Maschine/Pro Tools workflow question

I love Maschine but I'm finding it a little frustrating to use in Pro Tools.

Here's my problem.... I'm sequencing in two places. Drums in Maschine and everything else is sequenced or audio tracks in Pro Tools. If I need to edit the structure of my song then I have to edit in two places, Maschine AND in PT. If the Maschine Project is complicated this gets fiddly pretty quickly!

I know I can drag and drop Patterns as MIDI from Maschine into PT but again, this gets old very quickly when you have a lot of patterns. I can't find a way to drag and drop the MIDI of the whole Maschine song into Pro Tools which would help.

I know I can trigger Scenes via MIDI notes or program changes but this isn't ideal.

I've tried using Sound MIDI Batch Set Up and can play Maschine sounds from my keyboard and record the MIDI in Pro Tools but obviously I'd rather use Maschine's lovely pads.

So.... I can't find a way of sending MIDI from the Maschine pads, record notes into PT AND then have PT play the sound assigned to the same pad in Maschine. PT won't even let me do the routing for this on an Instrument Track saying a "possible feedback loop has been detected." I suppose Maschine needs a "Local Control Off" facility here so I can assign sounds to a pad in Maschine, input notes into PT from the Maschine pads and record my drums in Pro Tools.

Any ideas?

 

There are programs that act as virtual midi cables.

They have allowed people to communicate between maschine standalone, and their DAW.

I know it works as virtual midi, connecting program controllers between eachother. I haven't been able to make it work.

One program that allows this is Loopbe 1

If you get it going, please come back and let us know how it goes.

But, if you google, "Virtual midi" or "Virtual midi port" Virtual midi cable"

You'll be well on the way towards your solution.

Hope this helps.

 

Thanks for the tip... Forgot to say, I'm on a Mac so Loopbe 1 wouldn't work. I'd also need to route audio from the standalone Maschine back into Pro Tools.

I use VE Pro so maybe I should look into hosting Maschine there although I'd rather do it in Pro Tools and would imagine I'll come up against the same problem.

 

On Mac, try this for routing: http://www.jackosx.com/

 

i just loaded the Maschine software as a Instrument, loaded a kit and used Sound MIDI Batch Setup - Sounds To MIDI Notes - to have all 16 Sounds in a kit playing from C1 upwards. i then pressed Shift + Control. to put the Maschine Controller into MIDI Mode and pressed the Group button C, so that the correct octave would be transmitted to Pro Tools and it worked.

NB! you need the Maschine Virtual Input is active in the Pro Tools MIDI Input Devices.

i need more info about what you are doing, as i do not have any feedback warnings.

sowari

 

Hi sowari

Many thanks for that.... It's a workable workaround! It's a shame Maschine defaults to off in Pro Tools Setup>MIDI>Input Devices. That was were I was going wrong.

I still think Maschine should have a "Sequence In Host" or "Local Control Off" mode. Your workaround works fine but it's a bit of a pain constantly switching between Control and MIDI mode.

Dave

 

What you are seeing is a limitation of your DAW, not Maschine. If you run Maschine as an AU it will do what an AU can. VST implementations in Sonar and others can do exactly what you are looking for.. but i think for you there is a better workaround than hopping into/outof controller mode..

note that the concept of a "local control off" is for a separate standalone hardware device...so if you use Maschine as standalone, rather than launched from your DAW you should be able to do exactly what you want.. use Maschine as a controller & sound module...

try this
1. run maschine standalone
2. establish a virtual midi pipe. enable as midi output and input in Maschine
3. place kit on group A, assign sounds to midi input
4. set individual group B pads as midi output. change pad names as desired.
5. play pads in group B, midi is transmitted out the virtual pipe, comes back into maschine and sounds are heard from group A
6. maschine is now being used as a controller and a sound module.

not a large leap to start the DAW, then set a midi track for the virtual pipe to record and playback sequences...just ensure you do not have an additional midi loop through your DAW during record.

 

Thanks for the reply Mystic38. I was referring to "local control off" as a means of stopping the feedback loop Pro Tools is warning me about. It looks like it is this that is stopping it working like it does in Sonar. It does seem this is a limitation of Pro Tools and I hope NI can find a workaround.

If I follow your suggestion, how would I get audio from the standalone instance of Maschine back into Pro Tools? I don't want to go down the Soundflower route or anything similar.

Actually, come to think of it, could I not host Maschine in PT, use Sowari's method except rather then hopping in and out of controller mode, I'd just switch banks?

 

you could stay in MIDI Mode and use the Sounds To MIDI Batch Setup. remember you can have different Sounds and/or Groups on different MIDI Channels. in Pro Tools you can have different MIDI Tracks. if you choose the MIDI Track with Channel 3, and you have successfully configured Maschine and Pro Tools, then choosing the Channel 3 MIDI Track should play the Channel 3 Sounds in Maschine.

to clarify, choosing a different MIDI Track in Pro Tools will select a different Sound or Group in Maschine. Maschine will then be behaving like a Multi-timbral plugin.

sowari

 

Sowari!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Oh my god. I've been beating my head against my Macbook while looking at my Maschine like its a giant paper weight.

I can't believe it was that easy of a fix.

As thankful as ever.

 

I track in Maschine as an instrument. From that point, it depends on how much work I'm doing in Maschine. If its just drums, then no problem. If I'm adding multiple sounds and patterns, then I export audio for individual tracks and mute the Maschine instrument track. That procedure gives me more editing options. This also makes me look like a genius to my colleagues who still use a MPC and refuse to even touch a Maschine. I call them MPC zombies.