multi channel

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vanceg
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Re: multi channel

Post by vanceg » Sun Oct 18, 2009 9:56 pm

Very few (if anyone) use Live as their primary surround mix tool. I believe that most everyone who works in surround and uses Live, simply uses other software (PT, Logic, Cubase etc) when they want to do their surround mix.

There is surely a desire out there for some form of support for surround in Live. Even if the decision is made to not expand Live's feature set to include surround, I was hoping we would be able to build some M4L devices that could work around this.

Hopefully we're on our way toward that.

Vance
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vanceg
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Re: multi channel

Post by vanceg » Sun Oct 18, 2009 10:41 pm

ztutz wrote:
stefan-tiedje wrote:
hoffman2k wrote:The External Audio Effect allows you to specify speakers and you can use any number of these.
How would you do that? As far as I see, I can only create a row of effects, with the returns going back into the same track after the External Effect device. This could work for live input (be choosing the original input as return), but would not work for synthesized sounds or tracks, unless I patch a hardware cable to reroute my sounds...

Stefan
I put eight parallel externals into a rack, and map the gain to the eight macro knobs, automating these from my panning device. I then place one instance of this rack into each track that will go to the speakers. You are correct, the signal chain stops with these devices - they are the last device in each track's chain.

Not perfect, but better than a poke in the eye. You can accomplish a variety of routing solutions, and you can also write reasonable spatialization code.

This is a very nice approach: I like the External Effects idea (not as much as I would like to have multiple outs from M4L devices, but this is a smart work-around).
One feature I want out of a spatialization panner is the ability to route the Left and Right signals from a stereo track to different places in the spatial field. If one were to take a stereo track and use the method you mention above, then the stereo would be summed to mono as it is routed out of each of these External Effects (you have each External Effect's "Output To" parameter set to one mono output which is presumably routed to one speaker. So it becomes mono. That's ideal for some situations.

But If you would like to insert this panning system onto a stereo track, and have individual control of the panning on the left and right, then you could double the number of parallel chains you are using (Let's assume you are building an 8 channel panner): You would need 16 chains, each with an External device on it. Now insert a Utility plugin before each one of the External Effect devices. Set the Mode setting in half of them to "Left" and half of them to "Right". Now you've effectively set up output routing for 8 Left channels and 8 Right channels. Of course, you now have to create two panning control systems, and map one of them to control the Left and one control the Right....

Just a thought in case anyone other than me wants to pan Left and Right portions of a stereo signal separately.

Edit: Aaargh - I hadn't thought about the fact that devices inserted on an audio track are inserted before the track's volume fader. So, we won't be able to control the overall level of a stereo pair being routed to our "surround" speakers using the Track Volume. Maybe the value of the Track Volume can be used as a control for volume scaling in the surround panner itself. Again - thinking aloud here....

Vance
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ztutz
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Re: multi channel

Post by ztutz » Mon Oct 19, 2009 3:35 am

vanceg wrote:Very few (if anyone) use Live as their primary surround mix tool. I believe that most everyone who works in surround and uses Live, simply uses other software (PT, Logic, Cubase etc) when they want to do their surround mix.

There is surely a desire out there for some form of support for surround in Live. Even if the decision is made to not expand Live's feature set to include surround, I was hoping we would be able to build some M4L devices that could work around this.

Hopefully we're on our way toward that.

Vance
I agree - I'm totally willing to code my own panning laws and spatialization stuff. All we need is the parts!

stefan-tiedje
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Re: multi channel

Post by stefan-tiedje » Mon Oct 19, 2009 3:38 am

vanceg wrote:Edit: Aaargh - I hadn't thought about the fact that devices inserted on an audio track are inserted before the track's volume fader.
Yes, thats what I just realized and first I thought it sucks. You loose the normal fader control and you don't have a master.
But there is hope, you could grab the fader values through the Live API and control the level before the spatialisation and you can also grab the pan of the track and control the spatialisation itself. Its almost done...
I'd like to show this, how do we share a complete set with all devices and test files to showcase a solution?

Stefan
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stefan-tiedje
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Re: multi channel

Post by stefan-tiedje » Mon Oct 19, 2009 3:48 am

vanceg wrote:Very few (if anyone) use Live as their primary surround mix tool. I believe that most everyone who works in surround and uses Live, simply uses other software (PT, Logic, Cubase etc) when they want to do their surround mix.
I need it live! To run two sequencers at the same time just to get surround wouldn't make much sense. I guess that the user base of Live usually doesn't do surround live at all. This is very different at least for a part of the Max user base. And in this case it is not at all about 5.1 its usually set up with 8 speakers. KloTools sucks with 8 speakers as much as most other 5.1 fancy tools, time to go on and get serious about space...
(WFS is a bit too demanding for most of us I guess...;-)
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vanceg
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Re: multi channel

Post by vanceg » Mon Oct 19, 2009 7:08 pm

stefan-tiedje wrote:
vanceg wrote:Edit: Aaargh - I hadn't thought about the fact that devices inserted on an audio track are inserted before the track's volume fader.
Yes, thats what I just realized and first I thought it sucks. You loose the normal fader control and you don't have a master.
But there is hope, you could grab the fader values through the Live API and control the level before the spatialisation and you can also grab the pan of the track and control the spatialisation itself. Its almost done...
I'd like to show this, how do we share a complete set with all devices and test files to showcase a solution?

Stefan
Hehehe: We are on EXACTLY the same track. I was thinking the same thing - just hijack the Fader value of the track that the device is inserted on, and use that value to control an actual audio volume control which happens before the spatialization. If we want to pan the Left and Right side of a stereo pair we already have to break the stereo up before spatialialization, so why not do some gain control on it too.

