@clruwe said:

 But wouldn't it be lovely if we could do it straight on a score? A panorama type view that has MIDI controllers below the staff... Mmmmh... I'm drooling...

Yes, this would fill the gap between notation and sequencer packages. There is room for a new class of control lane editing tools like "anti-machine gunning" or sfz scaling. I feel that Notion took a step in the right direction, with their controller lanes, but they did not develope any useful editing tools. Randomizing tools, like Frank's midi plugin, could help with that staccato problem: put gaussian variation on the length of the notes.

How is VST expression preventing you from randomizing? How are you randomizing without it?

I am not disagreeing, but not understanding. If you don't mind elaborating, it may help me a great deal. I agree with the comment about Notion having the right idea, but lacking proper 'editing tools'. Spot on.

I simply want to use notation LIKE I use Cubase. VST expression is simply an articulation switcher to me, nothing more. VST expression is great for the piano roll, but there are 2 problems. 1) It is NOT dynamic at all. I'm not talking expression, but the lanes are very stuck. If I could expand a stacatto menu or an even more intuitive approach to having so many matrices in VI Pro- this would be great. 2) VST expression is a MASSIVE screen hog. I have 40 different articulations taking up WAY too much space (and yes, I use them all! I could use much more really). Notation is FAR more friendly to screen real-estate. I have multiple instruments SEPARATELY on one page. I have a dot as an articulation, a line, a word, etc. These are FAR less intrusive than an entire line for legato stretching across the whole window. Your screen real-estate is directly impacted by the number of articulations you have. With Notation, it isn't. I can't stress how much that matters, the fact that I THINK in notation NATURALLY matters, and that as a composing tool (as I hate using paper, I lose it, I'm disorganized, etc.) this would save me SO much time and headache. I could compose in Sibelius without decent sound, then move it over... but this only takes more time again, which is what I'm wanting to eliminate.

-Sean

@iscorefilm said:

I simply want to use notation LIKE I use Cubase. VST expression is simply an articulation switcher to me, nothing more. VST expression is great for the piano roll, but there are 2 problems. 1) It is NOT dynamic at all. I'm not talking expression, but the lanes are very stuck. If I could expand a stacatto menu or an even more intuitive approach to having so many matrices in VI Pro- this would be great.

The only experience I have with VST Expressions is, I helped a student very briefly with a project. There was a lane in the piano roll in his Cubase project, 'articulations' which was from VST expressions. If you need an 'articulations' lane for each articulation, it seems like a problem to me. It seems like there were more than one in the one lane but I'm foggy, I didn't use it as I wasn't using his VSL instruments. What you want is to explode or collapse an articulations lane... seems like a very useful feature.

I am suited to how it works now well enough, as I don't think in notation anymore. I keep my hand in with teaching... If I were to prepare a score from what I have, it would be a whole workflow, quantizing it and getting rid of all the keyswitches. Notation and realistic sequencing are just very different animals. When I started sequencing I did conceptualize it in notation, wrote in Finale and exported a .mid and brought it into a sequencer. The result was so robotic and the amount of work to make it breathe or live was so daunting I abandoned that idea.as a waste of time. I need the sound to know what to write anyway. It's come a ways since then; I don't know Notion 3 but if I was doing notation I would opt for that.

I have a 23" display monitor on my master (and one on my slave) machine and I use generally 8 controller lanes in Cubase, and more than that will be too much.

For me VST expressions was very attractive on paper, but in practice, no, I don't use it. There have been problems of the implementation apparently...

As per program changes, you can open up a lane for it in Cubase and it simply works in my experience. I've used it instead of KS for matrix switches. Visually I'd just as soon use a KS as I'm making that decision along with dimension switching.

If my living depended on both, I would want a partner on the notation end. I was impressed by the material on the Notion 3 website, but... I may be proved wrong by its actual implementation, but I'm not in favor of conflating the two workflows in one software, it's too much to go wrong in my estimation.

@iscorefilm said:

How is VST expression preventing you from randomizing? How are you randomizing without it?

