Start point editing and loops within items.

vovvov
edited January 2019 in Feature Requests

Or am I missing something again?
To recap what I would like to see there:
1. Start/end loop markers in pattern edit mode.
2. Preferably independent for each pad.
3. Possibility to move the playhead.

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Comments

  • It’s a highly requested feature, but it’s not yet been added

  • Oh, ok. Would also be great to have independent loops for each pad.

  • edited January 2019

    You don't need a start bracket, the start is the start of the item, the end bracket is the end of item length, items don't loop at all.

  • I beg to differ, those could be very useful to create different rhythmic variations.

  • ... And for editing of long patterns too.

  • edited January 2019

    Ok you are missing the point, items dont loop, that is not a loop bracket in your image.
    So its impossible to create loop variations, it is just the item end point.

    What you are requesting is valid, loops within items, what you screen grabbed is nothing at all to do with that.

    As for editing long patterns, yes item start and end points would be great, again, that is nothing at all to do with item loops though.

    Both ideas are very good but very different ideas.

  • I have changed the title of your thread to show your two requests and moved to feature requests too ;)

  • vovvov
    edited January 2019

    Thank you, I didn't know that. Is that "items don't loop" thing an inherent property of BM engine? I don't quite get it. When I play a pattern, it goes to the end bracket and starts again , that sounds like looping to me, so I'm still definitely missing something here. And by the way I can't move play head in pattern edit mode too.

  • edited January 2019

    Here’s a summary of findings I made whilst researching patern lengths/loops for my book - apologies the text is not very well-written atm, these are just my rough notes:
    (As far as I can tell very little of this is in the official manual/documentation)

    • When in the pattern editor, there is no such thing as LOOP handles. The bar along the top - a GREY bar with a handle on the right end - only shows the end point (current length) of the pattern (as it appears on the timeline). Extending or shortening this bar only has an effect on the instance of the pattern in the timeline you are currently editing. (This also explains why there is no need for a handle on the left edge)
    • Patterns also have a DURATION value (set initially when creating a new pattern) and this value can only be seen in the pattern helper (below the pattern name)
    • The pattern DURATION determines (a) how long the pattern will be when you drag it to the timeline, and (b) how long it will play before looping in Scenes mode.
    • You can modify the pattern DURATION using two techniques: (1) by editing the pattern settings via the pattern helper (although this technique only support ‘whole bar’ values, or (2) by activating the COLOURED LENGTH EDITOR, which allows you to set a very precise pattern length between whole bars, and enables the use of polyrhythms in Scenes mode. You activate this COLOURED LENGTH EDITOR by editing the pattern via Scenes mode.
      .

    Notice the DURATION and grey bar have no connection

    When in the Song arranger the grey bar works as a loop marker (nothing to do with patterns) which is why there are handles at the beginning and end. Notice also I have dragged the patten out to 4 bars, but this also has no effect on the DURATION value

    Modifying pattern DURATION via the pattern helper, but the controls here only support +/- whole bars, and you can’t doube-tap to enter a precise value)

    Activating the COLOURED LENGTH EDITOR via Scenes mode allows you to set a precise DURATION that is somewhere between whole bars, such as 001:1:0 which I’ve set for Pattern 1 in all 4 of these screenshots - which is equivalent to 1 bar and 1 beat (or 5 beats)

    If I switch back to Scenes mode you see that the DURATION of 001:1:0 is being used, and my pattern now loops every 5 beats (enabling polyrhythms if I add patterns of different lengths on a separate bank)

  • Did I miss anything @5pinlink ?

  • Yeah, three dots at the bottom used to have duration too, is that gone ?
    Im not at pad.

  • Yep - you can also bring up the pattern settings (duration, duplicate, rename, clear, delete) via the 3 dots at the bottom, but you are still only able to adjust by +/- whole bars.

    The only way to set unusual pattern duration is by activating the 'coloured bar' as in the 4th screenshot above

  • Yeah that isnt strictly true either, in song mode you can just turn grid to free and resize an item to any size you want.
    So you can free size two ways ;)

  • Resizing an item has no effect on Duration.

    But you're welcome to prove me wrong ;)

  • To recap what I would like to see there:
    1. Start/end loop markers in pattern edit mode.
    2. Preferably independent for each pad.
    3. Possibility to move the playhead.

