KVR Audio

teilo · Post by **teilo** » Thu Jul 12, 2018 3:18 pm

https://www.bitwig.com/en/18/bitwig-studio-2_4.html

Sampler getting a big update. Multichannel editing. GUI improvements. More modulators.

Still no drum rack enhancements, which is the thing I've been looking for...

pdxindy · Post by **pdxindy** » Thu Jul 12, 2018 3:29 pm

Plus full midi channel implementation!! (I waited for years for this to show up in Live)

Now the MPE stuff is fully realized... there are a couple new midi channel devices and a couple important new modulators that allow functionality similar to the u-he modmappers.

Reefius · Post by **Reefius** » Thu Jul 12, 2018 3:38 pm

Looks like they just added functionality that should've been there since v2.0. Totally not worth another $169 or even $129 with the current summer sale.
What I predicted seems to come true, they were holding back some basic functionality to add it after everyone's first year of free updates expired. Nice try but I'm not falling for it.

mholloway · Post by **mholloway** » Thu Jul 12, 2018 3:40 pm

teilo wrote: Still no drum rack enhancements, which is the thing I've been looking for...

but enhancing the Sampler *is* enhancing the Drum Machine.... after all, the Drum Machine is a collection of Samplers, to work with the DM is to work with many Samplers...

teilo · Post by **teilo** » Thu Jul 12, 2018 3:55 pm

mholloway wrote:
teilo wrote: Still no drum rack enhancements, which is the thing I've been looking for...
but enhancing the Sampler *is* enhancing the Drum Machine.... after all, the Drum Machine is a collection of Samplers, to work with the DM is to work with many Samplers...

No, the Drum Machine is a collection of Instruments, which may or may not be Sampler. There's a big difference. If all you ever did was use Sampler, then that's great. But a lot of us have an investment in drum VSTs. The drum editing workflow in Bitwig is useless for these.

The Drum Machine is too locked into a sample-based workflow. They need to take a page out of Ableton's book and allow you to re-route pads to separate notes targeting a single instrument. There is no way to use a drum VST, and a drum editing workflow, with the Drum Machine, without creating a separate instrument for every single pad and thus wasting gobs of memory.

There is no way to edit a drum MIDI clip targeting a single instrument, with hit names rather than note names. You can't even so much as name a pad unless you do so by renaming the instrument the pad targets. You cannot change the note the pad sends. It's locked.

In Ableton, I have created drum racks that use their chain mapping feature to load a single Kontakt drum kit, and map each hit to a pad. These pads can then be triggered with a Pad controller.

Say you have a standard 4x4 pad controller. Those pads send a specific note. An Ableton Drum Rack receives that note, maps the incoming note to the outgoing note the VST expects for the hit you want to trigger. That's the goal - trigger the hits in a drum VST using a pad controller with a consistent mapping from instrument to instrument. Edit the results in the MIDI clip editor with hit names rather than note names. This is impossible in Bitwig, and Bitwig themselves have acknowledged this problem.

Reefius · Post by **Reefius** » Thu Jul 12, 2018 4:01 pm

That's probably for 2.5 or 2.6, when everyone's second year of updates has expired.

pdxindy · Post by **pdxindy** » Thu Jul 12, 2018 4:15 pm

teilo wrote:Say you have a standard 4x4 pad controller. Those pads send a specific note. An Ableton Drum Rack receives that note, maps the incoming note to the outgoing note the VST expects for the hit you want to trigger. That's the goal - trigger the hits in a drum VST using a pad controller with a consistent mapping from instrument to instrument. Edit the results in the MIDI clip editor with hit names rather than note names. This is impossible in Bitwig, and Bitwig themselves have acknowledged this problem.

You have named the Drum Machine improvements I would like to see...

Bitwig came out with Phase-4... a quality instrument right up there with the better VST's... Now they are dramatically improving Sampler. Seems likely that the Drum Machine is up soon for similar treatment.

poonna · Post by **poonna** » Thu Jul 12, 2018 4:18 pm

Reefius wrote:That's probably for 2.5 or 2.6, when everyone's second year of updates has expired.

