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Question for Dan and perhaps those who are interested.

Started by bluebeat, June 17, 2018, 04:46:17 PM

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bluebeat

Hi Dan.
I was trying to write numerous times to you directly, but there was no response.  So trying here, on the forum to see if you will respond.

I asked about this long time ago, and I spend many fruitless  hours in trying to find a workaround instead of making music.

I, and I am sure many users are using vArranger with soundfont banks. It should be possible to export
separate WAV files for each tracks.  Because your soft synth is proprietary to vArranger, it can not be used in DAWs.  Midi file exported to DAW from Varranger creates many discrepancies because it is not using the same synth.

You have the sound engine figured out already. It should be easy to have "EXPORT AS SEPARATE WAV" files option. I really (REALLY!) need this because  WAV mixes from Varranger
sound dull. Since many people agree that progressive development of vArranger stagnated, I kindly ask you in this open forum to implement this feature.

I had spent many hours trying to find a solution, using various  VST "synths" in DAWs to support SF2 banks. It does not work well. The only solution to create a more or less reasonable mix is to have these separate wav files from separate channels.

Please let me, and perhaps others know if you can make "EXPORT AS SEPARATE WAV FILES"
option in "rec" mode. 

P.s. Not sure how to appeal to your consciousness.... If you do this, I promise not to bother you again asking for any features. I am willing to pay to make this happen.

Thank you.

bluebeat

Hi Dan,
you replied to a newly joined person to forum in hours (who does NOT own Va), but you did not reply to my multiple emails in 7 days now, including this post, while I own 2 licences......

Even if you do not want to do reasonable and not complicated modification to VA that would save me and perhaps others valuable time, or simply because you do not like me, there is always a pollite way to do things....simply ignoring is  not one of them.


stewbow

Hi
I haven't switched my gear on for quite a while but read the forum posts every day.
Without wanting to get into a battle with anyone, my opinion is that the job VArranger was originally designed to do was to emulate a Ketron style playing keyboard.
As it has progressed, it now emulates all of the best style playing keyboards around and does a great job.
I bought the Sound Fonts and they sound brilliant.
I used Cakewalk from version 1 from back in the last century upto when they closed down a few months ago.
The problem was that it got caught up becoming as Bloatware Programme, trying to accommodate everything in one box.
I don't think that VArranger should go down the Bloatware route, I have experimented with a few VST's over the last 5 years or so and the "what works today, might not work tomorow" (after all , it is a computer) sydrome has kicked in so often that I have given up.
I know that more recently. a more VST accommodating version has been developed, but to me, that's more time to load up, more time to re-boot when it goes wrong, and nothing that I would ever consider using in a live set-up..
So to sum up, I, and I think most users are happy with using it for what it basically does best and if the odd the odd hammond organ VST works then great, but I am not expecting, nor am I wanting it to morph into a VST Solution, ,,,,,, maybe Dan feels that way too but doesn't want to upset anybody!!!

bluebeat

stewbow., 3 things come to mind:

1) You clearly did not get what I was asking for.
2) You are generally happy with the support of 350 Euro software
3) quote: "when they closed down a few months ago. (Cakewalk)"  You do not follow up on the progress. 

I will start with the last one.

#3 Cakewalk was sold to a very interesting gentleman investor / musician from Singapore. He released Cakewalk Platinum, FREE for everyone. So far his team had fixed huge list of bugs and features in Cakewalk, something that previous owner Gibson was to LAZY to do. It seems he is listening to his followers and CARES deeply about them. I had been using Cakewalk for 20 years.

#2 What I proposed will not ADD any extra buttons on the screen for you to get confused, just have one more option in "saving file as" in submenu.  I would not worry about vArranhger becoming next BIAB :)

#1 V arranger designed as a multi channel player / MIXER. It is common sense to be able to render audio, saving them as separate tracks like you would with MIDI (individual instrument track per channel), but only what I am asking is AUDIO to be saved as separate files.

P.S. Hardware modules are a dying breed. Yes, there are some fantastic things out there, but they are disappearing rapidly, giving a way to software versions. Your computer=is your module, only much, much better.

