MIDI problem using the wiper

Discussion of Digital Performer use, optimization, tips and techniques on MacOS.

Moderator: James Steele

Forum rules
This forum is for most discussion related to the use and optimization of Digital Performer [MacOS] and plug-ins as well as tips and techniques. It is NOT for troubleshooting technical issues, complaints, feature requests, or "Comparative DAW 101."
User avatar
stubbsonic
Posts: 4600
Joined: Fri Dec 22, 2006 12:56 pm
Primary DAW OS: MacOS
Contact:

Re: MIDI problem using the wiper

Post by stubbsonic »

That video was with the latest DP 9. It is still an issue.

Shortening the notes would mean either following every quantize command with a change duration command-- which is just another step to slow down editing. (Or quantizing attacks & releases first, then doing an offset quantize on releases only--) Since that function is done quite often, it would be a slow workaround.

This problem of prioritizing note-ons over note-offs affected playback and wipe/scrub. MOTU fixed it for playback, but neglected to fix it for wiper/scrup operations. They just need to re-prioritize note-offs before note-ons of the same pitch on the same tick-- as it was for many many years.

For me, it is a nearly constant source of annoyance when I'm doing arranging/orchestration work.
M1 MBP; OS 12, FF800, DP 11.3, Kontakt 7, Reaktor 6, PC3K7, K2661S, iPad6, Godin XTSA, Two Ibanez 5 string basses (1 fretted, 1 fretless), FM3, SY-1000, etc.

http://www.jonstubbsmusic.com
User avatar
stubbsonic
Posts: 4600
Joined: Fri Dec 22, 2006 12:56 pm
Primary DAW OS: MacOS
Contact:

Re: MIDI problem using the wiper

Post by stubbsonic »

This issue also affects the Slow & Fast Reverse/Forward commands (on keys 4,5,6,+).

So again, MOTU fixed this for standard playback, but didn't fix it for other forms of cueing MIDI
M1 MBP; OS 12, FF800, DP 11.3, Kontakt 7, Reaktor 6, PC3K7, K2661S, iPad6, Godin XTSA, Two Ibanez 5 string basses (1 fretted, 1 fretless), FM3, SY-1000, etc.

http://www.jonstubbsmusic.com
User avatar
stubbsonic
Posts: 4600
Joined: Fri Dec 22, 2006 12:56 pm
Primary DAW OS: MacOS
Contact:

Re: MIDI problem using the wiper

Post by stubbsonic »

Curiously, MOTU is suggesting that this is a problem with the way VI's are responding to MIDI data.

IMHO, if the DAW is sending a Note-On, then immediately sending that same note's Note-Off, then it is not the fault of the VI.

The support ticket is still ongoing. I'll report further after that concludes.
M1 MBP; OS 12, FF800, DP 11.3, Kontakt 7, Reaktor 6, PC3K7, K2661S, iPad6, Godin XTSA, Two Ibanez 5 string basses (1 fretted, 1 fretless), FM3, SY-1000, etc.

http://www.jonstubbsmusic.com
User avatar
bayswater
Posts: 11923
Joined: Fri Feb 16, 2007 9:06 pm
Primary DAW OS: MacOS
Location: Vancouver

Re: MIDI problem using the wiper

Post by bayswater »

stubbsonic wrote:Curiously, MOTU is suggesting that this is a problem with the way VI's are responding to MIDI data.
That seems unlikely if the problem happens when moving the wiper, but not when using the playback button. How would the synth know how the MIDI was sent?
2018 Mini i7 32G 10.14.6, DP 11.3, Mixbus 9, Logic 10.5, Scarlett 18i8
User avatar
stubbsonic
Posts: 4600
Joined: Fri Dec 22, 2006 12:56 pm
Primary DAW OS: MacOS
Contact:

Re: MIDI problem using the wiper

Post by stubbsonic »

Exactly.

What else is weird is that I did some "change duration" commands to subtract ticks from notes, but the problem did not go away-- even after removing 11 ticks from duration (one-at-a-time).

That has me absolutely perplexed!!
M1 MBP; OS 12, FF800, DP 11.3, Kontakt 7, Reaktor 6, PC3K7, K2661S, iPad6, Godin XTSA, Two Ibanez 5 string basses (1 fretted, 1 fretless), FM3, SY-1000, etc.

http://www.jonstubbsmusic.com
richhickey
Posts: 55
Joined: Thu Jan 03, 2013 1:56 pm
Primary DAW OS: MacOS

Re: MIDI problem using the wiper

Post by richhickey »

stubbsonic wrote:Exactly.