It doesn't work that way. Now, everybody is not buying another update at the same time. So there's no specific 2nd year expiration date anymore. Expiration dates are going to keep spreading all over the year as time goes by.

And the 2.3 update, which everyone got, is by no means a small update.

pdxindy · Post by **pdxindy** » Thu Jul 12, 2018 4:18 pm

Reefius wrote:That's probably for 2.5 or 2.6, when everyone's second year of updates has expired.

Everyone is on a different schedule at this point... For me, 2.5 and 2.6 will almost certainly be out before I would need to upgrade again.

Reefius · Post by **Reefius** » Thu Jul 12, 2018 4:40 pm

They can see when most people buy updates, then they just wait a little bit over a year to release the next big update. This can of course never be proven because nobody except the people working at Bitwig can see the sales figures, which makes this payment plan so brilliant.... for Bitwig.

There will never be a way to know if they hold back big features, but this latest update makes me very suspicious.

Announcing MIDI channel implementation in v2.4 like they just invented the wheel is just hilarious. Such basic functionality should've been implemented in v1.0 back in 2014. It only took them 4 years to implement MIDI channels. Cubase already had this in v1.0 on the Atari ST back in the early 90's

poonna · Post by **poonna** » Thu Jul 12, 2018 4:41 pm

teilo wrote:The Drum Machine is too locked into a sample-based workflow. They need to take a page out of Ableton's book and allow you to re-route pads to separate notes targeting a single instrument. There is no way to use a drum VST, and a drum editing workflow, with the Drum Machine, without creating a separate instrument for every single pad and thus wasting gobs of memory.

If I understand what you mean correctly, I think there's a workaround to that, although a bit fiddly.

Use Note Filter and Note Pitch Shifter on each Drum Machine pad, and put an Instrument Layer after the Drum Machine with a drum VST as one layer and a pass-through device (such as Tool) as another layer to let the sound from the Drum Machine pass through. On each Drum Machine pad, use Note Pitch Shifter to retarget the note to the desired one. On a pad where there's a sample or a device, put Note Filter to block the note from reaching the drum VST on the Instrument Layer.

This should allow using a single instance of any drum VST with Drum Machine while allowing some pads to use samples or other devices.

Or maybe I got you wrong.

pdxindy · Post by **pdxindy** » Thu Jul 12, 2018 4:42 pm

Reefius wrote:Announcing MIDI channel implementation in v2.4 like they just invented the wheel is just hilarious. Such basic functionality should've been implemented in v1.0 back in 2014. It only took them 4 years to implement MIDI channels. Cubase already had this in v1.0 on the Atari ST back in the early 90's

And Ableton Live still doesn't have it on version 10...

pdxindy · Post by **pdxindy** » Thu Jul 12, 2018 4:47 pm

Reefius wrote:They can see when most people buy updates, then they just wait a little bit over a year to release the next big update. This can of course never be proven because nobody except the people working at Bitwig can see the sales figures, which makes this payment plan so brilliant.... for Bitwig.

There will never be a way to know if they hold back big features, but this latest update makes me very suspicious.

Upgrade purchase dates have quickly spread across the year. There is no reason to hold back big features. In fact, it is just the opposite... there is reason to release them sooner because the sooner it is released, the sooner those people whose upgrade plan has become inactive might purchase their next upgrade.

Distorted Horizon · Post by **Distorted Horizon** » Thu Jul 12, 2018 4:55 pm

teilo wrote:https://www.bitwig.com/en/18/bitwig-studio-2_4.html

Sampler getting a big update

Finally... Maybe I'll upgrade now.

Reefius · Post by **Reefius** » Thu Jul 12, 2018 5:08 pm

pdxindy wrote:
Reefius wrote:Announcing MIDI channel implementation in v2.4 like they just invented the wheel is just hilarious. Such basic functionality should've been implemented in v1.0 back in 2014. It only took them 4 years to implement MIDI channels. Cubase already had this in v1.0 on the Atari ST back in the early 90's
And Ableton Live still doesn't have it on version 10...

I can use my hardware synths and multitimbral VST's (like Kontakt) perfectly fine in Ableton Live, don't even need Max4Live for it.

Bitwig 2.4 announced