And final thing. I believe I spoke clearly of being polite. I find it just distasteful to ignore a true customer for days in exchange replying to random posts of non-customers.

Lylo

Hello and hello Bluebeat (do you know your user name is funny in aproxymative french translate  ;D )

I use vsti with vArranger since 8 years ago and it's ok for me and not for just a old organ. And I know Dan is happy to make vArranger with audio capacity. The problem with the Ketron filiation is only for make backward compatibility for the customers who don't use vsti. And I think is the reason for the sloweness developpement.

But you know what ? I think you doesn't use your brain enought for use the software, with the hardware you are limited but with the software you can obtain what you want wwith some little work and with the help of your brain.

Yesterday I use some vsti with audio input (a vocoder), for this result I use Akai VIP + Patchwork + Reastream audio. In my test all work fine, so I think it's possible to extract audio from vArranger.
The easy way is to record each track in solo, certainly it's fastidious but it's a choice of priority, cry in the forum or have a title in multi tracks in his daw.

And I don't say that in agressive mode, it's just because me to I want some features but it seems it's difficult for Dan to answer for all, I don't know his life but I know my life and when I want something I self made and it's why I like vArranger. (I used on stage sf2 and vsti before vAsynth include in vArranger)

bluebeat

Lylo.
vArranger already records WAV MIX. All I want is not mixed tracks. Separate Wav tracks.
If it is complicated (which I do not believe), nothing will fall off from Dan in answering that by being simply polite.


Lylo

Yes but if you record each track in solo mode you have 8 tracks accompaniement, I know it's fastidious but if you want "now" each track you can do that. But you have right if you want a live performance, my workaround is ok only for songchords.

bluebeat

That is exactly what I was doing for the past several month.

That cost me:
A) many fruitless hours of "monkey labor" instead of making music. (This is all about music right????)
Something that should take less than a minute, takes an average of 30 minutes.

B) I do not hear whole mix, so I have to record everything "dry" to add envelopes in DAW later.


Lylo

Yes, I understand but you know, we have many limitations with all products on the web. For example, I like the sound of Xpand2 and I use it in my electrojazz project, but Xpand2 work only with increase/decrease program change, so I encapsulate the vsti in VIP from Akai for have program change. It's a good way, yes but Xpand2 communicate only with channel 1 to 4 and VIP can use 16 channels and I want put another vsti in another channels, so I cannot drive only in channel one and I let in multi channel.... and Xpand2 don't play because it is in channel 13, so I must put Xpand2 in Patchwork for put a midichanneliser and have vArranger go to 13 in VIP to go for patchwork go to Xpand2.
It is vArranger who doesn't save the vsti state the ugly or Xpand2 with only four channels ? And it is Dan the bad worker or Air Music Technology the developper of the plugins of Protools ? I don't know, I have some dreams and the market give me some tools but I cannot modify their, just use it in a better way with my reflexion, I'm just happy to can do this because at 15 years ago it's impossible.

Dan

Hi Bluebeat,
Sorry for not answering I was a bit busy those days
Need to check but I don't think it is just a question of few lines of code to write to get 8 tracks exported in WAV format
By the way, it will not be 8 tracks, but 17 stereo tracks.
One for each of the 16 VST
Plus one for the vArranger Synth
When many midi tracks are sent to one VST, they has only one audio stream
Is it really what you want?

I am building actually for my own use a keyboard with a computer inside, and will go for the 100% virtual instrument route
I think that the hardware route and the software route are 100% in the field of vArranger

I also think saving VST states are actually more in priority than working on the multi wav export..................


Dan

I usually answer immediately to easy questions
When the answer need more research I let the email as unread for the moment I will have more time to answer

bluebeat

Dan, I am glad that at least you answered.
Ok, if not BULK export.  Can you at least make "render" song option, so it actually renders WAV (not records while playing) at full speed of CPU and not song tempo?

