Solved Modulating Kontakt's Master Tune knob

Any body got a way to do this in semi-tones? TIA!

 

It's not made to do that at the master level (that's a master re-tuning knob intended for re-tuning to something other than 440) but you can do it in steps by tuning each individual instrument.

 

Thanks–I guess I've used the wrong term; I didn't mean the Master Tune, but the Tune knob right above the pan slider:



Modulating this with MIDI CC is working great, except that my modulating device can't be quantized so the modulation is in semi-tones, as you can see:



I'm looking for one that can be…

 

You can't quantize it with MIDI CC. Host automation will be more precise, but still you would need to do manual quantizing.

 

Thanks—I figure that if I can find a mod source that can be set up to send out 73 equal steps, that would do the trick; too bad there's no Melda MIDI modulators, their internal mods can be divided into to any number of steps for exactly this purpose when targeting their own pitch controls. Seems like this could be done with Reaktor (by folks more knowledgeable than me!). Maybe in Bitwig, or Reason? Can't believe I'm the first person ever to want this, esp. since the control is MIDI teachable.

 

The main problem here is that you cannot really influence the quantization. Kontakt internally scales the MIDI CC values of 0-127 to 0-1000000 (which is internally used to change the instrument tune), and many of those values won't fall on whole semitones. Your only solution here is host automation, not MIDI CC.

 

Hmm…thanks. But even with host automation, what I do with the knob using my mouse isn't reflected in the automation recording. I can only move the knob in semitone steps and the sound is only shifted in semitones, just as expected, but the recorded automation when doing that isn't in semitones; it's not stepped at all and none of the values are integers, so Tune-knob movement actually CAN'T be recorded (except as audio, I guess). Why have the knob work in steps but not record its movement in steps? Non-stepped shifts are what pitch bend is for, and before you try to automate it, the tune-knob appears to be clearly just for semitone shifts.

 

You would need to manually find where the host automation leads you to a semitone. It is entirely possible, as opposed to using MIDI CC, where it's just not possible.

The instrument Tune knob is not just for semitone shifts. Shift+dragging it and you have the full range with cents there.

Over here in Reaper, automation records semitone steps correctly, however the recorded nodes are connected with lines. I just change the curve mode to square and that's it - everything quantized nicely. Looks like this:

 

Ah, thanks, wish I liked Reaper! Logic REALLY drops the ball in this regard, as you can't even manually edit to find semitones. Creating stepped changes is easy, but the value control is simply not fine-grained enough, even when using an event list

 

To record the above curve, I just set automation to Write mode, then tweaked the knob on Kontakt's GUI. It recorded the semitone values correctly.

You're not using host automation in that GIF, though. That's still MIDI CCs (otherwise the values wouldn't be 0-127, from what I can tell). This will not ever be snapping to semitones, because of what I mentioned earlier.

 

I'm trying this in Reaper today; where I can even use my Melda plugins as mod sources

As for Logic, I did just as you describe, and it sure walks like automation, talks like auto…, smells like auto…:



Have I been doing this wrong all these years!? Or is Logic just not good with Kontakt?

 

Not sure... in Reaper it snaps in semitones when recording host automation... I don't use Mac/Logic so don't know about that.

 

Reaper it is, for sure, does the best with this challenge of any of my DAWs; really disappointed with Logic, which I'd thought was as good or better than any others at automation.

But in my experiments I also learned that Tracktion Waveform (I have 9) offers the best editing environment I've yet found for messing around with automation shapes, and w K's Tune parameter in particular, with lots of LFO-like presets, a bunch of powerful adjusting tools (Scale and Displace) for the overall automation envelope, as well as precise value entry for each node, so you can really nail semitone integers or get very close. All of which is actually more useful to me, and what I wanted to be able to do from the start, since mouse entry during playback is very hard to control. Still haven't found the best of both in one place (great automation recording AND editing features), but gaining on it Thanks for your help!

 

You can actually do it with MIDI automation if you're prepared to accept small inaccuracies of a cent or 2. Using a bit of arithmetic, automate with your chosen cc#, with a range of 27.8 to 71.9 - this will give you a semitone for every inc/dec of 4, with 64 in the middle.
The slight inaccuracy arises because the range values have only one decimal place.

And remember that a semitone is itself an approximation!

 

Thank you, Stephen; will definitely give this a go!

Edit: Once I figure out how… Are you a Logic user by chance? What tools have you used to create such precise adjustments to a MIDI CC modulator? TIA!

Actually, I'll assume you're NOT a Logic user as the available Factory mods that's I've explored so far are not adjustable with any precision, that I can discover anyway. And as ED spotted, the CC range is exactly the same as the Host Auto range and can only be scaled down from there.

 

Simple arithmetic. (You set the range under the MIDI automation tab in the Kontakt browser, if that's what you mean)

Actually you can make it completely accurate with a script, which uses 32-bit arithmetic. Paste this into the first available script slot and click on Apply:

on controller
if ($CC_NUM = 11)
set_engine_par($ENGINE_PAR_TUNE,500000+(%CC[11]-64)*13888,-1,-1,-1)
end if
end on

This gives you 6 octaves (!) and uses cc#11, but you could use any cc - replace 11 in the 2nd and 3rd lines.

No I don't use Logic or any commercial DAW.

 

Thank you once again; will definitely keep on fiddling with this

EDIT: Whoa! Working great—Brilliant, thank you so much!!

 

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