I am not disagreeing, but not understanding. If you don't mind elaborating, it may help me a great deal. I agree with the comment about Notion having the right idea, but lacking proper 'editing tools'. Spot on.

-Sean

I have a 27" and as much as I love it, I want to get a a large format display. There will never be enough space! lol

You're mention of a controller lane peaked an idea. One could use a combination of a lane AND the VST expression lane. If a controller affected which 'row' VIP selected, you could have 5 or so rows. Shorts, Longs, FX, etc... and then have only 10 or so choices in the VST expression lanes. This would save a LOT of space, and possibly some hassle. The only problem is that I don't know how I could organize it to work for me. The 'shorts and longs' idea isn't to my liking, but an example. Plus, one would lost the naming scheme for VST exp. as the single controller lane would change the sounds, not the names on the VST exp. lane.

I just thought I'd post this idea, whether you or anyone else may find it useful. I can't think of anything else right now... but it seems to have potential to solve some of my issues with screen real-estate and my desire to increase my template capabilities. 5 different options via a controller and 10 via VST exp. would be 50 articulations! Imagine 50 on a VST exp. lane... not good. Of course, Steinberg could just implement my menu idea... but how often do companies take every good suggestion? I don't blame them as I realize developement is complicated, but it'd still be nice!

-Sean

@clruwe said:

I need two Bb clarinets and I only have one in my library, then the KS will sound very unnatural because no two clarinet players in the world will play exactly like the next one. So, when I'm working in a sequencer (from a score that comes from a notation program), I'll just take one instrument at a time and edit the performance as if they were reading a part. Consequently one clarinet may use the KS but the other one will be shorter notes (normally the second one) so when you play them together they sound more real, more inaccurate as real musicians sound.

I don't mean to bother you more if you are busy. By all means, if you don't want to reply to this, don't feel obligated.

But... lol, I don't see any reason you couldn't still use VST expression. Whether it's Violins, clarinet, or anything. You have a single instrument. To prevent phasing issues, I use sustain instead of legato on the second instrument... then I ajust the attack and decay to sound like legato. (I only recently started playing with attack and decay... while things will take forever now, the control over the sound is phenominal and I should have a lot time ago!!)

Anyway, the point is that you get two different recordings this way, plus I mess with the filter, or eq, or other things to give them a slightly different sound... There are also plugins out there to change things up for you also, but I haven't played with them. If all VSL instruments were recorded solo and divisi sections, this would be amazing! But in the mean time, there are enough articulation choices in the basic libraries that you never really need to play the same articulation to get the same basic performance (for most instruments anyway, strings are harder, imo)

If you reply, I'm wondering if that wouldn't work for you.

-Sean

for vertical dimension I use a switch, eg., 64 where there are two and a continuous controller if there are more than two, rather than KS. it's a much more obvious visual reference, which program change would be for me as well, I just use KS since I have the pencil tool in hand when I make these decisions.

also in VIP you can time stretch any patch and you have variance right there. say your 'lead' clarinet is more precise with a staccato, use a 95% 'stretch'... if you want you can create a whole section each with their own approaches.

@iscorefilm said:

I don't mean to bother you more if you are busy. By all means, if you don't want to reply to this, don't feel obligated.

But... lol, I don't see any reason you couldn't still use VST expression. Whether it's Violins, clarinet, or anything. You have a single instrument. To prevent phasing issues, I use sustain instead of legato on the second instrument... then I ajust the attack and decay to sound like legato. (I only recently started playing with attack and decay... while things will take forever now, the control over the sound is phenominal and I should have a lot time ago!!)

Anyway, the point is that you get two different recordings this way, plus I mess with the filter, or eq, or other things to give them a slightly different sound... There are also plugins out there to change things up for you also, but I haven't played with them. If all VSL instruments were recorded solo and divisi sections, this would be amazing! But in the mean time, there are enough articulation choices in the basic libraries that you never really need to play the same articulation to get the same basic performance (for most instruments anyway, strings are harder, imo)

If you reply, I'm wondering if that wouldn't work for you.