Please let me know.
thank you.



bluebeat

Dan,
ok, you do not want, or can not do "record separate WAV tracks."  I got it. I will continue with monkey work.
Can you maybe show a little bit of effort and kindness and fix this:

When I SOLO the track to record individual channels, actual recorded WAV file starts where sound of that track starts. 
For example, if arrangement track #3 starts on the 15th second of the arrangement, on the recorded WAV it starts on the first second, it does not record the silence before that.

Can you make it so that recorded solo tracks occupy full length of song arrangement. So when solo tracks are recorded, they all have a correct starting point so it corresponds to the song time....

kindly answer.

thank you.

bluebeat

Dan, still waiting to hear on this.
Can you please fix starting points when recording solo tracks, so they correspond to "song arrangement" timeline?
Now, they do not correspond to timeline.

Please let me know.

Thank you.

zeljko

I do it with contact 5 as vst and own soundbank. This is how each track works separately.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BzAegte1BH4

Lylo

Yes but I think bluebeat want use the vAsynth soundbank from Dan or sf2.
For sf2 I use Samplelord, for me the best soundfont player (with multi output) but we also have the freeware TX16W (and another).
But we can't use encrypted sf2 from soundbank vAsynth with this, also I think the best way is a own vsti from Dan for read only his soundbank and I think is not a big work because the sound engine is ready for this use.

bluebeat

Dan, kindly answer if you can fix correct starting times of solo tracks. I am waiting for your answer and hoping for a little customer help here.

Lylo, yes vst option of Vsynth would resolve this and actually is the best approach...it was proposed before.  But I do not have hope for this.

Samplelord does not output sf2 bank properly for me. The TX16 does not respond to program change and other issues. I tried that.




zeljko

Yes that's right. I also prayed to Dan that he make vagrander synth as VST with 16 outputs. That would be the best

Lylo

Quote from: bluebeat on June 24, 2018, 11:15:48 AM
Samplelord does not output sf2 bank properly for me. The TX16 does not respond to program change and other issues. I tried that.

Strange because I play on stage with Samplelord with Sde2 soundfont from Live Styler before arrival of vAsynth and I had just the only issue it is no effect.
And sorry but the TX16W can change the programs.

bluebeat


Dan

This feature is by design to start the recording when the first note is hit, so we don't have any blank on the record
I don't think tracks will be exactly in time even if you multi record them and start them at the same moment, as the clock of the first recording is not precisely the same as the clock of the second recording
Tracks can drift and not stay in sync together
Still need to find a better solution for you.
Maybe just export song chord midifile, and load it in your DAW
Setting 8 tracks of VST or SF2 for a song in the DAW is today the easiest solution for you

bluebeat

Dan, if there was a VST that can use same SF2 Bank in the same manner as your vsynth, I would never ask this. Of course there is a way to record form start...
Start point of recording = start button in Varranger. Press start = start recording. 

"Tracks can drift and not stay in sync together" I know that feeling very well as I was battling with it for several month. The only solution is have correct start point of start of the timeline of recording....

And of course best solution that would resolve ALL issues if vsynth is a VST. that could be used in other programs.  But this probably will never happen.


The mixed audio WAV from Varranger does not sound good in DAW. It sounds MUCH better when it is properly mixed in DAW using envelopes. For all "hardware" users that is a non issue. For SF2 users... well alternatives are not good.

stewbow

A Tyros 3 that I had many years ago had the option to send the audio out to 4 different channels.
I'm wondering whether there is something like an 8 channel audio interface that could be added to a system and then have VArranger able to select the 8 different audio out channels rather than just stereo.
I would use this setup to record into a DAW and mix and play around with the mix without any timing problems

bluebeat

stewbow... please do not get mad... but why in the world you would want to bring hardware into this equation? 
It will add those many "extra" things that naturally you want to avoid, like:

1)More latency
2)More things that can go wrong.. drivers, compatibility, resource conflicts, etc.
3)Specialized expensive hardware
4)wire cluttering.
5)More artifacts in sound quality.
List goes on....

