Why pattern changes need to be automatable

Maschine still has major problems with basic integration in DAWs. Namely in the area of capturing performances. This is a huge problem in Ableton Live where the philosophy is translating from a live view (session) to a timeline view by capturing changes you make on the fly.

The big problem is that only the 8 macros per group are automatable. It goes without saying that it at least needs levels, mutes and solos to be exposed to automation automatically (I'm shocked this isn't already implemented. I think it should have been in a 1.1 update). But it also really needs a way of recording pattern changes. Although you can send midi notes to scenes, that's not really good enough because the goal is to actually use the integrated Maschine hardware/software combo for pattern changes and tweaks. So pattern changes should therefor ideally be automation. People don't totally realize the major advantage this has, which is that you don't have to switch to midi mode and use it as a generic controller (or use a different controller), you can use the functions as they were meant and have changes captured. Even if patterns could accept midi notes, it wouldn't be ideal because there wouldn't be an easy way to use the excellent integrated maschine hardware control (you'd need to have the pads send midi notes while in Maschine to record in your DAW and then accept the midi notes for playback for pattern changes.

The best way would simply be to have the pattern selection per group be a single automatable parameter. This would be identical to how sugar bytes did it with Effectrix. There are 12 selectable patterns in a preset. While these are selectable by midi, it is also a single parameter which can be recorded by automation. So each pattern is basically split into even ranges over the 128 values, similar to how toggles get assigned to 0-63 and 64-127. But in the case of patterns in Maschine it would be in short ranges of 8 (0-7, 8-15 etc.). One of these for each group.

So think of that. You could play all your pattern changes using the dedicated Maschine functions on the hardware and have it captured by your host. This is how it SHOULD be. It would be perfect.

Please support this idea!
NI, look to Effectrix!

 

+ everything

I can't understand why you still can't record pattern changes. Currently you have to create hundreds of scenes which use each of your pattern combinations and automate those via midi.

 

this would be very good +1

 

Damn, this would be nice, come to think about it.
+1

 

The first part is very challenging because we need to find signatures having a low variance for humans, still ... they may find patterns in the decisions. However, there .... lated with small angle changes.
The second [...]

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Daniel

 

Thank you weird automated Netbot.

 

Absolutely. +1

 

+1

I'm still trying to find a way to use maschine, with all it's functionality, in a daw or alongside one. This would definitely help.

 

+1

 

+ 1

 

+1

Hope someday see this. It's kind of hard for me to work with Maschine now, I bounce a lot in audio and I have tons of GB with different scenes in my HD (and I don't like it, btw).

 

+1 to pattern change automation

A master automation track is really needed, full stop

 

OK, I just got Maschine a little while ago and I dug into it (finally) and I'm happy to see that I'm not the only one who thinks this is important. So much so that I thought I must have been missing the functionality. I came to the forum to figure out how to do it and I found this thread. Even something as simple as assigning a number of repetitions for each pattern withing a scene would be nice. The last drum machine I owned was a Commandstation and if that thing had a software component... man it would be something. With Maschine I find it's really set up to create grooves and bits, but very weak on arranging full compositions.

 

+1

 

I'm feeling just like you! I think it's hard to make full compositions, I'm always ending with a nice sketch of a song, but a little bit more (some changes on the fly in a kind of session view, without compromising patterns) would be killer.

 

Althought I do agree with the idea that a simple master pattern sequencer should be included in Maschine (ie Scene 1 repeat 2x, Scene 2 repeat 2x, Scene 3 play once, Scene 4 repeat 4x, etc), I don't understand why you would need pattern automation, what kind of tracks are you putting together where you need to constantly change, within a scene, one or more of the patterns, in a way that it wouldn't make sense to just combine patterns together into a new pattern, and build scenes with those?

Maybe there's just a better sequencer out there for you, or perhaps you should look into workflow consolidation. I'm as guilty as the next guy when it comes to the "Oh, man, I can do everything!" option-overload when it comes to composing on the computer, but at some point, you have to step back and look at what you're building and think about efficiency. If you only build a series of 1 bar patterns, and thusly are constantly changing patterns, you aren't working efficiently.

Also, are you taking advantage of the Scene Retrigger functionality? If you set that increment to say, 1/8th, and uncheck the RETRIG box, then on the next 1/8th note, the scene you activate will begin playing at the position the last scene was just at (so, it would go from scene 4: 1.2.3 to Scene 8: 1.2.4, then 2.1.1 and so on, with RETRIG checked, it would go from Scene 4 1.2.3 to Scene 8 1.1.1). Since you can play Scenes, Patterns, etc from the hardware, if you are bouncing to audio, this seems like another easy to way to change things up and get closer to what you want out of the current iteration of the Maschine sequencer.

Also, levels are automateable, the AUTOWRITE button held down while adjusting the volume knob on a selected sound will change the volume in the automation lane in Maschine. In fact,, I think you can also do that by just holding select, the sound's button, while in record mode. You'll want "EVENTS" to be the highlighted tab on the left LCD, too, I believe. MUTE and SOLO do need to be made into automation functions. The only workaround I can think of for MUTEs is to duplicate a pattern, then hold the ERASE key and the sound(s) you wanted to MUTE and while the REC button is engaged, roll through the scene erasing the notes you want muted. While this does create yet another pattern, it does largely do what automating mute would do, but I think it a crappy workaround.

 

That would be enough for me.

 

it would be dope for live purposes, to mix new live.
i bought 2 apcs for that purpose, but since i can't store my automations within the patterns (midi triggering maschine) it doesn't quite work well.

If i could trigger the pattern i could store all automations in maschine.

EpikureeR

 

What if I have 4 hat patterns, 4 tom patterns + fills, 4 snare patterns and 4 kick patterns for fills. I'd need 4x4x4x4, or 256 scenes just to be able to muck around with a small drum kit.

 

thats another point

+1