Tempo-synced plugins like Volumeshaper not syncing to grid properly

[dodge-and-fuski-rob]

Anyone know a workaround for this?

I spoke to the cableguys people and they said they were aware it was an issue with Ableton down to the host not reporting BPM/plugin delay compensation properly... I was under the impression Bitwig had proper compensation and this shouldn't happen?

For instance when you put a volumeshaper/LFOtool plugin on a channel and set it to pump/duck the audio every 1/4 bar, the first ducking is perfectly in-time and then it quickly goes out of sync and the ducking occurs out of time. There is also an issue with 'clicking' at the loop points of the pattern.

I know there's a workaround for Ableton where you use a MIDI channel's output to re-trigger the loop start for each instance which I'm sure would work here too, but that's awkward and slow especially if you can't put an instance on a group as Bitwig doesn't yet support them, so you'd end up with piles of duplicate MIDI channels...

Shame really as I really love Bitwig and I'm trying to make a permanent move, but obviously there are still issues to be ironed out. These plugins work perfectly as intended with Cubase with no clicks or timing issues btw.

[billcarroll]

This must be a new issue because I've tested LFOTool extensively with Bitwig. I'll check this out again today and check back in here.

FYI, you can use the scope and offset of LFOTool to correct for unreported latency in Ableton Live and get the sidechain in proper time. I have a video that explains the issue and how to correct for it if you want to check it out.

What's your OS and Bitwig version?

[nechronics]

It generally works pretty good here - The PDC in BW was spotty in previous versions and has been vetted by many here, including myself. PDC was recently overhauled by the devs to address many of the reported issues so I can confirm it is usually quite reliable now. It can still be broken though in some odd circumstances that I don't quite understand. For instance, I just now tested LFOTool both before and after a linear phase ProQ2 with 1300ms latency. I also tried placing the LFOTool on a bus (effect channel) and it worked spot on in all scenarios. I also did a similar test using volume automation instead of LFOTool and it still worked as expected. I then switched the ProQ to natural phase which is <10 ms latency and things went out of sync when I bounced the end result. Some projects things work spot on, but occasionally the software doesn't add things up right. It's definitely much better now than it was before though. I've also noticed very weird graphical glitches after bouncing audio where the waveform doesn't get drawn properly and redraws itself in weird ways when you hover the mouse over it...not sure if it was present in earlier versions or just in the latest one. I'm going to try to put together some reproducible examples of these when I get time and submit them for bug fixing when I get a chance.

In terms of the "click", that likely has to do with you needing to soften the tail of the curve on the volumeshaper/LFOTool plugin, eg.



vs.

[dodge-and-fuski-rob]

Gonna be honest, I haven't fully tested LFOtool - post was mainly based around volumeshaper and I put 2+2 together and assumed LFOtool would have issues for similar reasons.... volumeshaper 4 glitches out as it does in Ableton so I assumed LFOtool would too.

RE: the clicking, that's a combination of an LFOtool thing and a bitwig thing - LFOtool always clicks, but under cubase volumeshaper is capable of pretty extreme chops without artefacts

OSX 10.9, Bitwig 1.1

[billcarroll]

Gonna be honest, I haven't fully tested LFOtool - post was mainly based around volumeshaper and I put 2+2 together and assumed LFOtool would have issues for similar reasons.... volumeshaper 4 glitches out as it does in Ableton so I assumed LFOtool would too.

RE: the clicking, that's a combination of an LFOtool thing and a bitwig thing - LFOtool always clicks, but under cubase volumeshaper is capable of pretty extreme chops without artefacts

OSX 10.9, Bitwig 1.1

LFOTool allows you to dial in an offset in samples, and that control is right next to the scope switch. I assume Steve put this in because of the lack of latency reporting in Ableton track chains.

You can use the smoothing control or the technique pictured above in LFOTool to eliminate clicks.

[askewd]

I've reported a few new pdc issues recentky recently and devs have acknowledged them, including one specific to Fab pro q. They seem confident they can fix it, which is good.

This post also makes me think that it would be really cool for bitwig to make a native "volume shaper" type device. Would be really tight working at sample rate.


Dale

[billcarroll]

I've reported a few new pdc issues recentky recently and devs have acknowledged them, including one specific to Fab pro q. They seem confident they can fix it, which is good.

This post also makes me think that it would be really cool for bitwig to make a native "volume shaper" type device. Would be really tight working at sample rate.


Dale

Out of curiosity, what are those PDC issues? I was testing with fabfilter pro-q 2 in linear phase mode and LFOTool yesterday, and latency was properly compensated.

[askewd]

Out of curiosity, what are those PDC issues? I was testing with fabfilter pro-q 2 in linear phase mode and LFOTool yesterday, and latency was properly compensated.

Sure. Mainly they are connected to AudioMod in some way. For example putting a latency inducing plugin after the Audiomod. So if you have a tight audiomod sidechain effect, then it goes out of time after adding a latency plugin. However it works ok with most plugins... just a few that dont.

Also, when this happens buried two-layers deep within a container there are similar problems - but affected by different vst plugins.

These bugs are hard to discover but once you do, you'll sure know about it

I see a 1.1.3 version is out now so interested to try that and see if these issues are fixed yet.

Best