There are many different approaches to solve this smart way like:
A) Make vSynth as a VST
B)Make the CORRECT starting point in outputted solo tracks, hopefully with fast rendering.
C)Adjust 3rd party VST sampler (NOT the 32 BIT outdated sample lord) to accept SF2 banks and play them correctly, so it acts as VSTi sound module regardless which DAW or other place you will use them.

And several other software approaches, a bit more involved.

#B should be not complicated for Dan at all.  But I do not believe he is eager to help his customers for "mystery" reasons. With most of the features that people are asking almost all get some sort of vague promise but almost all never get completed.

P.S. Lylo, you are VERY helpful at times, but kindly do not advocate for Dan, I know your opinion, but I am entitled to my opinion :)
If this was a 35 euro program I would understand the lack of desire to improve, but I feel that it is a false advertisement in the sense of "Get FREE Support"
statement from Dan, which is on the top right corner of this page. I do not believe that promises to "look into" mean "support" in English or French.

My hope is that Dan wakes up from this comatose and does some good deeds by following through some things that people were waiting for.






stewbow

Bluebeat, it's not in my nature to get mad, and I find these discussions really interesting.
I agree with you that the features you are asking for would be a good asset
But........ for me, and the way I record it wouldn't help.
Question,,,, Am I right in thinking that you want to build a song by inputing chords in VArranger (say in 8 tracks) and then be able to export the 8 WAV files to a DAW, so that when loaded into the DW the 8 tracks would be there complete?

Lylo

lol bluebeat  ;D you take some cautions with me because you afraid my answer.  ;D ;D

I think we can hope to have a vAsynth in vsti from Dan because it is a project before include it in vArranger. If it's possible for Dan to make a copy protection I think it's not to difficult for him to create the plugin.
So wet and see. :)
 

bluebeat

stewbow:
Yes, mostly you are correct.
All I want is to be able to export individual audio tracks with correct starting point and hopefully with  option of live or fast rendering.

Lylo:
If Dan confirmed that VST is coming  in the next 3-6 month I would shut up and wait quietly, knowing that unpleasant, time consuming monkey labor would stop.
I do not think this will happen, at least not in near future. I agree, vSynth VST is the most proper solution for many different tasks.

I have seen discussions of some people (not on this forum) who where thinking of buying Varranger and their biggest concern was that Dan is stubborn and not flexible in admitting mistakes and fixing issues. That they would be dependent on 1 person instead of a team.
Take Cakewalk as an example. I was able to get in contact with their chief engineer Noel and he is a polite and helpful gentleman. Cakewalk has a user base 1000 times larger than varranger and I was pleasantly surprised by personal approach.

I mentioned this before, if Dan does not have time to work on VA, he can make "pay per feature" approach. If enough people want something, the join and pay for code segment. I just find the current approach a bit tasteless, but at the same time I believe that there is always opportunity to make situation better. That is why I am not giving up as some folks who stopped visiting this forum or those who sold their licences for the reasons mentioned above.

Dan, I am sure you will read this. Do not get offended.
When I write songs and send them to my friends I do not want to hear how "good" they are. I want to hear truthful, healthy critique, so I can try to be better in what I am doing by at least acknowledging my mistakes and trying to improve.    I wish same to you..., to improve connection with your followers and keep this project alive.

Dan

I don't see what you are asking as a vArranger issue to fix, but more like new features you need to add. Isn't it?

bluebeat

Correct start time at of solo tracks in "song" is a FIX because timeline makes the song not the "first note" of particular track.

VST- is a only a wish, that probably will not come to life anytime soon.  VST of course will fix the STARTING time, because allmodern DAWs will record silence BEFORE first note of the track...And obviously be useful to more of your customers.


Dan

The goal of the vArranger's audio rec feature is to provide a simple way to record what you are actually playing into a WAV FLAC or MP3 file
When you press the REC button it start to record, but imagine you have waited 10 seconds before starting playing, you would have 10 seconds of blank before your wav starts
That's why I have added this nice feature to start recording when you play the first note
It does not fit your plans, but this is really not something to fix :)

Still thinking about the best solution for you

bluebeat

Dan, you done coding... I am not a coder, but even I know it is easily insertable.

