How to setup the Akai Advance in the Maschine Software?

Hey guys,

i`m a little new to this audio stuff so please don`t kill me for asking

I just bought a Advance 49 to use it with the Maschine Software because of the benefits against the Komplete Kontrol S.

But i`m a little confused that there is no preset on it for Maschine, it feels like there is one for every other DAW!?
Plus i can`t find any good Guide to set it up properly.

Hope anyone of you can give m some tips on how to set it up the "right" way!

Thanks and Greets from Germany

Mister Leek

 

Can you be specific on what you'd like to set up? It's only going to work as a generic midi controller unless you add an instance of the VIP plug in. Maschine won't let you map much to another controller

 

Hi Zombieskank,

thanks for the quick reply.

i would like to use the Advance on one Group for all the Instruments and Synths like a preset from Maschine. For example: i load up VIP on sound 1 as a plugin then put some piano keys on it, then i want to add a bass on sound 2 but they play simultaneously on sound 1, i don`t know how to edit the bass then. And i would like to use the record function on the Advance too.

 

The record button definetly won't work. I would say change the midi channel of what you don't want to sound together. Piano on ch1 bass on ch2. Put advance on common midi channel and change the midi channel on advance a1 b1 etc

 

Sorry a1 a2 the b channel is for the midi out on the controller. The a channel is for soft synths

 

So i put VIP as a plugin on sound 1 in maschine, then the piano on slot 1, channel 1 on the advance. But where do i put the bass on? i´ve tried it this way: VIP as plugin on sound 2, bass on slot 2, channel 2 on the advance ... but it won`t play the bass

 

You'd have to press shift then global to switch between midi mode to play a maschine plug in and VIP mode to play the mapped plug

 

You´re right but then they still show up on sound 1, what i need is to put different VIP instruments on different sounds in maschine so i can make different patterns later, correct me if i`m wrong but this makes more sense to me. Especially when it come to arranging the track.

 

OK, so, when you shift you can see a different instance of VIP. Select the different slots with a maschine pad, switch to that instance of VIP

 

Ahh now i got it thanks man! And my next question is, can i record automation from the knobs on the Advance?

 

Maschine kind of sucks with external keyboards beyond just the keys. I doubt much is mappable. Any other daw out there can map though. I'd definitely look into the mpc software. It looks like what maschine should be, with better VIP and advanced integration. If NI doesn't perform a miracle with 2.5 I see a lot of people jumping ship

 

...re. recording automation - even though I don't have an Advance, I think something will be possible, though I suspect it might not be satisfying. It depends on what you want or what's there respectively - are the parameters of the VIP software, i.e. the parameters of the plug-in hosted by VIP available as Maschine controls? Then you yould use your Maschine hardware to automate. Or are the Maschine controls moving when you're moving a knob on your Advance keyboard? If so, you probably can record automation directly from the advance. If all of this is not the case then you might be able to record parameters in midi mode. Then you'd need to map Midi CCs to the Maschine controls (by that I mean the knobs that are appearing in the centre panel of the Maschine software, if this is unclear). So to recap - the first condition in order to be abel to automate VIP controllers in Maschine is that Maschine needs to know the parameters - and that would be clearly visible in the centre panel. From there it's either that the VIP software recognises the movemement of a knob on the Advance keyboard and passes the info to the Maschine software or not. Then you would need to map the controls via midi and use the Advance in midi mode (something you probably don't want to) or you would use the Maschine controller, as the controls are there already. I guess, it's not that Maschine sucks in this regard, I suspect it's a technical issue and it would be as difficult as it were the other way round - the software needs to provide some access to the hardware and since the software has only been written for a specific hardware one can't expect them to work automatically with a different hardware (but I don't think you'd expect that). So, it could be that these things might not work the way you'd like them to be...

 

They don't want you to be able to use the program with any other midi controller. They purposely locked you out of this feature. You can move and map knobs, but not record movements.

 

...Akai or NI? I don't know what you mean. I think you can record midi automation in Maschine. (If it doesn't directly record a CC movement first and then map it to a control later IIRC). But recording (host) automation in a software with a different controller probably doesn't work with any combination - I don't know but I wouldn't expect being able to control VIP with the Maschine controller or Maschine with an Advance keyboard...

 

The advance doesn't have automation. I can fully map and automate it in a host like ableton. There was a thread a few weeks ago on here talking about modulation Vs automation

 

...I know - my question was can you control VIP with the Maschine controller or would you expect this to work as they're two different systems? Hence, can we expect it to work the other way around? The crucial points for the OP are what controls the VIP software are automatically passing to Maschine - they could be naturally automated via the Maschine hardware. Or if knob movements on the Advance are reflected by a movement of the respective Maschine knob of the VIP software? That could mean that it can work like the OP wants it to, however not necessarily. But after all both are systems designed for a special purpose and it's probably unfortunate wanting to mix them. Like you said - the MPC software is probably better complementing VIP, just like Maschine and the Komplete S series are meant to be used together - but I don't see anything being purposely locked out on both ends. To me it just doesn't seem to be a good match, but I hope the OP will find a satisfying way of working...

 

The VIP software is not a sequencer, maschine is. There's no automation in VIP. Yes, the maschine controller can be mapped to VIP software if one so chooses in midi mode, but that would be dumb. It's well established that users have been asking to use a third party controller with maschine. Unfortunately, like many other features that users have been asking NI for years to implement, this one is implemented by other companies leading the way.

 

...I guess, we're getting our wires crossed here. It's not my intention to argue about obvious things, because I know what each software is. And I have no interest figuring out whether team Akai is better or team NI (sorry, if I'm getting ahead of things, because I got the wrong impression, but that's what I'm sensing). The OP asked some questions, I hope I could be of help and that's that...

 

So guys, i`ve tried some some things ...

I can map for example filter knobs from maschine to the knobs on the advance with the learn function in maschine, this works very well! I set the knobs on the advance in an empty bank to Midi cc and hit the learn button in maschine, but it won`t let me record automation till now ...

If you have some thoughts on setting it up in maschine or so please let me know

PS: Picture shows a LP Filter with the knobs set

 

...as I've indicated before, depending on how you want to use the VIP and Maschine software and their respective controllers, it might be that you either come across redundancies or you may hit a dead end. So before investigating any further please allow the question why you don't use the Maschine controller for controlling the Maschine filter since this one is perfectly mapped to it? And as I'm not a user of VIP and the Advance and since up to I'm not using midi automation very often, I might be of limited help here.

However, about recording midi automation - I don't know why it doesn't record the midi automation correctly (and I'm not sitting at my Maschine atm), but it may be that (up to now) this isn't quite working as expected in Maschine. But the following was something that I was told when I was trying to record automation curves from a DAW into Maschine. (you can find more about that here: https://www.native-instruments.com/forum/threads/modulation-in-maschine.231728/page-2)

So, if you like to, try this: unlearn the MidiCC from the parameter, open the automation lane at the very bottom, select the midi automation, select the corresponding MidiCC you have selected on your controller, hit the record button in Maschine and turn the knob on you controller. You won't hear anything, since the MidiCC isn't connected to a control right now, but it may be that Maschine will record the data. Then you can reconnect the control in Maschine to that MidiCC and it will automate. However, if all of this works that way, I guess, that's not what you wanted.
As I've said, I might be of limited help when it comes to VIP, but if you want to you can mich gerne auch mal per PM kontaktieren, wenn Du noch weitere Fragen hast oder Du rufst diesbzgl. mal beim NI Support an - meiner Erfahrung nach ist der Telefonsupport echt gut und die Leute dort sind sehr hilfsbereit. Viel Erfolg!