What else is weird is that I did some "change duration" commands to subtract ticks from notes, but the problem did not go away-- even after removing 11 ticks from duration (one-at-a-time).

That has me absolutely perplexed!!
I have a theory. It's not (just) about the wiper. It's about how DP sends live MIDI to AUs (and maybe VSTs, haven't tested yet). This includes both wiper-triggered notes and notes played live into a VI in record mode. I've seen this cutoff problem when playing VIs live from a controller (like a LinnStrument) which can trigger the same note on more than one pad/key.

The problem is DP rounds off all live MIDI events to the top of a buffer window. You can see this if you drop e.g. Bidule's MIDI monitor (https://www.plogue.com/bidule/help/ch04s09.html#d0e1723) on a track. When triggered live, all the 'sample offsets' (https://developer.apple.com/documentati ... umidievent) are 0. If you do the same thing in e.g. Logic, they are non-zero. This causes events which end up in the same buffer window to appear to the plugin as happening at the exact same time (and thus why moving things a few ticks might not matter). Obviously when the transport isn't running there isn't a proper song-relative offset, but fabricating one as Logic et al do makes sense in order to preserve, well, order.

Different plugins get confused by this to different degrees, e.g. I've seen some that only hiccup in mono mode. Furthermore, while you may experience these cutoffs while recording, playing back that same recording works fine (as DP has captured the on/offs sequentially with sub-window accuracy, when playing back they get sequential offsets within the window).

It's quite frustrating.
User avatar
stubbsonic
Posts: 4600
Joined: Fri Dec 22, 2006 12:56 pm
Primary DAW OS: MacOS
Contact:

Re: MIDI problem using the wiper

Post by stubbsonic »

richhickey wrote: The problem is DP rounds off all live MIDI events to the top of a buffer window. You can see this if you drop e.g. Bidule's MIDI monitor ... on a track. When triggered live, all the 'sample offsets'
are 0. If you do the same thing in e.g. Logic, they are non-zero. This causes events which end up in the same buffer window to appear to the plugin as happening at the exact same time (and thus why moving things a few ticks might not matter). Obviously when the transport isn't running there isn't a proper song-relative offset, but fabricating one as Logic et al do makes sense in order to preserve, well, order.

Different plugins get confused by this to different degrees, e.g. I've seen some that only hiccup in mono mode. Furthermore, while you may experience these cutoffs while recording, playing back that same recording works fine (as DP has captured the on/offs sequentially with sub-window accuracy, when playing back they get sequential offsets within the window).

It's quite frustrating.
I'm afraid I don't understand what you are describing. I don't know what "rounds off" is referring to. What is rounded off? I don't know what "sample offsets" are. I would like to understand what you are describing, but I'm afraid I don't. If you don't mind having another run at it. Thanks.
M1 MBP; OS 12, FF800, DP 11.3, Kontakt 7, Reaktor 6, PC3K7, K2661S, iPad6, Godin XTSA, Two Ibanez 5 string basses (1 fretted, 1 fretless), FM3, SY-1000, etc.

http://www.jonstubbsmusic.com
richhickey
Posts: 55
Joined: Thu Jan 03, 2013 1:56 pm
Primary DAW OS: MacOS

Re: MIDI problem using the wiper

Post by richhickey »

stubbsonic wrote: I'm afraid I don't understand what you are describing. I don't know what "rounds off" is referring to. What is rounded off? I don't know what "sample offsets" are. I would like to understand what you are describing, but I'm afraid I don't. If you don't mind having another run at it. Thanks.
Sure. If you are familiar with the buffer settings (e.g. 256 or 512 samples) used to determine how sound is sent to I/O hardware, it is similarly sent within a DAW from plugins to the DAW engine. I.e. plugins deliver audio to the DAW a buffer at a time. Depending on the buffer size, that could be several milliseconds worth of time.

Notes that start within that time need to start in the middle of a buffer, and during normal playback of recorded MIDI a DAW works ahead of itself, asking for buffers from plugins and telling them what notes to play and stop, in terms like "42 samples into the next buffer stop playing that C note, and 63 samples in start playing another C" (42 and 63 being the sample offsets I described). I.e. the beats/ticks timing system you are familiar with is turned into samples within buffers. The VI figures out the sound samples to generate and prepares a buffer accordingly.