One example separate functions in "PLAY" in song mode from "START" button on main window by secondary function.
Logic: IF rec is pressed and "PLAY" button in pressed in "song chords", WAV recording starts from first bar of song regardless of notes. In this scenario all other functions will stay the same. In the same manner if "REC SYNC" is pressed follows rule "record on first note" if not pressed records whole line.

Second example, a bit brutal, but easily achievable. Have option to insert note at 1st second of the first bar on each track at lowest velocity, non audible to human ear. And in the menu where you select "type of file" to be recorded Wav/ Flac / MP3 have a small checkmark "record complete timeline". This way it will not interfere with what you say is by "design".

My guess is that you having thoughts as to how to "end" recording..... I can end it manually. As long as I have correct starting points, that will be ok.

I am sure there are many other ways to make this happen. But it narrows down to:

A)Record complete solo tracks in Varranger.
B)Have vsynth as a VST which could be used independently in DAW and of course it will resolve these and many other issues. As I mentioned, all modern DAWs record silence from start.

This is not new. I asked you many month ago about this. I have thought about it for a long time. Yes, there are a crazy workarounds. But A or B are the common sense ones. #B of course will serve more of your customers and make VA more desirable.

Let me know.







bluebeat

Dan, still waiting for an answer.
This is very important to me to be able to record separate audio lines as audio from start as timeline dictates not from the first note.

I have spent great hours in trying out different synth, to be able not to be dependent from Varranger on sound once the arranging is done. None are working properly with multiple SF2 files.

All the mastering and mixing are done in the DAW. Varranger will never have these capabilities, nor it was designed to do true mixing with envelopes or chain effects and all other fun stuff.

You are refusing to make vsynth as a VST which would be ideal,  please make so at least recorded audio solo tracks start in proper position of the timeline.

Please respond. If you know that you will not do this, kindly reply as well, so my time and hopes are not wasted for nothing.

Thank you.

bluebeat


BjayG

Hi Bluebeat,

Sorry not to have responded before - but I've been away...

I will give you full credit here - you are at least persistent.   Do you mean "selective support" or "non-existent support".   Unfortunately, I honestly believe you are wasting your time - and I suspect you are very unlikely to get what you want (and maybe you should not as its probably of low priority to others).    Cajoling Dan will clearly not work - so I suggest you should think about giving up; or accept limitations on what you can actually do with vA; or even think about moving to another solution as many others have done.   Having read through this thread - I find it mind boggling the number of hoops people are going through to get the sort of solution they want.  That's not how it should have to be (or needs to be).

I actually now more than suspect that the only development that is going on is that which makes vA more useful for Dan's own specific requirements and his customers are actually secondary (and are used to fund his hobby!).  Indeed Dan seemed to inadvertently confirm this himself when he responded after you provoked him:- 

He wrote:

"I am building actually for my own use a keyboard with a computer inside, and will go for the 100% virtual instrument route I think that the hardware route and the software route are 100% in the field of vArranger".  This sort of thing does not just take 5 minutes - so its clear where the highly restricted/limited one man development resource is going.

The fact that Dan ignores you (many of us) when its anything other than a real fault or, more likely, a request for information which might result in yet another sale is the reality.   If the request is anything about further development, or a request to see some sort of plan - then the "silence is deafening"!  And Dan's comment about not responding on the forum until he has more information is frankly treating us all as fools. 

I'm really disappointed - but this increasingly seems not to be the professional program with a professional support many of us expected for its high price.

Barry

Dan

I am actually working on the saving of the SD1000 multi effect
I also see the saving of VST with song as a priority after the SD1000
I will not start any new projects before finishing those 2 features I am working on

They are the 2 features request that I have received the more often by vArranger users in my list (not counting the style creator)

I hope to finish SD1000 FX very soon

haweneu

Hi Dan,
very very good news!
I cant wait for your result :)

Best regards
Werner

bluebeat

Dan, 
the items you are describing do not take long to make.
If you are only "getting" to these things after people asked for them for many (MANY!) months... You can just be straight and tell me that you will not fix starting times. This "mystery" approach is not professional and a bit sickening. With your latest reply, I do not believe you will help me in any way to do what I asked for, to have the audio start, where it should start. Which (note start) was actually "added" as a "feature" by you, which can not be turned off by the user.

