Newbie Questions about Patch Loading, Preset saving, Polyphony, Midi Channels of standalone patches

#1

Hi all, I've had lots of fun creating some instruments that are more or less ready to implement in my live sets - but I am now wondering about enclosures and building interfaces and started thinking about versatility of my instruments.

The main questions and sources of anxiety that I have now are:

How can you make a patch that has adjustable polyphony and switchable midi input/output channels?
-For polyphony I guess the easy solution would be to load different patches with the number of polyphony that you need for the situation. For midi input channels, I am not sure what is an easy workaround. I basically would be glad if I could assign controls to the drop down menus of the Polyphonic subpatch - but not sure if those paramenters are Live-switchable..

How can you save patch presets while the instrument is in live mode?
-Is it possible to create presets while the instrument is live? and what is the best practice to implement that, since I guess the presets need to be added to some sort of array.

Patches that use tables that need samples - do they need some sort of an Init Script to load up the sample once the patch is live?
-I have a button that I need to press to load the sample into a table, but i think there is a better way of doing that. I've got tables that I want to load one of 200 samples into..would be cool if someone can give some advice about making an interface for that - otherwise i think i just make 200 string objects that get selected by some ridiculous switch system.

#2

lots of questions...

the first thing, we must remember with Axoloti... and the golden rules are (for me):

a. we need to be create efficient patches, as the STM32F4 is a micro controller, not as powerful as your computer. we do this by fixing certain elements so the compiler can produce more efficient code.

b. we do not want audio glitches, this means we don't want to change CPU load over time.

(there are some other technical factors, like not using dynamic memory allocation, which also creates 'limits')

midi channel is mainly (a) , but there are objects which allow this to be circumvented.
poly count, is a bit of both a and b.

I think you can change presets in live mode... but bare in mind the presets are 'saved' in the patch, which only exists on the computer not the board and a computer may not be connected to the board... hence you can only save when you come out of live.

loading samples dynamically, yeah I think its been discussed before about the ability to select strings from a list at runtime. ( I think last time this was related to program control loading other patches from SD Card).

I think this is an area where there are a number of possibilities. personally my approach is to use a controller with an LCD (Ableton Push), and this will be able to browse patches/samples on the SDCard and allow selection.

So I view this as related to supporting 'controllers' e.g. ableton push, axoloti remote, lemur, computer screen. simply because for many of use, we will use Axoloti not connected to a computer... so I don't want to start reinforcing that 'tether'

as i say, thats just me, and what Im doing...

Im sure @johannes, may have other ideas about the official direction smile

#3

The midi channel and Polyphony is not really an issue now that I think about it - almost always I can adjust other gear or simply assign a midi channel for different pieces of gear that i will use for years. Polyphony can really be solved by using separate patches or some other work around (although i still wonder how to create polyphonic objects without actually using subobjects with polyphony hehe)

Saving presets and loading presets I guess is the main challenge. I have a versatile instrument that can yield lots of cool sounds, so it would be cool to be able to save them as i make them. Of course I can prepare the presets on pc and then save them to the patch..but using a workaround to save patches on some other device would be great too. Maybe I'll investigate preset saving and loading on other platforms or with use of a computer (I am pretty sure it is inevitable that I will use ableton as a sequencer or at least an mpc2000xl).

as for the sample loading, i also think i have some hints about it somewhere and I sure it is already possible relatively easily. I'll explore it a bit more.

#4

loading can be done... you can save up to 8 by default, and these can be loaded 'programatically' (IIRC) , as stated elsewhere, given the presets change only certain controls, you can actually get quite alot of variations from this.
(you can I think increase the number of presets available in the patch settings, again iirc)

also you can store... the values when its live

what you cannot do is:

a. add new controls to a preset

b. save/recall the presets to disk/sdcard

I think (a) would be tricky to do... since its almost a part of building the patch.
I guess (b) could be possible, and allow preset 'sets' but is it necessary? would you not define the 'starting point' presets in the studio, then when playing live adjust/store them... why do you need to save/load from SDCard?

of course, in the future this is all open... Im interested about how others are planning to use (or are already using) in a live performance environment...
I guess it will come down to a few different ways, and also some adaptation.
even something like Elektron machines, have a workflow in mind... so you'd have to adapt to what they provide....

so I wonder what that might look like for Axoloti?

There are some here, that have been using Axoloti (prototypes) for quite some time for live performance, so would be interesting to hear their views.

#5

Ohhh so you CAN do it after going live?

I know about the preset creation in the editor and preset values setup when using the patch settings. But i haven't studied how to save values when in live mode.

