How do you control a multitude of parameters in a mega-set?

[balance_productions]

Help Please! I've seen some of my favorite artist play a huge mix with most of their best songs all mixed together. But normally glitched parts and effects from their original songs will be changed up or totally glitched to hell in these live mixes - its awesome! Its like their not just hitting play and dancing around, they are actually keeping it LIVE. So I tried my hand at mixing my songs together and it works to a point. From what ive seen all you need is one 25 key midi controller with a row of knobs and faders. But when i midi map my knobs to lets say a beat repeat and the other 15 knobs to other wondurful ableton effects i run out of knobs.. there is an abundance of clips and tracks in live but i dont have enough hardware. Well that doesnt make sense ive seen plenty of people tweak at least 5-10 songs live? but i cant do 4? The only thing i can think of is using the automap software that came with my controller which supposedly comes with pages and pages of presets that you can save but i try to map faders and knobs with automap and im left with a splitting headache and end up crawling back to abletons midi map button.... left with no control over my huge megaset. Am i missing something? i have to be... how can you keep on switching between songs moving your 8 measly faders like you have 100? Hopefully someone has had this same problem? Please help!

[oddstep]

One option is explore instant mapping with device macros and chain select to switch devices on a track. You then have 8 parameters per track. Another is develop a effects chain that works on everthing. Put that on the master and map as much as you can

[JuanSOLO]

I use a TON of FX. Many of them in "smart knob" fashion. However I also use the Finger and Buffeater, which makes glitching stuff up super easy and efficient. I have some glitchy stuff that happens through midi clips that go to the Finger and Buffeater, yet some of it I do on the fly.

I used to have a Novation ReMOTE 25. It had an F1 F2 F3 and F4 buttons on it. I could select these and it would change my mappings. For example, I might have F1, mapped to FX Racks on Track 1, and F2 mapped to FX Racks on Track 2, etc etc...


Once upon a time I had tons of controllers and tried mapping everything I thought sounded cool when I turned it. Overtime I realized I had more fun building smart knob FX, or cross fading chain style FX. Many of the things I used to try and map went un-used.

These days I have a much simpler setup, and find I can do more with that, and focus more on mathching songs up, cathing loops, making builds, with a smaller amount of FX.

[Pitch Black]

Assign all the Scenes/Clips/Mixer ch's/FX/Instruments for each song to a different MIDI channel.

Example: Song 1 is mapped so all of the above receive on MIDI ch 1, song 2 receives on MIDI ch2, etc etc...

Then all you have to do is change the transmitting channel of your MIDI controller between songs - I have a ReMote25 and I have a preset stored for each song, and each preset transmits on a different MIDI channel. So when I change presets on the ReMote, the next song and all it's parameters become instantly available "under my fingers".

Here's a 1 hour video demo I made with a mate, Tom Cosm. In the second half hour I demo using a mega-set and different MIDI channels per song.

http://www.vimeo.com/6281034

HTH

[balance_productions]

Assign all the Scenes/Clips/Mixer ch's/FX/Instruments for each song to a different MIDI channel.

Example: Song 1 is mapped so all of the above receive on MIDI ch 1, song 2 receives on MIDI ch2, etc etc...

Then all you have to do is change the transmitting channel of your MIDI controller between songs - I have a ReMote25 and I have a preset stored for each song, and each preset transmits on a different MIDI channel. So when I change presets on the ReMote, the next song and all it's parameters become instantly available "under my fingers".

Here's a 1 hour video demo I made with a mate, Tom Cosm. In the second half hour I demo using a mega-set and different MIDI channels per song.

http://www.vimeo.com/6281034

HTH

Questions about that?

1. When you say midi channel are you talking about the drop down tab in abletons in-out section or are you talking about an external midi channel section outside of ableton for your controller. Just to be sure...?

and..

2. What if you are using an audio track and not midi? Does it have to be in midi form to have this kind of control? Isnt't it better to render to audio to save cpu? If not how does your computer handle using midi tracks with this method? Do you use alot of midi tracks?



Thanks for your reply! I will check out the video as well. Ive seen your posts on other forums, always good stuff, never figured you'd be helping me directly thanks a ton mate! Funny how you work with tom cosm, ive been watching his stuff for a while now. lol thank you very much for your help!
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:)Peace, and Music!

[balance_productions]

What about controlling 10 tracks with 8 Faders...? I know they made the apc40 for this but how do i do this with a 25key midi controller with no shift or bank buttons.... and only 8 faders! lol

[Pitch Black]

Questions about that?

1. When you say midi channel are you talking about the drop down tab in abletons in-out section or are you talking about an external midi channel section outside of ableton for your controller. Just to be sure...?

Yes, I'm talking about changing the transmitting MIDI channel of your controller. If you map a bunch of stuff to MIDI inside Live, when you change the transmitting channel of your MIDI controller, you get a whole "new" set of controls that you can map again to different things/songs.

2. What if you are using an audio track and not midi? Does it have to be in midi form to have this kind of control? Isnt't it better to render to audio to save cpu? If not how does your computer handle using midi tracks with this method? Do you use alot of midi tracks?

Yes I'm talking about mostly audio tracks in Live. MIDI is being used as the control protocol from the er... MIDI controller hardware to trigger clips/scenes/parameters etc. It is also used to play virtual instruments inside Live. Anyway, have a look at the video, hopefully it will explain a lot.