Ableton Forum

I have been using Ableton for some time now and have a good setup going. The more I get into it the more I want to spend time making all my control surfaces around me as mapped and automated as possible.

To this I mean I tend to jump in and out of projects quite a bit and I like having all manner of controls around me mapped to different functions. I have recently setup an iPad with both touch-able and touchOSC and started building control surfaces for the different kinds of projects I do (live DJFX mixing, score mixing and general studio work). I also have a launchpad, BCF2000 and other static controllers. I use my iPad mostly because I get realtime feedback from automated controls so when opening a project, all controls are set to their current states and I can just start mixing (love it).

One thing that now bugs me though. I have just purchased Omnisphere (which is awesome) and have started mucking around with it quite a bit. I am now to the stage that I want to create control layouts on the iPad to directly tweak volume, cutoff and other common tweaks in the plugin BUT I am having an issue getting the feedback. This is not spcific to omnisphere either.

Most VSTs you would use the Configure option for the VST loader in Ableton to map a VST control then MIDI map to this control. Your midi controller then sends the data to Ableton, which sends it to the VST and moves the control. This in turn can then send the MIDI data back you to keep your controller in sync when the control is moved on the vst (or you load a new project. Omnisphere, while it CAN map controls into Ableton, also has a direct MIDI CC Learn function which is nice and I can save the entire MIDI map within omnisphere and it will always work when loaded, but if I move the control in Omnisphere, the data does not get transmitted to my controller.

I would be quite happy to learn the 200 controls I want into Ableton BUT even when I create an instrument rack to save this configuration, the MIDI assignments are not saved. The only thing I can think to do would be to save a whole project as the default and always start with that which wouldn't work well since I don't know when I want to use Omnisphere.

Any ideas or suggestions to this little issue?

Cheers Funken

I have an MPD32 that has 8 auto-mapping pots which I use for the same that you do. I also like to have manually mapped controls because my main synth keyboard is over the right and I have to swing away from my control desk over to the keyboard where the MPD is out of reach.

I have an iPad and have been using toucOSC and love being able to whip uo a custom control surface in a few minutes, upload to the ipad and then map my controls in ableton. The ableton controls then update the ipad with current positions and off I go. Being wireless means it works anywhere I move and I tend to be all over the place some times when things get going.

For now I will just have to try and settle for fewer controls but with all the apps comming out on iPad and more synched control I can't help but want all the controls of the main instruments I purchase at my fingers... I guess the next step would be an actual real instruments with real faders and the what knots.