BjayG +1! You are very observing. I could not possibly put in more precise  wording.

To whom it may interest, a possible alternative to Dan's Vsynth please read my new post. I will put a title as "Alternative SF2 VST to Vsynth"
This thread is getting too depressing.

Lylo


stewbow

BlueBeat.
I have just experimented with the problem that you have.
I inputed 8 bars into the Song Chords, then Solo'd the Bass and recorded the mp3 file, Solo'd the Drums and recorded the mp3 file,Solo'd the Accompany 1 and recorded the mp3 file.
Then in Cakewalk I selected 3 Audio Tracks and imported the 3 mp3 files into the 3 audio tracks..
I struggled a little bit at 1st, but after setting the Tempo in Cakewalk to the same speed as the original track in VA it took me about 30 seconds to line up the tracks together.
I am estimating that if I did a full song of 3 minutes with 16 tracks it would take about 50 minutes to record and label the 16 mp3 files, another 10 minutes to load them into Cakewalk, and another 20 minutes to line them all up correctly.
That's 80 minutes it would take me to do the task.
Now I personally would rather get on with doing the pleasure of making music rather than behaving like a blind man in a dark room looking for a black cat.

bluebeat

Stewbow.
Lets start with mp3...... Why in the world mp3 for DAW when you have option of wav or flac?
There are plenty of acrobatics you can do, including hooking up 16 channel analog recorder to computer and then bouncing mix back to Cakewalk  ;) to get individual tracks.

2 ways described in this thread would be ideal.,
A) output individual tracks.with correct time start simultaneusly (did I get this word right?) With fast rendering.
B) vsynth as VST.

But Dan will not make them. He has better things to do...  <= Edited by Dan :  No sarcasms here please


That said,  I started discussion about VST by Synthfont that hopefully will be able to accept large, multi file SF2
Banks to be used in other audio programs with midi files from varranger. Hopefully it will be completed in 2-3 month. It works now with a single file SF2 bank pretty well, but owner promissed to tune it for multi file / large file use. Full working 64 bit VST DeMo available at synthfont.com



zeljko

Alles könnte er machen nur wenn er es will aber das ist nicht seine Interesse. Kauf dir ein von Transaudio Produkten und du hast deine Ruhe. Mindestens der Transaudio Erfinder verspricht das.
Schöne Grüße   

bluebeat

I feel, you did not understand the concept...
To use sounds elswhere you need synth. The problem is not the sounds, but a synth which will play arrangements in other software same way.  TA has nothing to do with synth, it is sound.  There are not many synths that accept large, multifile  SF2 banks and that will play GM standard correctly. Dan synth is one of them but NO VST to use other places.  The alternative synth I found, if you have interest you can read about in the thread titled: Alternative to  vasynth.

Best regards.


Ich fühle, du hast das Konzept nicht verstanden ...
Um Sounds überall zu verwenden, brauchen Sie Synth. Das Problem sind nicht die Sounds, sondern ein Synthesizer, der Arrangements in anderer Software auf die gleiche Weise spielt. TA hat nichts mit Synthesizer zu tun, es ist Sound. Es gibt nicht viele Synthesizer, die große, multiple SF2-Bänke akzeptieren und GM-Standard korrekt wiedergeben. Dan Synth ist einer von ihnen, aber KEINE VST, um andere Orte und den anderen Synthesizer zu verwenden, den ich fand, wenn Sie Interesse haben, können Sie über im Thread lesen, der betitelt wird: Alternative zu vasynth.

Freundliche Grüße.

P.S. Ich bin kein Moderator, aber das ist ein englisches Forum. Versuchen Sie, Google Übersetzer zu verwenden. Es funktioniert wie Magie.

zeljko

I completely understood what you wrote here. The author of TA promises that TA can do all that and much more. I do not have TA myself, I only write what he says.

I also need a Vst to play the benches in Studio One and to be able to record every single track.