NAMM 2015: DP9

[stubbsonic]

I don't because I have snap-to-grid off by default. How to do this is on page 317.

Two-handed mouse/trackpad moves are not in my repertoire. If there's a way to do something one-handed, I look for it.

Yes. I understand. I just need to keep the grid on because otherwise when I'm dragging I lose the notes RELATIVE position.

BTW, I do believe people have been asking for this feature for years, but this thread is the first time I recall even hearing about it. It has never crossed my mind.

[BKK-OZ]

I need to be able to import audio, chop it up, and line up tiny clips on a grid down to 16th (or even 32nd) note. I don't always know in advance exactly where the clips will sit best. I don't see how quantizing applies, or is even helpful, in this situation.
Babz

I think you mentioned it before, but for this sort of work, I would go with Maschine. You can re-scale the grid, move things around, repeat whatever needs repeating, add effects, etc. You can even trigger sounds via MIDI if you need to. Drag-n-drop and all that.

I recently finished a track with a lot of found audio (speeches, etc.) in it, and I found Maschine to be just a helluva lot easier to use for that purpose. Pretty CPU efficient, can directly host plugs, and it also has enough rudimentary sample editing capabilities to keep one happy.

[HobbyCore]

The thing that I disagree with is this: I believe the reason MOTU hasn't put in an absolute grid is because it's a major rewrite of a fundamental part of the program, and they simply don't have the programmers available to spend that much time (and time is money) to write the new code and work out all the bugs.

This can't be correct, because audio will snap TO the grid (absolute) if you drag import audio. The grid in tracks view also works in an 'absolute' manner.

So the capability is already in the software, it's just not uniformly accessible to the users currently.

[frankf]

From a musical Point of view; when I take a Stylus RMX "loop" and drag it into a DP MIDI track, most of the time the REX slices are not hard quantized. The natural feel of the recorded drum or percussion part is preserved by the slices not being hard quantized. I personally find hard quantizing unmusical, unless you are going for that stiff sound. I don't understand those who have written that quantizing in DP doesn't work. It works for me unless I've played in a part that so far from the grid that it confuses DP. You need to do another take if it's that far off. But when I do Quantize I set the percentages in the dialog carefully and even add a bit of randomness to get as musical result as possible.

[frankf]

The relative grid "dragging" now in DP helps preserve natural performance. I'd hate to see that go. "Absolute" grid snapping would be a good option. While we're waiting Quantize does the job. Set up the Quantize window to absolute values, select your notes, hit "q", then enter and you have it.

One more time with feeling.

I am not talking about MIDI or material that I play myself. See what I wrote above. I need to be able to import audio, chop it up, and line up tiny clips on a grid down to 16th (or even 32nd) note. I don't always know in advance exactly where the clips will sit best. I don't see how quantizing applies, or is even helpful, in this situation.

Without absolute great snapping, I have to zoom in really close and line things up visually, without the benefit of the grid snapping at all!

Of couse, I'm all for relative great snapping and preserving natural performance and all that (in those situations where I actually am performing) and don't want any of that to change. I also use that all the time.

Babz

Babz, I understand what you need to do, and absolute snapping would be a big help for you. But I still do not understand why quantizing audio (soundbites actually) doesn't work in this situation unto we get this feature. Once you hard quantize them to the grid of your choosing, then any dragging you do WILL be absolute snap to grid, no?

[BKK-OZ]

Look how close this iPad is to controlling DP... so close, yet just used for tweeting!

No update to DP Control announced...

[HobbyCore]

The relative grid "dragging" now in DP helps preserve natural performance. I'd hate to see that go. "Absolute" grid snapping would be a good option. While we're waiting Quantize does the job. Set up the Quantize window to absolute values, select your notes, hit "q", then enter and you have it.

One more time with feeling.

I am not talking about MIDI or material that I play myself. See what I wrote above. I need to be able to import audio, chop it up, and line up tiny clips on a grid down to 16th (or even 32nd) note. I don't always know in advance exactly where the clips will sit best. I don't see how quantizing applies, or is even helpful, in this situation.

Without absolute great snapping, I have to zoom in really close and line things up visually, without the benefit of the grid snapping at all!

Of couse, I'm all for relative great snapping and preserving natural performance and all that (in those situations where I actually am performing) and don't want any of that to change. I also use that all the time.

