Ideas for your ideal Live controller

[ashtonron]

My ideal controller would be a 8x8 monome for firing clips with the ability to scroll up/down left/right for more tracks/clips. Each pad would have feedback to indicate the current state. e.g. triggered/on/off/loop and there would be transport controls for start stop etc.

knobs can be handled elsewhere

You can program a Monome to do this right now... fyi.

Scrolling can be done with button presses assigned to the Monome (4 buttons). That would leave the rest of the row for shift states (scene selection)

This would give you 8x7 buttons on a monome 64. PLus the shift states, that would be 224 buttons.

I am experimenting with using my monome with dummy clips for fading, and effects. I have almost figures out how to eliminate the need for KNobs and sliders by programming variations using dummy clips.

I HIGHLY recommend the monome.

Cheers

I really want to get one, but I cant afford to buy Max/MSP as well and I dont really have time to start programming and setting things up. It would be nice to be able to get a working solution out of the box.

I think an ableton clip matrix product would sell very well.

[8O]

I think the answer is staring us in the face:

no midi out. one review "sounds like a nintendo that somebody's stepped on"

Where's my obviously joking font?

[zeropoint]

You don't need to get Max/Msp as well. There are various free utilities available to use with the Monome 40h. I use a utility called Monogrid, coded with Chuck. This gives you 8 grids of 7 x 8 buttons, selectable via the first row of buttons and all sending midi to Live and receiving feedback.....

I have a couple of grids for launching clips
One for dummy clips
One for jamming on cut up loops, sliced with follow actions
One for clips and other controls in Livid Union
One for midi control clips running in a second copy of Live and piping out to Livid

and still got a couple of grids up the sleeve for other stuff........scenes etc.

Total of 448 controls plus another 448 accessed by holding the grid select button at the same time as pressing one of the launch buttons. The buttons stay illuminated while the clip is playing and even flicker at the loop point of the clip.

Someone will have to try pretty hard to better the monome as a grid matrix for use with Live........

[zeropoint]

double post ....deleted....

[hambone1]

My ideal controller would be an economical Lemur without all of the nuclear physics bells and whistles, bouncing balls, OSC, LAN, etc.

Just multiple user-configurable touchscreen pages of MIDI controls with buttons, faders, sliders, and labelling.

[Angstrom]

this was a first draft of a theoretical midibox project

long time ago, but I think it needed two brains and a number of input boards to handle all the knobs and buttons -

basically a mackie control type thing with a clip/scene launching system above..

"modular" in the sense of being rackmounted, and trying to use similar pcb's in different spots - and having "sub-rack-mounts" so you could put different elements in different places

you are familiar with the (yet to be released) Vestax VCM600?



An Ableton specific controller, supposedly developed in close partnership with Ableton.
http://www.wiretotheear.com/2008/01/24/ ... ontroller/

[forge]

^^^ cool! from the same page:

[8O]

An Ableton specific controller, supposedly developed in close partnership with Ableton.
http://www.wiretotheear.com/2008/01/24/ ... ontroller/

That's the one I was thinking about! Cheers!

Edit: 400 quid, what's that, about EUR 600? Available in July, hopefully. Oh well, there goes my summer holiday fund...

[pulsoc]

Nice!

ok.. thats what i'd be happy to have and its pretty simple. basically a uc-33 with a grid of scene launch buttons. also, mute, solo and arm for each channel, cue knob, and very important, those little arrows - it scroll to the next 8 faders on the right, or next clips on top/below/right/left, next send knobs, next 2 return tracks, etc. the actual controlled functions in live will highlight, so you know exactly where you are in the GUI.

i have a doepfer Pocket Dial which i find a great concept.
http://www.doepfer.de/pd.htm
4 groups of 16 knobs, 8 of them i dedicate to automap, the rest can be assigned and modified. ableton might consider something similar as a modular controller to compile the big board. but really, there are enough knobs in the market.

this one-knob mouse is a cool idea.. but its just one knob at the time, right..? its a very crippled tweak potential.. nice to have, but no substitution to a real board.

[ashtonron]

You don't need to get Max/Msp as well. There are various free utilities available to use with the Monome 40h. I use a utility called Monogrid, coded with Chuck. This gives you 8 grids of 7 x 8 buttons, selectable via the first row of buttons and all sending midi to Live and receiving feedback.....

I have a couple of grids for launching clips
One for dummy clips
One for jamming on cut up loops, sliced with follow actions
One for clips and other controls in Livid Union
One for midi control clips running in a second copy of Live and piping out to Livid

and still got a couple of grids up the sleeve for other stuff........scenes etc.

Total of 448 controls plus another 448 accessed by holding the grid select button at the same time as pressing one of the launch buttons. The buttons stay illuminated while the clip is playing and even flicker at the loop point of the clip.

Someone will have to try pretty hard to better the monome as a grid matrix for use with Live........

This sounds just like what I want... order request placed. Will probably have to wait 2 years though

[jamez666]

note the crossfader is in the right place!! (shame on you Vestax!)

[longjohns]

That vestax looks pretty good, I remember when someone posted a thread on that

It would be better with 8 strips, I think. and a button grid somewhere..

[Angstrom]

That vestax looks pretty good, I remember when someone posted a thread on that

It would be better with 8 strips, I think. and a button grid somewhere..

yeah, completely.
it seems very odd to design something "in close consultation with Ableton" and not have a clip grid. 8x8 even. Surely that's one of the big things that all users want.
In that recent vid Robert says something like "we decided not to persue constructing an Ableton controller because everyone wants different things, excpet perhaps the clip grid (of the monodeck) , yes would be the main thing" .

I think that's the main 'ableton specific' part anyone ought put on a controller, I mean faders and pots are hardly groundbreaking. They really missed something there.
Also this whole "DJ" thing, that's just not for me, I never have been and never will be a DJ, so a lot of that stuff just passes me by.
The 1 time I have ever touched Abletons crossfader was to see how the curve menu was handled, I really can't see the point of it. Scratch perverts will all use latency free hardware, multi-channel people will surely use channel faders.

[longjohns]

maybe "in close consultation" was Ableton saying "everybody wants something different"

IOW "make whatever you want"

[sweetjesus]

usership is divided into three primary segments:

DJ/remixer, taking existing material and modifying it.

Electronic musician/composer, writing new music and designing new sounds.

Theorist/educator, establishing new models for understanding music.

Recording engineer/sampler, capturing live performances or found sounds

you forgot to add, 'ones who cant count to 3



just having a dig
lol