garageCube

[ghostofelvis100]

Hello folks,

As some of you may already know, I have been working on a family of modules for some time which I hope will change a lot about how we use M8. And I know a lot of you are going to get quite excited about these mods.

For the last year or so, I have been working on a set of modules which I believe will radically change the way a lot of us work, and perform with Modul8. They give an added flexibility to the control of our loops, a removal of the limitations of what we can contain within a set, and a new way to trigger our performances.

We can now go from using just 80 clips per set, to a maximum of 5120!

We can now fit our videos into a set number of beats at the click of a button.

Trigger your video files just like in Ableton.


I have finally decided that I am at a point when I can show you all what I have achieved so far. This first phase is a proof of concept, and I really do need your help and feedback to get this right.



for further info about these mods, the beta and full documentaion go to: http://www.blackearthmedia.co.uk/collected/Collected_Consciousness/Modul8/Entries/2011/4/22_Gener8.html

If you want to get involved with this beta testing phase, please email me at andy@blackearthmedia.co.uk and I'll pass you on a link to the mods!

Thank you so much.

Andy T.

[mowgli_uk]

This looks like part of an awesome set of modules but I've been trying for a while and I can't get the modules working. No clip names or thumbnails ever appear in the launchpad. I've tried opening existing projects and starting from scratch to no avail. I don't know if I'm missing something really basic or its not working...
All I can manage is to create a series of empty clips/loops with nothing appearing on the launchpad's editor thumbnail (naming seems confusing, in the clip manager they're called clips but they appear to be the same as what appears in the "loop list" in the launchpad) that appear in the clip list and loop list respectively but I can't place them on the launchpad grid.

Thanks for any help!

[mowgli_uk]

After fiddling and some help from Andy I've got this working now and although it is still a beta it is fantastic. I seriously recommend it for anyone working with ableton and modul8.

[ghostofelvis100]

So, here's the latest on this mod:-

I've had loads of fabulous help finding a sackfull of bugs and most helpful feedback, so I'm whittling away at those until the next beta release, which should be a lot more solid (as I'm going to do some proper testing before I release it this time...).

Loads of bugs are already fixed - there was a major problem with installing onto fresh systems which I believe is at last finally solved.

All in all it's looking good, but it is a major project for me and will take a while.

Please keep sending me those beta test requests if you are still interested. You'll get an update as soon as it's ready.

[bareimage]

Hey, I would love to participate in the beta test. I might be even able to help you code...

So, here's the latest on this mod:-

I've had loads of fabulous help finding a sackfull of bugs and most helpful feedback, so I'm whittling away at those until the next beta release, which should be a lot more solid (as I'm going to do some proper testing before I release it this time...).

Loads of bugs are already fixed - there was a major problem with installing onto fresh systems which I believe is at last finally solved.

All in all it's looking good, but it is a major project for me and will take a while.

Please keep sending me those beta test requests if you are still interested. You'll get an update as soon as it's ready.

[ghostofelvis100]

New version v1.3b now available for any willing beta testers out there.

Let me know if you're interested and I'll pass on the download link.

[ghostofelvis100]

Okay folks,
V1.4 beta now available.
Loads of new features:
Launchpad Module:
• Clip previews on the Launchpad clip-slots.
• Scroll bar for easier pages access.
• Improved MIDI mapping. Scene select knob now designed for hardware controllers with 270 degree knobs. 
• Send MIDI messages from Clips.
• Adjust media of inactive Clips.

Editor Module:
• Create custom envelopes for any controller. (only applies to media elements with a time dimension, ie, not still images)
• Record realtime keyword control changes. 
• Global LFO input.
• Scrub bar / Position indicator. 
• Graphical I/O adjust.
• Pause button.
• Improved online help access.

LFO Module:
• Random waveform

As always I will be keen to hear your comments and suggestions. Don't forget that this is your opportunity to guide the development of the project. And with your help, maybe we can push this through to an Alpha version...

Please email me if you want to take part in the testing.

[mowgli_uk]

I've been messing with the updates for a while and I have to say that so far they work like a charm.

[ghostofelvis100]

Lovely,

Got some plans to rationalise the timestretch system. It will be much simpler.

Also I'm thinking of incorporating the bpm module code into the Launchpad to get a bit of performance back. Then we can drop a module.

How are you finding the speed of them? They aren't lite on the processor. I'm welcome to suggestions if anyone has any performance improving tips....

[mowgli_uk]

The performance so far is very good. It works a lot better than using the BPM Router (layer) module to synch a clip to BPM.
As far as suggestions go, a proper clip browser will come in handy. Something with the ability to search and tag would be great.

[ghostofelvis100]

That's not a bad idea. Could be part of the Clip Manager module.
In fact the possibilities are probably quite endless, and I really do need to focus on getting this out of beta first. however something like that shouldn't take too long to implement.

Incidentally, what processor & memory are you running this on? And have you used it with a lot of layers running?

[ghostofelvis100]

For anyone interested in seeing a visual of what we're talking about, the latest release is looking like this:-

[mowgli_uk]

After playing for while longer, I'm getting loads of bugs and random behaviours.
Often after I've made a clip I can no longer edit it in the editor as the editor only displays the name (no moving time line etc). Also after a while pressing the different synch values for a clip (4/1, 2/1 etc) doesn't do anything at all and after a while modul8 freezes.

[ghostofelvis100]

Thanks for the report...

There are a few obvious bugs that I am working on with the timestretch, the next update will have a completely different system with only about 3 buttons (on/off, double speed, half speed), none of which will need to be pressed, as it will be mostly automatic, and a lot more intelligent.

but as for the other errors, maybe it is not such a clear interface. Let me explain a bit how the editor is working:-

Only a video file has a timeline (I have intention to create timelines for stills, qtz, etc, but it is more complex as the timeline is currently based on 'direct_layer_media_timePosition' - other types of file do not have this, so this will happen later on).

Sometimes the timestretch will go out of acceptable range, and the sync buttons will have no effect. In those situations you will need to reduce the length of the clip. (This will not be a problem in the next update as there will be no sync buttons!)

The whole timestretch system is based on the keyword 'info_layer_media_timeLength', (and to a lesser extent 'info_layer_media_type' - which tells me if it is a video or not). There is an issue with the way Modul8 deals with these 'info' keywords in that they are not available until about 3 or so frames after the 'ctrl' keywords are received by the modules.
If anyone wishes to verify this you can insert this script into the keywords script of a new module and read the 'script output' window as you flick through some different medias:

if keyword.startswith ('ctrl_layer_media'):
mediaLength = modul8.getValue('info_layer_media_timeLength',0)
print 'Movie Length = '+str(mediaLength)

...so, I have had to set up an internal delay to account for this, and maybe the code it is not quite solid enough, hence the randomness.
The reason I am explaining all this is because it has wasted nights and nights of my programming (and sleeping) time to find this out! Sort this out Garagecube!!