Syncing ipolysix (or any other app) to BM2 through Audiobus

Comments

• dwarman

  March 2013 edited 2:39PM

  You are up against several issues, and it is not true that they apply to pretty much any other App, either. Every App has individual sync characteristics.
  
  iPolysix does not implement any MIDI out (at least, only its In port shows up in other Apps including MidiBridge and BM2), and only implements MIDI In on channels 1 - 8. No sync, start, stop, or clock. So it cannot be synced with BM2. I experimented with transferring song tracks from it to BM2 and the process is, to put it mildly, tricky. Doable, but tricky, with several manual steps per track. Even then you have no real guarantee its BPM will match other sequencers when you come to add them in to the mix.
  
  BM2 does not separate Record Arm from Start, so you cannot arm it to record and start it from another App with MIDI Start using the BM2 clock. You can if you set BM2 to use Clock In. As long as your control App does not generate clock until you press its Start button.
  
  So far I have not found an App that actually specifies its behavior in regards to sync. BM2, for example, only refers to "Clock" without mention of whether or not it responds to or generates the MIDI transport control messages Start. Stop, Continue, or Song Position Pointer. I have empirically found it only does Continue and Stop. Or it is treating Start erroneously to mean Continue. The MIDI spec requires the Start response to start playing at measure 1, not wherever the cursor happens to be. BM2 does not do this when sent Start.
• antonleroy

  March 2013 edited 2:39PM

  Great reply, thanks.
  
  So the workaround that you must be referring to is....render a wav file from ipolysix for each mixer output by soloing each mixer channel and bouncing it. Just add all the tracks separately into DAW of choice, and they should all be lined up, and hopefully BPM matching works out after....correct?
  
  Which then begs the question....is there an easy way to get those tracks into BM2 without resorting to iTunes?
  
  Also, is anyone else having stuttering problems with ipolysix audio into BM2 through audiobus? I'm running lean, airplane mode on a new-ish ipad4, played with latency settings, changing order of launching the apps etc etc. Let me know if there's something I can do. I just find the big-name synth apps (korg, animoog...) tend to cause more problems than the 'smaller' guys eg magellan, nlog....
  
  Peace
  
  Anton
• dwarman

  March 2013 edited 2:39PM

  Actually you can do it all into BM2.
  
  Another post pointed out that the recent upgrade to iPolysix introduced CC mapping to various functions, including in particular CC #111 on Ch 1 to set (>=64) or clear (<64) the Seq Play state. A half-assed solution instead of using the already defined MIDI Real Time messages Start and Stop, but it kinda works.
  
  So to get ready for transferring a song from iPolysix to BM2 follow these steps:
  
  1: run AudioBus
  2: select BM2 as output
  3: switch to BM2
  4: New Project
  5: Add an Empty Keyboard Sample instrument. This will control iPolysix sequencer.
  6: Edit its MIDI controller mappings to set Keyboard Send 4 to controller #111
  7: switch to Audiobus
  8: add iPolysix as input
  9: switch to iPolysix and load up the song you want to transfer
  10: switch to BM2 and set its BPM to match iPolysix
  11: Open the BM2 track window
  12: BM2 should have created track 3 with the name iPolysix for you, it should already be record armed.
  13: in draw mode, add a measure at the start of the keyboard track.
  14: Edit the measure (double-tap it), select Keyboard Send 4 via the event menu bottom right
  15: draw in a single event at the start of the measure with maximum value
  16: close the editor, back to track view, and select Navigate mode
  18: switch to iPolysix, open its mixer, and mute tracks 2-8.
  19: switch to BM2, make sure its record head is at the start of the song
  20: tap record. the one unmuted track should then show signal at the bottom track and the red content bar growing as it records.
  21: Stop BM2 when the song finishes. The track audio will be written to file (in Content/Recordings) and its waveform should appear in the track.
  22: turn off the record arm for the new track.
  23: add a new audio track, ope its config and sekect iPolysix as its inut and arm it for recording
  24: repeat from step 18, muting the track just reordi==ed and unmuting the net one.
• dwarman

  March 2013 edited 2:39PM

  You might want to rename the tracks later and put them in the project folder instead of Content/Recordings. Double click each track content in turn to get to the sample editor, the tap the gear icon top left and choose "save as". Saving as to a different location and name will update the project to use the new file for you.
  
  You might want to delete the old files from Recordings after you've done this. There does not seem to be a file manager per-se, so you have to do a "Save As" again, but this time in the resulting file dialog navigate to the Recordings folder, tap "edit files", tap each name in turn so they all get highlit, then tap "Delete" and "Yes" to get rid of them. Cancel out all the way so you do not accidentally also mess up the track you used to get there and save your project.
• antonleroy

  March 2013 edited 2:39PM

  1000 thank yous for the reply. You obviously know your shit.
  
  Your instructions were spot-on, and they worked, with a couple of quirks unfortunately -definitely unrelated to the quality of your advice:
  
  1) The seemed to be some latency from the MIDI CC to the start of the audio track. I'd say between half and 3/4 of a beat.
  
  2) The audio from ipolysix came with random pops and clicks here and there (I tried more than once).
  
  3) something new I've caught through this deep dive - BM2's drum machine (most noticeably on the hip-hop banks) introduces noise while a pad is 'lit up' during a pattern. It took me some time to figure this one out. Even when you've exited the drum machine, the noise coincides with when it's corresponding pad is lit up. This is especially noisy on the hip-hop bass drums, but the hats also seem to introduce this too. Anyone else pick this up? It's like you have your beat, and there's this extra noise going on....it's when the pad-lights are on......
  
  Again dwarman, thanks a mil.
  
  Anton
• antonleroy

  March 2013 edited 2:39PM

  Edit for last post.....#3 happened while using Audiobus, not standalone.
  
  Peace
  
  A