finer midi reslolution control of external vintage midi equipped synths

    fram hamill
    Jan 09 2016 | 5:10 am
    hey all. ive been poking my head around for a way of controlling say, a novation bass station rack via midi so as to increase resolution of controls. is this possible? perhaps taking the midi input from the BSR's hardware controller faders into max and somehow smoothing them so as to have little to no stepping and then outputting the altered midi data right back into the BSR? note: the goal being to use the Bass Station's hardware knobs as intended, just make the fidelity higher any ideas or pointers to other threads much appreciated. thanks!
    • daddymax
      Jan 09 2016 | 7:00 am
      midi (as you probably know) has 128 steps resolution, so that's probably your bottleneck. That said, if you used some slew limiting (ie the line/ line~ objects) you could make sure that the values move as smoothly as possible from one setting to another at a speed you dictate.
    • daddymax
      Jan 09 2016 | 7:17 am
      Also - dont forget that while you may be able to send midi out of the synth, through max, and back in again, if the knob you re using is still tied to the parameter in the hardware, you will be still sending your original (steppy) signal internally, as well as a second layer of smoother signal, being routed back in. So Id control it with a second hardware controller so its a smooth path from controller, to max, to the synth . Otherwise, you might just make the tweaking sound more erratic than it already is.
      also - https://us.novationmusic.com/answerbase/8-bit-knob-data-on-bass-station-ii
    • fram hamill
      Jan 12 2016 | 9:16 am
      k, it seems that using the bsr as the source of control is no bueno. how about using max as the platform to control and also alter the control (with lfos, envelopes etc.) in a more complex way and packing up the data to send back to the bsr so it responds in a smooth/less steppy way as well as altering the bsr's software controls so that they are recognized by the bsr? ie:adding env gens and such, combining and packing data to be sent back to the bsr? basically i would like to expand on the sound engine of the bsr via max. thanks!
    • daddymax
      Jan 12 2016 | 3:45 pm
      Yes- im currently doing the exact same thing with a waldorf blofeld - anything that is controllable by midi cc and/or sysex can be hooked up to max. If you have more specific questions, i can probably help you.
      If you have a midi chart of your synth, that will be useful. Failing that, get midi running FROM your synth to max, and you can note the messages it is outputting when you move a knob, so you know what CC numbers control what variables.