my Q,
it sends the whole master of s.o. project to my end, right? means to get only eg. his basstrack he'd either have to solo his bass and play the whole song OR upload a file somewhere for me to download, is that correct?

and if more than two are working on it, i get their master-bnc (sotospeak) as two different tracks into my ninjam?
how do i get their single files, eg. bass and piano of so. else to my place?

Last edited by Aira; 03-14-2012 at 01:29 PM.
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Old 03-14-2012, 03:20 PM   #11
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I'm glad to be of help. Likewise, if you find any cool new uses for this please let me know.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Aira View Post
edit: to clarify my Q,
it sends the whole master of s.o. project to my end, right? means to get only eg. his basstrack he'd either have to solo his bass and play the whole song OR upload a file somewhere for me to download, is that correct?
No, it's much better than that!
Actually you can set up as many discrete ninjam track sends and receives as you would like (and your network speed will allow). For each of these in session mode ninjam will 'dub' the latest version to the server, from which it can then be played, mixed and edited on other clients.

I always envisioned using it for larger collaborative mixing efforts, like for film and the like. In that case each respective department would work on music, fx, dialog..etc. and as they worked their latest efforts would be 'dubbed' to the ninjam server. All the while they simultaneously monitored the latest 'dubbed' efforts of the other departments by the same means.

I think that could be immensely useful...but it possibly sucks when you log off from a 2 hour show and then have to play/'dub' the whole thing in again the next day.
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Old 03-15-2012, 05:15 AM   #12
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Originally Posted by plush2 View Post
Actually you can set up as many discrete ninjam track sends and receives as you would like (and your network speed will allow).
yea, my thoughts were going that direction too... you can setup as many tracks as you need in ninjam... coolz...


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Originally Posted by plush2 View Post
I think that could be immensely useful...but it possibly sucks when you log off from a 2 hour show and then have to play/'dub' the whole thing in again the next day.
im afraid in this case youd have to setup a server yourself, and leave it running overnight... as well as your stationary reaper, so if anybody logs in next morning, they can go ahead with the work, same as you. just- what if your station or the server crashes overnight..?

i was wondering if we can move a coder to add to the script the poss to reload a session from a local folder (on server) to reload the session into the server-buffer... wich might take a few mins even for a 2 hour show...
that would be totally awesome and more or less finish the session mode-coding as in perfectionalized lol, im wondering who programmed this...

im wondering if wed send the one who built it an email wether they gonna shoot us or think about it lol
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Old 03-15-2012, 09:19 AM   #13
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Originally Posted by Aira View Post
i was wondering if we can move a coder to add to the script the poss to reload a session from a local folder (on server) to reload the session into the server-buffer... wich might take a few mins even for a 2 hour show...
that would be totally awesome and more or less finish the session mode-coding as in perfectionalized lol, im wondering who programmed this...

im wondering if wed send the one who built it an email wether they gonna shoot us or think about it lol
That sounds like a better design to me as well. Ninjam was created by Justin Frankel (and possibly some help from Christophe) but he has open sourced the project so now some work is being done on it under the project name wahjam (I think) but I think that work is mostly client side. Since our particular session mode usage is currently inextricably linked to Reaper the request is probably best made through the feature request section of the Reaper forum.
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Old 03-16-2012, 07:42 AM   #14
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i did some more testing with a setup of a multi-IO-bus with 8 ch to ninjam, routing the locally to be recorded tracks and a "voice-mode" talkback to 3/4, 5/6, and the TB to 7, to send distinct channels to ninjam-server. all routings are doublechecked, seems all correct to my eyes.

now im facing the following problem:
if i reimport the clipsort.log of that session, my local stereo-channels are MONO... ... uhm...

any idea about this one?


EDIT: some testing later i found out that if you "log" the session with "wav" enabled, it records stereo-tracks (as shown in samplitude), but marks it (in header?) as mono (1 channel under item props) and therefore reimports them as mono...

soo... thou shalt not log sessions as wav!

Last edited by Aira; 03-16-2012 at 08:52 AM.
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