If i can preconfigure 30 presets or something before going live, and assign which knobs should be part of the presets..and I can go live and then save presets that would be awesome.

I guess the problem would then be - what to do if i reached a limit with the presets or transferring the presets to the pc - since a modified patch can't be loaded from the axoloti in the editor - you always load the patch from the file.

#6

yeah, though having just played with it again (I don't use it much)

I think the recall/edit is a bit 'odd', and perhaps can be improved.
currently when live if you switch using edit (which is what I always do) then it works 'as expected'

but recall, seems to recall the state that the patch was saved in, not the state it was last edited to.

e.g. say I have a pitch, which is active on preset 1 & 2
in patch (saved/before live) , preset 1 - its A3, in prest 2 it D3
start patch, edit preset 1.. its A3, change it to C3
edit preset 2, D3, edit preset 1 its C3 (as expected)
recall preset 1, A3

this is kind of useful... think of it as 'edit' mode is the set as its adjusted and you can switch between them, and recall is back to defaults/home.
(perhaps edit/recall are not best terms?)

only issue is the patch/preset object only does 'recall' , i.e. you cannot go between edit presets.
I think we need another object which switches between edits.

(not sure if its possible, depends if the board is keeping these edit/recall presets, or ifs the UI.. the later would not be useful for non-computer based performances)

#7

Sorry, saving presets without the editor is not implemented.
Only recalling is implemented.
It may be added in the future.

#8

saving each knob/button individually is a bit ehm... 'not userfriendly' if you ask me.
I think it would be more useful if all the knobs/buttons/values in the patch were saved in 1 go.

#9

yeah, someone has previously said they would like 'all controls' to be saved in a preset...

I don't think its about user-friendlyness or not... e.g. automation is usually done per 'control' in a daw, its more about expectation perhaps.

the current system is much more powerful, as it allows more combinations with fewer presets,
but I think perhaps its 'unfamiliar'

e.g.
we can have a preset (1) with say 'heavy echo at 1/4 temp',
and another preset (2) with 'high resonance on low pass'
combined this gives us 4 combinations... which if all controls were saved would require 4 separate presets.
(and obviously this get combinational advantages when we go to say 8 presets giving 256 possibly unique settings .. albeit, you have to go thru (potentially) 8 stages to get to a state )

so its a 'different approach' thats perhaps not familiar.... perhaps presets is a bad name?
(interestingly u-he have introduced this kind of saving in Hive, e.g. you can save settings for the oscillator, sequencers, filters separately)

perhaps an 'all controls' mode would be useful (assuming it doesn't have a performance hit),
though might be a shame for users to not experiment with a different approach !?

#10

@thetechnobear

I dont realy understand what you mean, but I compare it to a synth or Reaktor.
The thing is that if I have created a synth with 50 controls, I'd have to set 50 controls to save a sound. Forgetting one means I'd perhaps never get that sound again, and more importantly it costs a lot of time.

Perhaps it would be useful to save all control values to a simple csv file (or table). that way presets could than also be easily exchanged and manipulated (for example, things like 'randomize' or morphing would than be relatively easy to make).
(I was thinking of creating simple 'editor' in reaktor for a axoloti synth and save presets there, but it kinda goes against the idea of having a standalone device.)

#11

my point was simple... presets in axoloti are not what they are in other synths (hence why i said perhaps bad name)

the presets in axoloti are not about saving the sound as is.... like a VST/synth, to me, they appear, to be designed as a live performance tool ... to change aspects of the sounds not to go to a new sounds entirely.

none of that is to say, we don't need more traditional presets, a whole state save would be useful... but does raise some interesting questions. (e.g. switching presets but allowing voices to complete, where to store presets (sd card is not guaranteed etc))

#12

Alex, just to clarify - axoloti presets act like groups. So if i assign 50 knobs to preset 1, this is what it will remember (although dont quote me on that number..i think 50 knobs for a preset might be too much, haven't tried it yet!). I can make preset 2 and 3 just 10 knobs to attenuate something slightly. I really like this system - it is more flexible. Might just be a bit more to note as you create preset controls and whatever.
You adjust the number of settings per preset in the settings btw - there's some documentation about it and how it affects memory/cpu usage i think.
Still haven't player around with this stuff..soooon.