Babz

Babz, I understand what you need to do, and absolute snapping would be a big help for you. But I still do not understand why quantizing audio (soundbites actually) doesn't work in this situation unto we get this feature. Once you hard quantize them to the grid of your choosing, then any dragging you do WILL be absolute snap to grid, no?

Every time you make an edit that isn't 'on the grid', you have to open the quantize window, set the value, execute it, THEN actually move it, or redo the quantize procedure again if you don't want to grab the mouse (or fuss with nudge values).

It does get the job done, but it's a lot of extra work. In Babz's case it's A LOT of extra work. Frequently 5-10+ steps for something that is a single swift motion in any other DAW. If that's most of your work for the day... that's a lot of frustrating wasted time.

Of course, there's a lot of things in DP that are one swift step that are 5+ steps in other daws too... Pretty sure that's why most of us are here to begin with.

[FMiguelez]

Yes. I understand. I just need to keep the grid on because otherwise when I'm dragging I lose the notes RELATIVE position.

Stub, I think I must be missing something because you would know this... Remember that you can constrain horizontal (or vertical) movement by pressing Shift as you drag. This would avoid your mentioned issue.

[monkey man]

... Without absolute great snapping... Of couse, I'm all for relative great snapping...
Babz

Snapping is great, but great snapping snaps best, eh Babz?

also trying to introduce features that it feels will attract new users to DP.

Then MIDI regions and snap to grid should be no-brainers.

Agreed, Stoooiv.

... I believe the reason MOTU hasn't put in an absolute grid is because it's a major rewrite of a fundamental part of the program, and they simply don't have the programmers available to spend that much time (and time is money) to write the new code and work out all the bugs.
Mike

Hey Mike, if I'm not mistaken, this'd actually be ridiculously simple to do. It's just a (small) bunch of maths, mate.

No GUI tweaks, no possible conflicts with other areas of the app's operation, nada. It's after all only a new set of constraints upon MIDI and audio timing data, specifically event placement on DP's timeline.

If I'm way off here, please whip me hard...

[stubbsonic]

Stub, I think I must be missing something because you would know this... Remember that you can constrain horizontal (or vertical) movement by pressing Shift as you drag. This would avoid your mentioned issue.

Yea. Thanks. I do know that. But it is good to mention that for the record.

I drag notes & phrases all the time, and always want the relative grid on for all that, anyways. So at least I can drag or option-drag and that's that.

And when I'm selecting I'd just get my nice freestyle freedom with the COMMAND key down.

[MIDI Life Crisis]

The CMD key will suspend snapping to the grid/measure/beat level. I'm often able to edit a lot of stuff (mostly rendered MIDI and audio) right from the tracks overview window (and from the SE as well).

It does the job. Next.

[Killahurts]

The CMD key will suspend snapping to the grid/measure/beat level. I'm often able to edit a lot of stuff (mostly rendered MIDI and audio) right from the tracks overview window (and from the SE as well).

It does the job. Next.

Exactly right.. and it's also worth mentioning that if you have the grid turned off already, CMD will do the opposite and turn it on temporarily. As it should be.

[MIDI Life Crisis]

Good point. So what was the problem again? Selecting range of moving the selected MIDI to it's own track for separate processing? LOL.

[Killahurts]

Yeah, but I respect the people on this board, and I mean no disrespect. Not the first time someone has described a badly needed feature that I don't need, or maybe I don't even know what it is.

But if they need it.. Let's add it!

[MIDI Life Crisis]

I'm just not convinced it's not already there [in DP] and only requires a different approach to arrive at the desired results. I would NOT want to see MOTU implement MID regions if it meant loosing the current methods of dealing with MIDI or the implementation of any feature that negatively impacts the overall stability of the app in general.

The bottom line for me is that DP works as is (for me and many others) and there is no need for the MIDI region thing. If I need to do anything that anyone has described so far, I can do it in DP now, so for my money and energy I simply don't see a pressing need across the board for DP end users. OTOTH, I could use a few dozen less guitar pedal plugs and wouldn't mind if resources went towards more generally useful plugs - like noise reduction, IRCAM/MachFive inclusion, etc. Heck, include MachFive and then charge for a killer library after-market.