I do know that there is a sizable community of Live users who would really love native support of surround in Live - but there are also about 200 other features that this same thing could be said about. One thing I do feel very positive and hopeful about is that whatever support for surroudn does happen in Live (even if it's based on M4L), will likely extend well beyond the typical 5.1; many of us use 8 or 12 speakers. Several even do X/Y/Z panning (vertical).

I think our goal for the moment should be to accurately define what 'minor' changes we would need to see in Live to support M4L surround devices rather than relying on "native" support of Surround in Live. My 2 cents.

Vance
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stefan-tiedje
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Re: multi channel

Post by stefan-tiedje » Thu Oct 22, 2009 1:15 pm

vanceg wrote:Hehehe: We are on EXACTLY the same track.
My results so far: http://dl.getdropbox.com/u/288305/St.pace.zip
Just load the Rack and jump into space. I wonder what you all think about it. Its a pretty different approach than the usual vbap/spat/virtual sound source. It deals with speakers as part of an instrument which for my taste works much better in the concert hall, as you don't have a sweet spot problem. Its less dependent on the place a listener is in space as you think in speakers, not in a virtual sound source.
Try to create the movement of an eight in spat and you know what I mean...

The strange speaker numbering is out of experience, if you are in an environment where you need to distribute works with less channels, it will fit one to one, stereo is channel 1 and 2, quad is 1 to 4 etc. and on 8 channels I insist on getting a speaker center stage. Only 5.1 would need a little adaption, but who wants 5.1 in a concert anyway...;-)

Have fun and let me know if this sort of distribution works. The Live set is using a sound file which is in every Max ditribution under examples/sounds...

Stefan
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matcham
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Re: multi channel

Post by matcham » Thu Oct 22, 2009 2:10 pm

Hey Stefan

it seems brillant ! :-)
thanks for sharing it.
...but... a couple of files are missing, so actually, it do not work :
here are the errors I get when opening your device in max :
newobj: TrackFader: No such object
swap: too many arguments
swap: too many arguments
matrixctrl: can't find file StereoSpace.pct

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stefan-tiedje
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Re: multi channel

Post by stefan-tiedje » Fri Oct 23, 2009 8:06 am

I don't know why TrackFader isn't included with the freeze. the same applies for the StereoSpace.pct.
Maybe I don't understand the freeze process.
Anyway, as I am updating my St.ools along my beta testing, a link to these with some of my new abstractions including those files.
But still, a freeze should transport all necessary files, maybe its a bug...
The swap extra arguments is harmless, its simply one argument too much, I've overlooked the error message...

St.ools: http://dl.getdropbox.com/u/288305/St.ools%20for%205.zip
Corrected St.pace: http://dl.getdropbox.com/u/288305/St.pace/St.pace.amxd
Or the complete rack: http://dl.getdropbox.com/u/288305/St.pace.zip
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ztutz
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Re: multi channel

Post by ztutz » Fri Oct 23, 2009 4:33 pm

I've also been having problems with freezing. Anyone care to explain the details?

vanceg
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Re: multi channel

Post by vanceg » Sat Oct 24, 2009 4:11 am

It's working for me now that I manually downloaded those 'missing' files and placed them in my Live Library.

I like your approach of numbering speakers to make it simple to scale the number of speakers up or down.
I also like the approach you took of using Matrix to do the panning. I was inserting one External Audio Effect per output channel, and controlling each of the External Audio Effect's Gain knobs. I think your approach is likely much simpler.

I would like to use a standard X/Y axis to control the panning; as it is here, there is no way to fly a sound through the middle of the space, or place it right in the middle of the speakers...but that's just a matter of controlling the Matrix using a different UI and panning calculations.

Thank you for sharing!

Vance
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pyrolator
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Re: multi channel

Post by pyrolator » Wed Nov 18, 2009 3:54 pm

stefan-tiedje wrote: My results so far: http://dl.getdropbox.com/u/288305/St.pace.zip
Just load the Rack and jump into space.
Stefan

Hi Stefan,

I agree, this is a great solution to the missing multi-channel feature.
I am hoping to built a device which is working in 3-d in an octagonal soundfield. I liked the icst-ambisonic-objects, because of the monitor-feature, where it is possible to record movements ect......

best
pyro

LOFA
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Re: multi channel

Post by LOFA » Tue Feb 02, 2010 3:46 pm

I would love to see what people use this for. I will scratch my strictly live-set, rack-based workaround for now and investigate this approach. I will try and develop it into a 4.0 stereo, then into an x-y-z controlled 8.0 format.

Variable 360 degree formats for custom setups would be great. I wonder how much farther this code could be pushed.

Lastly, does anyone have a clean method for distributing this back into live across a the appropriate number of tracks? I was hoping to grab the out put in a new track for each stereo pair but I couldn't find a way.

pyrolator
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Re: multi channel

Post by pyrolator » Tue Feb 02, 2010 5:51 pm

I managed to use the ambimonitor from ICST (http://www.icst.net/research/downloads/ ... or-maxmsp/) to distribute audio within a 3-D-cube using the 8 sends in Live with M4L for a project I am working on. But this is no real ambisonics, its just panning between the speakers. Still waiting for the a possibility to get 8 seperate audio outputs in M4L.

pyro

LOFA
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Re: multi channel

Post by LOFA » Wed Feb 03, 2010 2:19 am

pyrolator wrote:I managed to use the ambimonitor from ICST (http://www.icst.net/research/downloads/ ... or-maxmsp/) to distribute audio within a 3-D-cube using the 8 sends in Live with M4L for a project I am working on. But this is no real ambisonics, its just panning between the speakers. Still waiting for the a possibility to get 8 seperate audio outputs in M4L.

pyro
I am looking for the same thing, and possibly a higher number. Still, this is very helpful. Thank you very much.

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