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Author Topic: XM Play Midi Plugin problems and suggestions  (Read 4323 times)
Ian @ un4seen
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« Reply #20 on: 20 Apr '11 - 15:55 »
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From my understanding, a soundfont with all stereo samples would have one sample for the left channel, and one for the right, thus, 2 samples would be playing for every note instead of one. Am I understanding correctly?

Yes, that is correct. As well as that, a preset/instrument can also consist of multiple layers, ie. multiple samples played together for a single note. So the voice count doesn't necessarily equate to the number of notes that are playing.

Also as you might have read, some of us were wondering about a tempo adjustment in the mixer window, but we are asking a lot of work.

The issue with changing the tempo is that it also changes the duration of the MIDI file, and the position displayed by XMPlay would no longer match the position being heard. For example, if the tempo is doubled, then when the position display shows 10 seconds, the MIDI file is actually at the 20 second mark. That messes up seeking, eg. moving the position slider forward could actually result in seeking backwards from the position being heard. If people are OK with that, it may be possible to arrange something Smiley

@Ian: Could you add a 'Max. & Peak Active Voices' indicator to the MIDI Mixer, so you don't have to look at the Active voices all the time. The 'peak' number is what most people need Smiley

OK, here's an update with the peak displayed...

   www.un4seen.com/stuff/xmp-midi.dll

The peak counter will reset when a new MIDI file is opened or the config changes.

Just to reiterate, it is the quietest voice that gets cut, usually a voice that's decaying/fading-out after a note has been released. Once you reach a high number of voices (eg. 200+), I don't think you need to be too concerned about cut voices, due to the cut voices being too quiet to hear over the other voices. All looping samples actually get cut eventually (even if there isn't a lack of voices) because voices decay logarithmically, which means they never reach total silence (0) by themselves. So it could be that a voice that's cut due to a lack of voices was about to be cut anyway due to reaching a very low level.
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raygrote
Posts: 19


« Reply #21 on: 20 Apr '11 - 22:47 »
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Hmm, that seeking thing could be a problem. I'd say put it in but let users know about it somewhere. I don't really know where, I'm not very familiar with the sight anymore.
 Smiley
I would only use it to hear a passage better, or to just see what something sounds like at a different tempo, or to practice with.
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oddiophile
Posts: 149


« Reply #22 on: 21 Apr '11 - 00:20 »
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The issue with changing the tempo is that it also changes the duration of the MIDI file, and the position displayed by XMPlay would no longer match the position being heard. For example, if the tempo is doubled, then when the position display shows 10 seconds, the MIDI file is actually at the 20 second mark. That messes up seeking, eg. moving the position slider forward could actually result in seeking backwards from the position being heard. If people are OK with that, it may be possible to arrange something

People who use this feature usually don't care about / don't use seeking Smiley

Seeking could be implemented with a 'workaround': auto-reset the tempo to the original value, seek to the desired position and then set the tempo back to the previous (modified) value.
« Last Edit: 23 Apr '11 - 06:13 by oddiophile » Logged
raygrote
Posts: 19


« Reply #23 on: 21 Apr '11 - 00:55 »
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Wow, that sounds like a good idea. Wouldn't it be a lot more work for XM Play to do though? I would think it would be a lot slower to seek then.
As you said, most people who use the tempo control probably aren't going to seek, at least while they are using amodified tempo. But it would be all the more useful if we could find a way to make it work.
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Ian @ un4seen
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Posts: 15244


« Reply #24 on: 21 Apr '11 - 15:05 »
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Implementing the seeking isn't really the concern (basically no modification required), it's more the possible user confusion. Taking the double tempo example I gave previously, with the position display showing 10 seconds and the MIDI file actually being at 20 seconds... if the user moves the position slider forward to the 15 second mark, then that is where the MIDI playback would move to, which is behind what the user was hearing (20 seconds) despite the slider being moved forwards.

Anyway, here's an update to try, with a tempo slider added to the "MIDI mixer" window...

   www.un4seen.com/stuff/xmp-midi.dll
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raygrote
Posts: 19


« Reply #25 on: 21 Apr '11 - 21:19 »
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Hi,
The update does work, but as you said the tempo and seeking causes problems. I thought of a suggestion to help though. Maybe when seeking, XM Play can calculate the new position and seek to that instead. You' would just multiply the position by whatever you have the tempo set to. So, if you have the tempo set twice as fast, you multiply the current position by 2, then add however many seconds it should seek, and go to that position instead.
Not sure if it can be done within XM Play or not though.
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oddiophile
Posts: 149


« Reply #26 on: 21 Apr '11 - 23:03 »
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Tempo Control works like a charm. Thanks for the kick-ass feature Smiley
Inaccurate seeking is not a problem, just a minor annoyance.

So with Tempo and Transpose control already implemented, the only things left to do are:

- A 'Bypass' checkbox to disable/enable the mixer processing (useful for doing an A/B compare) without changing/resetting the slider / button states

- Channel Instrument selection

- Loading / saving of the mixer state [custom presets] (very important)

- Global Chorus slider (optional)
« Last Edit: 23 Apr '11 - 06:16 by oddiophile » Logged
raygrote
Posts: 19


« Reply #27 on: 21 Apr '11 - 23:57 »
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Yep, I'd agree on those. But I would still be happy if this was the final version. The biggest things we are missing now are users who have been looking for something as good as this, especially that are free.
 Smiley
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Ian @ un4seen
Administrator
Posts: 15244


« Reply #28 on: 22 Apr '11 - 17:09 »
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The update does work, but as you said the tempo and seeking causes problems. I thought of a suggestion to help though. Maybe when seeking, XM Play can calculate the new position and seek to that instead. You' would just multiply the position by whatever you have the tempo set to. So, if you have the tempo set twice as fast, you multiply the current position by 2, then add however many seconds it should seek, and go to that position instead.

Unfortunately, there are problems that way too. One is that if the tempo is lowered, playback will last longer, beyond what can be reached by the position slider, so it would prevent seeking to positions towards the end of the MIDI file.

- Loading / saving of the mixer state [custom presets] (very important)

That is possible via the Saved Settings options ("Decoder" settings). If you want only the mixer settings included in the presets (eg. not soundfont config), you can specify that in the MIDI plugin config. The tempo setting isn't currently included in the saved mixer settings.

I'll look into the "bypass" option next.
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oddiophile
Posts: 149


« Reply #29 on: 23 Apr '11 - 06:24 »
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- Loading / saving of the mixer state [custom presets] (very important)

That is possible via the Saved Settings options ("Decoder" settings). If you want only the mixer settings included in the presets (eg. not soundfont config), you can specify that in the MIDI plugin config. The tempo setting isn't currently included in the saved mixer settings.

What I was talking about is a quick access dropdown box below the mixer controls  (so you don't have to open the XMPlay settings window every time you want to do this) and two buttons: 'Add' and 'Remove'. Pressing 'Add' prompts for a preset name and when confirmed with ENTER, the preset (just the mixer settings) is added automatically to the dropdown list. Selecting a preset from the dropdown box instantaneously loads the preset and adjusts the Mixer settings.
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