Export all currently selected patterns to midi from multiple scenes at once

Hi,

I have been searching for a way to export my track in Maschine to midi at once. What I found up till now, all involves only 1 pattern and 1 scene. But I have lots of scenes and patterns which I want to export at once. What I would like, is to export my currently selected patterns in all the active scenes at once.

Is this possible?

At the moment I have to drag and drop each pattern separately, but that should be able to be done faster I think.

I want to export it into Logic Pro X.

 

...I guess, it's possible to send the midi out of Maschine as a plug-in and record it in your DAW. I remember that it worked using the Maschine software as some sort of step sequencer to send midi to other plug-ins. But it wasn't something that I've used very often, so I don't know the necessary steps by heart. Anyway, if there is a way I guess, that would be the one to go (though it might be that I did that with v1)...

 

You can't do it by drag and drop the way you describe - it's one pattern at a time which, as you rightly say, is painful.

And to make things even more painful - if you have a pattern that was longer but you've truncated it gets placed in the daw at its original length meaning you have to manually edit midi regions as well.

But, hey, there's probably a new expansion to look forward to...

 

..."8.2.5 Sending MIDI from Sounds" in the manual. I'd just send the midi to the DAW and record it there. However, sending the midi notes from Maschine kits might be a bit problematic, as the sounds' root key is always C3 - just in case you'd send all sounds of one group in Maschine to one midi channel in your DAW. Depending on what you want to do and on the complexity of your Maschine track, preparations might be a bit annoying, but since there's no midi export that's basically how it works. But I guess, it shouldn't be too hard and doesn't you cost more than a couple of minutes. Good luck!

 

Thanks for all these messages. I think I understand what you mean by sending the midi to the DAW. I am also sending midi notes from Reaktor standalone to Logic Pro X which works fine. So maybe Maschine can do the same thing indeed. Isn't there a way to merge patterns by the way? Because that would be an easy trick to do.

 

...no, to my knowledge there is no merging patterns function. The easiest way would just be to set the sounds/groups to send midi to the host (using Maschine as a plug-in) and then record the midi in your DAW. And if you run into any trouble, you can post here. Good luck!

 

I tried using Maschine as a plugin in Logic Pro X and set the output of the sound midi to host but Logic Pro X did not retrieve any midi data that I could record. I have also tried using Maschine as a standalone application, but also then Logic Pro X cannot record the midi data. I have also changed midi channels but also that did not work.

I remember that with Reaktor you also had to run it as standalone instead of a plugin, because as a plugin Logic Pro X could not record the midi data. So maybe it is because of Logic Pro X that this doesn't work?

 

Logic is ***** at getting MIDI out from plug-ins and most developers can't be bothered to work round the issues.

Many developers reckon you can't do it at all with AU but this is bollox as Toontrack do it with their MIDI player plug-in (I forget what it's called) you just have to do a very simple bit of cabling in the environment for it to work.

Yet another thing that irritates me about Maschine is that Maschine won't even seem to send MIDI from it's hardware ports when running as a plug-in.

I always end up using drag and drop on each individual pattern and, yes, I'm pretty close to give Maschine the boot.

 

...on the road right now, so I can't have a look at it (so this is just from memory what might be required). Also, I don't have a mac and I don't know Logic in particular. However, there is a midi setup context menu, if you right-click on a Maschine group. It may be necessary that it is set to have the sounds send midi notes (or something like that). Also, I'm pretty sure that the midi input on the Logic midi tracks should have Maschine as the input and that they have to be armed for recording (sometimes that can be overlooked on DAWs). Apart from this, I can't imagine anything else where to look. Good luck!

 

This is because the host deals with the audio and MIDI ports. However, it is possible for at least VST plugins to access MIDI ports directly (i.e., without having to route through the host) and I would LOVE for MASCHINE to get this feature.

As Logic/AU is particularly difficult regarding MIDI out from plugins, the way I'd record MASCHINE's MIDI into Logic would be to run MASCHINE standalone and send the MIDI to Logic via the IAC bus. As long as you've got a note directly on the 1.1.1.1.1 beat, you don't even need to bother syncing the two applications first, just set up MASCHINE to send MIDI out of the Sounds/Groups you want to record, set Logic to record those MIDI inputs, and you're good to go. You can essentially record an entire performance as MIDI this way (and audio at the same time if Logic allows that).

 

I understand that when Maschine is running as an AU it is effectively in a 'sandbox' so prevented from accessing the computer's MIDI out ports.

However, there is no good reason why the Studio shouldn't be able to output MIDI via it's own hardware output ports - the plug-in has control of everything else in the hardware.

 

I certainly see what you mean and I do not disagree in the slightest. While I'd love full access to all MIDI ports, it at least makes sense to allow MASCHINE plugin to use its own hardware's MIDI ports. Perhaps there is a hardware limitation for this, though, and the MIDI interface part of the controllers is on a different circuit or something, so the communication between MASCHINE software and controller is actually divorced from the MIDI ports. Speculation though, I don't know.

 

Another method would be to use ctrlr (http://ctrlr.org/) to accept MIDI inside MASCHINE and spit it out to a virtual MIDI cable (e.g., IAC bus on OS X) and record into Logic that way.

 

Ok, I will give it another try. This will take me a couple of days, but I hope that I can do it during the weekend.

My current opinion is that I like the Jam and its capabilities in Maschine, but I do not really like the Maschine software in particular. Maschine cannot replace my DAW Logic Pro X. But the combination of the two also doesn't seem to work very well. Maschine is not really a full featured DAW right? But what is it then supposed to be?

I am also wondering why there is no template for Logic Pro X as there is for Ableton Live which can be downloaded from the NI website. Any idea if something like that is coming for Logic Pro X? And why did they not make a template for Logic Pro X while they made one for Ableton Live and some other DAWs?

It seems I almost have to buy another DAW for this.. but that is not very cost effective as I am already using Logic Pro X.

 

Its not meant to be a daw, its meant to be a groovebox.

I find it best used as a standalone since version 2, as I use other standalone hardware it bothers me less than it used to. In version 1 i only ever used it as a plug in.

 

...if it's really important getting the midi data out of Maschine and if it doesn't work with Logic, you could try the demo of Reaper (http://www.reaper.fm/). It does allow saving & exporting (even in demo mode) and works on both Mac & PC. So, if everything with Logic fails, you could try this or even let someone else, who also has Reaper, do it for you (or maybe someone with Logic is willing to help).

About the DAW integration - like it has been said before here and elsewhere, Maschine is a groovebox, not a DAW and although many people would like Maschine to work differently with a DAW, currently it works best, when you create patterns & scenes in Maschine and trigger (or sequence) these scenes via midi or program change messages from your DAW (using Maschine as a plug-in). Then use your DAW's automation lanes and audio tracks to automate Maschine parameters and to record audio and I'm sure you'll find it's working quite nicely. A groovebox and a DAW are different tools and we wouldn't expect a trumpet to played like a violin.

 

I got it working now when Maschine 2 runs standalone. Because only in standalone mode there are settings in the preferences for midi out to send it through the IAC bus. I am still figuring out what the best workflow for me is though. I liked running it as a plugin but then I cannot record long patterns.

 

If you really want to use MASCHINE as a plugin in Logic and achieve what you describe, I'd recommend trying that ctrlr plugin as a way to get the MIDI from the MASCHINE plugin to the IAC bus. It's pretty simple to set up, but I appreciate it is a workaround and one that some might not like.