#13

Hi , hmmm, what happens if i want to develope a standalone synthesizer with separate MIDI CC controls .
The posibillity is there with AXOLOTI . But i can't store the Presets in the standalone mode ?!!
We have now a tool that allows us to develope nice synths and effects - but without saving - or - only save the presets on a PC/MAC. The goal should be to get a standalone APP that allows also to store the presets.
Hopefully this will be fixed in future .
Best was a preset manager that is controlled by MIDI so that i can switch the Presets via MIDI
Without saving patches it is a little...... disappointing.
But Ok , AXALOTI is a brand new System. And i think there is a lot of we can improove

Greets
Andre'

#14

There probably are as many 'goals' as users 😀
Actually the saving should not be too hard, simply a matter of persisting the parameter table to an sdcard, and of course the reverse to load it again.
( this assumes all the parameters are correctly put in the param table, which I fear a couple are not ... so that's the first step as its needed for other purposes too)

#15

That´s the point. I build a Standalone Synth, load the default patch from the internal flash, after turned on the Core.
Maybe a simple Sawtooth Wave. Now a tweak some parameters to get a cool sound. But then, before a turnoff the Core, i want to save the current state, because i don't wanna start from the scratch.

In my opinion, to save and load presets should be a main goal, if you wanna use the core as standalone unit.

BTW the parameter table must be big, because my Synth has about 107 Parameters to store. :sunglasses:

All the Best and Happy new Year ....

#16

Yes. The current preset system is too complicated and too hard to set up. And if you want to control a lot of parameters and objects there might be some issues with the SDram, especially on larger patches. Large patches cannot really use the presets system very well.

Yes that would be so awesome. Nord g2 have an awesome preset/snapshot system. And I think Axolotis is inspired from G2 preset system. But in G2 you dont have to set a value for each parameters manually in a seperated system like Axoloti. This is what makes Axolotis preset system a bit complicated. On G2 you just push preset 1 adjust parameters as you like, push preset 2 make the sound as you like and so on. It is way simpler and could be used in "Live" mode too :smile:

#17

Yes , i think store a Preset in a standalone version is a 'must' , equal what you build . It must be easy possible to save and load presets .
This are only the values of the knops than must save and load to SD card . Is it so hard to build a Module for this ??
But all in all , i am very happy with AXOLOTI.
Specially for me i like to have the 12 Bit input ADC'S in audio frequency and also the PWM's with more than 100HZ .
10..40 KHz . Than it was usefull to control other electronics outside from AXILOTI in realtime.
Hopefully it comes in an update .
Greets
Andre'

#18

You can save values to SD card using tables. There are examples of how to do that, but with random numbers. I made a patch, with help form community that creates a bunch of random numbers created with a random object and then saved in a table. This can be recalled over and over again and it works. But I am ot sure how to use it for preset system. Cant figure out how to send the different table values to the different parameters. The random table object is only made for controlling ONE parameter, but with many values. It should work opposite, like many parameters with only ONE value for each(Or actually as many values as you want presets).

Link for saving random values patch:

I think one of the Alexs(There are two, I always, mix them up.... Sorry Alex) :smile: in here have been working on saving parameters without the editor. Not sure how he does it or if he got it working.

#19

Guys, I'm not saying its not important... just the only 'paid' axoloti resource is Johannes... so there are lots of goals.
...currently there are 92 posts in the improvements for the patcher UI alone, and many more posts around asking for improvements/more performance etc.

anyway, as I said its 'quite easy' to build this yourself if you are a programmer....
you will see in my Axoloti with Ableton Push video, I directly access and change the parameters completely standalone. this is done by accessing ObjectKvps in ui.c ... so that could be persisted using the fatfs libs to the SDCard.
(Im not sure we can write to the flash easily, Id have to check that, but I think personally id prefer SDCard)

the 'issue' with this, and why I have not pursued it (apart from also being busy) is some objects are not being stored there correctly, and also the current structure is (imo) too limiting. (it needs to be hierarchical, and have a bit more metadata) ... for me this is a prerequisite to any work in this area (including saving/loading) , the parameter code needs a bit of an overhaul which might invalid other work.
I've discussed this a bit with Johannes, but not enough to be able to just do it... as its pretty fundamental and could potentially break things, and i cannot put in my own private fork, as this would immediately be broken by other work that may be done in this area.

anyway, perhaps the show of interest, may mean johannes will turn his attention to this area.

#20

Man it was no critique of you or Axoloti or Johannes. We are just discussing options good or less good with what we have :smile: Or what would be nice to have :smile:

My main focus atm is trying to implement midi cc into the ctrl/i object. I tried once but with wrong program editing the javacode for that object. I think I got right program now so Ill try and edit the java code again and see if I have any luck.

Presets are a bit down on my list, since I dont really use it as stand alone a lot yet. When I have more patches finished the presets would become more important :smile: