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  4. Lateral Thinking - would their be any point in this?

  • Lateral Thinking - would their be any point in this?

    Z
    Z
    This has been on my mind for a while, and being as this is world class orchestral site I thought I would share it.

    A couple of ideas....

    Would their be a point in integrating a score function actually into the VST? What I am imagiing is a single/split stave of scrollable four or eight bars, where one could atually write your sequence, select articulations for individual notes, see a controller lane below, and where there would be custom icons/ symbols to indicate factors which are not indicated in a traditional score. Such a display would be able to read a track from a sequenced score, and display the music in the VST so that you could see a VI customised display seeing what VI is doing to your notes. One would also be able to dump the data into the sequencer.
    Another advantage would be that, whatever the sequencer, whether score enabled or not, VI would be portable - learn once, use in Finale, Sibelius, Logic, SX, SE or whatever. All would be totally in house, and one would not have to cope with the foibles of various diverse score packages, though one could use them if desired - in this case simply ignore the feature.
    I see the main advantage of this idea as bneing that VI would have complete control over the display and would be able to customise the visuals according to the features of the program.

    Idea Two

    What about a "Phrase Memory", an encyclopedia of midi/VI phrases, that are saved with settings in the instrument. Basic chords and arpeggios, typical runs and glisses - all set up and ready to customise. Any phrase could be customisable and saved under another name, transposable, patch selectable, note alterable, invertable.

    All this needs a two way dialogue with the sequencer, but is it the future?


    Zero
  • J
    J
    Well, I don't really get Idea 2; or at least, it's not something I think I'd use (could still be a good idea, though).

    But Idea 1 is great! I'd actually imagined a VST version of Sibelius being really great, but this is, in many ways, better. I've been wondering for a long time when VSL would create a notation-based front-end, and this might be a great way of doing it. I don't, however, think it should be limited in terms of duration to a few measures. Think of apps like FLStudio, which is a complete sequencer in a VST. All it would need to be able to do is read locator info from the host, so that it remained in sync, started/stopped at the right place, and so on.

    That said, and given the scale and general philosophy behind MIR, I wouldn't be surprised if the ultimate Master Plan of VSL will be to create a standalone sequencer/score editor, with VI hosting, a network link to MIR, and a multitude of other brilliant features. That would be the ultimate dream come true for me! If they built the sequencer, then all issues of sample selection, integration with notation markings, memory management, etc., could be dealt with in one fell swoop. I wouldn't even begin to doubt that they've been considering this approach. Time will tell, I suppose.

    Anyway, cool idea!

    J.
  • Z
    Z
    Thanks for the reply J. Concerning your idea of VSL creating its own notation sequencer, I think my concept is better - because - You would not have to loose the sequencer you are comfortable with, If you want to ,say, use SX's many desirable features they are their to be had, if you prefer logic then you can use this. If VI created a standalone sequencer, surely it would not have all the engineering and synth features of the big boys, and even if it had then their would surely be something you would miss, be more comforatable with, in your pet sequencer.

    Yes Fruity Loops proves what is possible.

    One thing I did not say in the bit about a 'phrase memory' think of hte ease of cut and pasting runs glisses, chords, etc rather than tooling them in, think of the possibility of VI contructing a tweakable library of say clarinet runs - customised to the possibilities of VI and the characteristics of the instrument. This would also be a great learning tool in say learning how to write for the harp, solo violin etc etc..
  • J
    J
    Yeah, that's a good point about using your sequencer of choice. However, I'd be fine learning a new platform if it solved my major problems in one go... But yes, it's a good point. After all, I stayed on Finale not Sibelius for a good couple of years simply because I really didn't like the way it forced me to choose accidentals _before_ entering the pitch, which makes absolutely no sense to me (still). Finally, I had to jump ship because Finale 2006 just seemed like a complete mess, and the ability to write genuinely useful plugins in Sibelius was really tempting.

    Anyway, point taken. Idea 2 still doesn't really work for me, but I'm sure it would work for others. It's just not something I'd be likely to use.

    J.
  • D
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    @jbm said:

    Yeah, that's a good point about using your sequencer of choice. However, I'd be fine learning a new platform if it solved my major problems in one go... But yes, it's a good point. After all, I stayed on Finale not Sibelius for a good couple of years simply because I really didn't like the way it forced me to choose accidentals _before_ entering the pitch, which makes absolutely no sense to me (still). Finally, I had to jump ship because Finale 2006 just seemed like a complete mess, and the ability to write genuinely useful plugins in Sibelius was really tempting.

    Anyway, point taken. Idea 2 still doesn't really work for me, but I'm sure it would work for others. It's just not something I'd be likely to use.

    J.
    I think that it is highly unlikely that VSL would come up with a sequencer to rival the market leaders. The feature base of something like Nuendo takes huge number of man hours to program and test and I don't think VSL has the resources to deal with this. I'm still in favour of a Sibelius plug-in within Nuendo so that I can deal with some notation at the same time as sequencing.

    I understand your pain about the accidental thing in Sibelius, but I think that you only have a problem because you come from another program. It makes very good sense to enter an accidental before the pitch; after all that's what you do with pencil and paper.

    Regarding the phrase thingy, I think that this is partially what Synful does, and (sound quality aside) sometimes it works extremely well. In the end I don't want to deal with anything apart from a score; the workings (and sample selection) should be invisible, but currently we are a long way from that, I'm afraid.

    DG
  • J
    J
    "It makes very good sense to enter an accidental before the pitch; after all that's what you do with pencil and paper."

    hehe... that's kind of funny, because this is precisely why I don't like it this way; when I write on paper I draw in the note _first_, then put the accidental in front! Oh well, I guess there's no way they could please everybody, is there! [;)]

    I guess I agree with the point about VSL not wanting to produce a sequecer app to go up against the "market leaders". However, look at Intuem. That's a pretty slick program. It's cheap, and it has some great ideas figured into its design. They obviously didn't shy away from the competition, and kept their niche by offering an excellent product at shareware prices. VSL would obviously have their niche guaranteed by the fact that it would be proprietary, a bit like MIR will be (not that MIR is totally proprietary, but it will certainly work best for Vienna Instruments). Also, I don't see VSL as being in any way timid about going up against the competition or revolutionizing the market. A notation-based sequencer, whether standalone or VST, would solve all of the sample-selection problems you're talking about, as the score itself could specify absolutely everything, or at least, with some clever music analysis-based programming, could be made to specify everything. Also, it would be entirely possible to have a "non realtime" mode, in which _only_ the samples needed for the written score would be loaded, thus basically eliminating the memory problem. The "pros" are just too positive to ignore. Personally, I think Herb's up for it. [;)]

    Time may prove me wrong. And actually, even if they don't do it, I'm sure Herb is fully aware that this is basically the ideal way to resolve current limitations. The sampler has to know, in detail, what the score requires; not just "now", but right through to the end of the piece. With a score-based front-end, this is a no brainer. After all, the samples were recorded by players reading from score! Just map the markings used in the recording sessions to the markings available in the notation editor and you're done! Easy (tongue firmly in cheek).

    J.
  • D
    D
    If I was only using score based notation, never used samples/noises from any other sample company and didn't want to work to picture, the VSL sequencer would make sense. However as soon as you add other elements to the equation it becomes much more complicated. I'm not saying that I wouldn't want to change sequencer, but it would have to replace both Nuendo and Sibelius in order for me to consider it.

    Ideally in a sequencer I would have a notation front end for when that is what I'm doing, ability to work without bars or notation, features for film, advanced audio recoding and mixing and automatic articulation choosing depending on what I play or notate. Ideally with the live version this should be controlled by pitch and one other controller. Of course I would need the ability to override the sequencer's choice of articulation as well, but I have no problem with a quick and dirty way of programming, followed by a "learn" function that calculates what articulations I need based upon my playing.

    DG
  • J
    J
    Yeah, I guess I see your point... But a VST/AU score plug, with interpretation capabilities, wouldn't get in the way of the platform thing, like zerozero was suggesting. It would just be such a relief to deal directly with the samples through the score... Also, it could always have a MIDI file import function (drag and drop, too!), which would make it easy to use both for passages recorded into the host sequencer in realtime, and from Sibelius-based projects.

    Dunno, I'm obviously just dreaming, but it would make my life sooooo much simpler.
    I just wish we didn't always have to think as technicians/programmers _while_ were actually composing. I actually enjoy the tech/prog stuff on its own, just not while I'm composing.

    J.
  • Z
    Z
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    @Another User said:

    Also, it could always have a MIDI file import function (drag and drop, too!), which would make it easy to use both for passages recorded into the host sequencer in realtime, and from Sibelius-based projects.


    I dont think it would need adrag and drop feature, as it would 'read', in a scrollable fashion the bars x....y depending on settings.

    Lets try to visualise this thing...

    To recap I say a VST with scoring capabilites, ability to split staff, read from sequencer midi track, insert /edit notes, symbols, and custom icons for VI features as well. . A midi sequencer's control lane visible/ setable underneath, perhaps visualise a further page in a VI VST. Ability to read and dump to sequncer track

    Any refinements?

    Zero
  • Z
    Z
    The bold type above looks like I am "shouting" - I did not mean this it was just to highlight
    Zero