When playing live (or scrubbing) the DAW doesn't know what's coming next (from you, the player/scrubber), so when you trigger a note it has to get the VI to start it ASAP. It seems as though DP is taking everything that happens during the previously playing buffer and queues it up at the beginning of the next (rounding everything to buffer start), saying in effect "0 samples into the next buffer stop playing that C note and 0 samples in start playing another C", so the plugin sees the same note off and on at the same time and chokes on it. Logic and other DAWs OTOH give those live notes separate offsets in the right relative order.

The Bidule MIDI monitor I suggested is cool because, unlike many others, it shows you those offsets as they are seen by the plugins. While playing live it shows 'off at 0, on at 0' and playing back the recording it shows 'off at 42, on at 63'.

I hope that helps :)
User avatar
stubbsonic
Posts: 4600
Joined: Fri Dec 22, 2006 12:56 pm
Primary DAW OS: MacOS
Contact:

Re: MIDI problem using the wiper

Post by stubbsonic »

That is more clear.

However, I had always understood that buffers were in a constant state of refilling and emptying-- simultaneously-- i.e. a buffer always contains the next x-samples that are to play-- and if there is a lag in processing, the buffer will empty out while the CPU catches up.

Still, if I understand you correctly, the VI, MIDI playback, and all various clocks all need to agree where now is- relative to that buffer setting.

I will attempt to set my buffer lower and see if it has any affect.

I won't get into how MOTU's support has been dismissive of this issue-- not until they've had a chance to work on it some.

I'll start a new thread for that little doozy.
M1 MBP; OS 12, FF800, DP 11.3, Kontakt 7, Reaktor 6, PC3K7, K2661S, iPad6, Godin XTSA, Two Ibanez 5 string basses (1 fretted, 1 fretless), FM3, SY-1000, etc.

http://www.jonstubbsmusic.com
User avatar
bayswater
Posts: 11923
Joined: Fri Feb 16, 2007 9:06 pm
Primary DAW OS: MacOS
Location: Vancouver

Re: MIDI problem using the wiper

Post by bayswater »

stubbsonic wrote:That is more clear.

However, I had always understood that buffers were in a constant state of refilling and emptying-- simultaneously-- i.e. a buffer always contains the next x-samples that are to play-- and if there is a lag in processing, the buffer will empty out while the CPU catches up.

Still, if I understand you correctly, the VI, MIDI playback, and all various clocks all need to agree where now is- relative to that buffer setting.

I will attempt to set my buffer lower and see if it has any affect.

I won't get into how MOTU's support has been dismissive of this issue-- not until they've had a chance to work on it some.

I'll start a new thread for that little doozy.
Wouldn't this be inconsistent with the claim of sample accurate MIDI?
2018 Mini i7 32G 10.14.6, DP 11.3, Mixbus 9, Logic 10.5, Scarlett 18i8
User avatar
stubbsonic
Posts: 4600
Joined: Fri Dec 22, 2006 12:56 pm
Primary DAW OS: MacOS
Contact:

Re: MIDI problem using the wiper

Post by stubbsonic »

bayswater wrote: Wouldn't this be inconsistent with the claim of sample accurate MIDI?
I'm not sure which you are referring to . If DP is holding a samples in a buffer which gives all the processes time to complete calculations before playback, than DP should be able to release the MIDI on schedule with the audio such that notes are "sample accurate".

I tried dropping my buffer down to 16, and it didn't have any affect on the issue.

I still think it is simply a matter of outputting note-offs BEFORE note-ons. But for some reason, I can't get a straight explanation from MOTU. They keep insisting the 3rd party VI's are doing something wrong.