  • edited January 2019

    @tk32 said:
    Resizing an item has no effect on Duration.

    But you're welcome to prove me wrong ;)

    Ok consider yourself proven wrong ;)

  • Damn youtube has that end frames bug back again, needless to say when i shorten that item at the end, the duration changes too, i do go in to the item, but mehtube

  • Adjusting the pattern length in the song view doesn't change the pattern duration setting. The pattern duration setting determines the duration in scene view as well as the duration of the pattern when it's placed from the track helper/pattern list.

  • edited January 2019

    Thanks @ronji

    ...and that's exactly what I explained in my lengthy post above. I don't think 5pin read it :p

    @5pinlink your video only proves that dragging out a pattern in the sequencer moves the END MARKER for that particular instance of the pattern. As Ronji says, DURATION is a property of the pattern itself, and completely independent of the end marker (see my screenshot above which shows end marker as 002:0:0 and duration as 001:1:0 for proof)

  • My mistake, I thought we were talking about patterns in song mode, not scenes.
    Time for me to take a break from the forum i think.

  • edited January 2019

    Wait, can you only adjust the pattern to something like 5 bars in Scenes mode? Thought you could do it in the pattern mode. But i never use Scenes mode. Interesting stuff @tk32. Off to try it out.

    ... oh what I wouldn't give to be able to move the playhead in pattern editor.

    One workaround is to just get really comfortable with the Rewind button and how far it jumps back with one press or two presses and so on. (Anyone know if there's a set metric there?) It works pretty well in the mean time til that feature is added.

  • edited January 2019

    So either duration is broken and buggy, or having a duration setting for patterns in song view is the stupidest UI design i have seen in software in many years, if it works how you suggest, that is entirely redundant.
    Surely that duration control should be for a patterns duration in song view, or it needs removing from the UI, it is duplication and redundant.

  • From what I can gather, DURATION has two purposes only:

    1. To determine when the pattern loops in SCENES mode
    2. To determine how long the pattern instance is when youfirst draft it to the timeline in SONG mode.

    That's all. The Great thing about point #1 is that it enables polyrhythms in SCENES mode. A bit like @brambos 's awesome Euclidean sequencer.

  • edited January 2019

    Okay just tried it. It works both ways..via the pattern editor from Scenes mode or from Song mode. cool. like i said i never use Scenes mode so thought there might be some special pattern mode there.

    @tk32 Guess i was confused by your 4th screen shot and your notes where you say more precise pattern editing allowing polyrhythms etc is only available via Scenes mode. But the same can be done in the pattern editor via Song mode. ... unless these are notes strictly from the Scenes mode part of your book.

  • edited January 2019

    @BitterGums I definitely need to re-write/re-word everything to make it easier to understand :)

    Polyrhythms have always been possible in SONG mode, but there has been a misconception in the past (myself included) that SCENES mode only works in whole-bar units (which is not true). If you can find a way to set your pattern's DURATION to a value that is between whole bars (such as the the 5-beats/001:1:0 in my screenshots) then SCENES mode will honour that setting and loop every 5 beats.

    Like I said - I think this will make more sense once I've figured out how to explain it properly and do a little more research into the finer points. The thing that confuses me most is how the horizontal bar has 2 different modes:
    most of the time it is grey - which means it only controls the END POINT for this instance of the pattern. Other times it is COLOURED (matching the bank colour) and when this happens you can adjust the end marker to set completely custom DURATION settings.

  • edited January 2019

    These two images might help a little to explain:

    Image 1 - showing pattern editing in SONG mode

    Image 2 - showing pattern editing in SCENE mode

  • So theduration property via the three dots in song mode should be removed then, it is neither unique to song mode or even useful becauae when in scene mode there are other ways to get to that property.

    Personally i always assumed that that was just for the selected pattern in song mode and only effected song modes patterns, which would have been useful to some.

  • 'Duration' also determines the default pattern size when dragging to the timeline, so it is still somewhat useful — even if you hardly ever use Scenes mode (like me).

  • edited January 2019

    @tk32 said:
    'Duration' also determines the default pattern size when dragging to the timeline, so it is still somewhat useful — even if you hardly ever use Scenes mode (like me).

    So how is that useful ?
    Before dragging to the timeline the pattern has the three dots directly on it, so you can access that same panel.
    Duplication, redundant.

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