I explained that the issue affects Bassline (but intermittently) that went unacknowledged. I also displayed Pianoteq's MIDI monitor in my vid and explained the out of sequence note-offs-- again, no acknowledgement. They are being pretty selective about what they read. Makes troubleshooting it harder and more frustrating.
M1 MBP; OS 12, FF800, DP 11.3, Kontakt 7, Reaktor 6, PC3K7, K2661S, iPad6, Godin XTSA, Two Ibanez 5 string basses (1 fretted, 1 fretless), FM3, SY-1000, etc.

http://www.jonstubbsmusic.com
User avatar
bayswater
Posts: 11923
Joined: Fri Feb 16, 2007 9:06 pm
Primary DAW OS: MacOS
Location: Vancouver

Re: MIDI problem using the wiper

Post by bayswater »

Simply saying that if MIDI is sent with sample accurate timing, then this is not happening because of some timing error associated with buffering. I agree it is more likely a problem with prioritizing Note Off and Note On messages that happen at the same time, note, and channel.
2018 Mini i7 32G 10.14.6, DP 11.3, Mixbus 9, Logic 10.5, Scarlett 18i8
User avatar
stubbsonic
Posts: 4600
Joined: Fri Dec 22, 2006 12:56 pm
Primary DAW OS: MacOS
Contact:

Re: MIDI problem using the wiper

Post by stubbsonic »

bayswater wrote:Simply saying that if MIDI is sent with sample accurate timing, then this is not happening because of some timing error associated with buffering. I agree it is more likely a problem with prioritizing Note Off and Note On messages that happen at the same time, note, and channel.
Agreed. 100%

But apparently we're at odds with the MOTU team. Either I'm struggling to understand them, or they're struggling to understand me-- although, it really seems like they aren't trying to understand OR be understood. But I'll try to be patient. They have a difficult job dealing with fuss-budgets and whatnot.
M1 MBP; OS 12, FF800, DP 11.3, Kontakt 7, Reaktor 6, PC3K7, K2661S, iPad6, Godin XTSA, Two Ibanez 5 string basses (1 fretted, 1 fretless), FM3, SY-1000, etc.

http://www.jonstubbsmusic.com
User avatar
stubbsonic
Posts: 4600
Joined: Fri Dec 22, 2006 12:56 pm
Primary DAW OS: MacOS
Contact:

Re: MIDI problem using the wiper

Post by stubbsonic »

MOTU's support person is just icing me now.

He claimed the issue didn't affect MOTU VI's, I quickly made a video showing that it does affect them, but no reply.

When I compose and arrange, scrubbing is a great way for me to hear just MIDI slowly without audio tracks playing. For my process it IS a big deal.

Another issue is that when lasso selecting MIDI, some notes are highlighted but often you release the mouse button and what is selected is different than what was highlighted pre-release. It's a known bug that's been around for a while. It just requires me to say to myself: "Doesn't matter what I'm seeing. I'm pretty sure my selection is right."

DP has plenty of power and features that I really like, but these selecting, scrubbing functions are so basic, and it bugs the hell out of me that they are never going to get fixed, and support will deny the problems in one way or another-- then treat me badly in their support ticket system. Aaaarrgh.
M1 MBP; OS 12, FF800, DP 11.3, Kontakt 7, Reaktor 6, PC3K7, K2661S, iPad6, Godin XTSA, Two Ibanez 5 string basses (1 fretted, 1 fretless), FM3, SY-1000, etc.

http://www.jonstubbsmusic.com
User avatar
bayswater
Posts: 11923
Joined: Fri Feb 16, 2007 9:06 pm
Primary DAW OS: MacOS
Location: Vancouver

Re: MIDI problem using the wiper

Post by bayswater »

stubbsonic wrote:MOTU's support person is just icing me now.

He claimed the issue didn't affect MOTU VI's, I quickly made a video showing that it does affect them, but no reply.

When I compose and arrange, scrubbing is a great way for me to hear just MIDI slowly without audio tracks playing. For my process it IS a big deal.

Another issue is that when lasso selecting MIDI, some notes are highlighted but often you release the mouse button and what is selected is different than what was highlighted pre-release. It's a known bug that's been around for a while.
I tried it with Proton, Polysynth and Baseline playing a series of 1/8th notes with attack and release hard quantized. With the first two, I didn't get this problem. With Baseline, play works properly, but dragging the wiper doesn't -- only the first note plays.

Tried a few others and they all worked:
Ample Bass Lite
DLSMusicDevice
4-Front Epiano
Analog Lab 2
GPO 5
MODO Bass
Falcon

(I wanted to try Kontakt, but as usual when I open it, it had a hissy fit about something. Can't be bothered with it)

I am not seeing the problem with selection in any of the 3 section modes using the Pointer tool in the MIDI editor. Don't recall ever seeing this. Maybe another one of the growing list of things that work on some Macs and not others.
2018 Mini i7 32G 10.14.6, DP 11.3, Mixbus 9, Logic 10.5, Scarlett 18i8
Post Reply