How Long Does Other DAWs Take To Save 20,000 Midi Items?

[Dunbar]

I think there are far more appropriate adjectives.

Synonyms for random
adj haphazard, chance

Taking elements of 'music' blindly from a heap and seeing if it "works" is reminiscent of "découpé", where text is chopped up, rearranged, to create new text. It was pioneered by the Dada movement in the 1920s and has been used in popular literature by William Boroughs and in music by David Bowie.

Most of the "new text" is nonsense, of course, but it can lead the 'curator' to interesting places.

[jancivil]

please leave the personal attacks out of it, if you dont agree with or understand his approach so be it but there's no reason to attack the person's intelligence.

Evidently he's clever enough for speed scrabble.
I wonder how in the world you come away with anyone failing to understand the approach. It's 20,000 one bar MIDI items downloaded off the net, and the best he's done is the <average the kit pieces velocity> bit, and just go with that result randomly rather than "approach" drum parts as music in any way.

AND he's using a lot of space with this. Some people are enabling this behavior. If that's what he wants to do, so be it but as an idea of what to do, he's opened the idea up for discussion. It seems like this is not the first time we've seen the 20,000 one bar clips as a topic here, but I could just be losing it.

be that as it may, I'm not going to judge whether or not this person's question is worthy of KvR. I get people questioning why he does this, I get people suggesting he cold speed up his process by learning more, but personal attacks are unwarranted, opening up an idea for discussion does not mean one needs to be subjected to personal attacks.

Did someone ask you to judge whether or not...? That would be interesting.

Nota bene, I know the difference between a personal attack and having at their idea. Someone else may not, whatever. I'm just being clear where I stand, on bullshit as a whole. It's one thing to go on and on about this, it's another to argue bullshit.

[jabe]

Here's a whacky idea for the OP:

August: look at the contents of some of the MIDI clips. Make some of your own. Make up something rhythmic in your head. Try to make it into MIDI. Use MIDI clips several times in a song. Experiment and repeat. Try to emulate a rhythm you hear in a song with MIDI. Repeat till August 31st.

September: Investigate bass.

October: Investigate chords.

November: Check in for your next assignments.

Voila, dawnings of musical skill.

[harryupbabble]

I don't think there are 20,000 random midi drum patterns that can be downloaded from the net. I could be wrong though.

But even if there 20,000 random mid drum patterns to download from the net... I wouldn't download that because I want unique ones. I don't want to reuse others' random midi drum patterns because they may already have used it in their own music creation

And if they used the same random midi drum pattern generators that I used, chances are not all of them would be duplicates of what I already have because I have made edits to mine. Mine has no tom toms, no crash cymbals and my opened hi-hats were edited to not ring out abnormally long.

[harryupbabble]

I stated before that I was finding it futile aspiring to be like my musical heroes. Sure, my musical heroes played their instruments and created songs that way. But in my case it's not going to work that way because I find that I'm not made to function in a band.

So I have to do everything myself. I don't have time to really really learn an instrument because as I've said before my other passion is speed scrabble and that is taking half my available time already. I can already use a keyboard one-handedly to find melodies but I don't want to be boxed in by muscle memory.

So I can only simulate and do the functions of the bassist, the drummer, the guitarist, the lyricist, the melodist, the keyboardist, the mixer... as best and fast as I can.

And I have to deviate and/or not copy my musical heroes way of doing things. This may be good because what's the point of being exactly like one's musical heroes?

So if I deviate from the norm, maybe in the end I can make music that is not exactly like the music of my musical heroes but something like it?

[Hink]

please leave the personal attacks out of it, if you dont agree with or understand his approach so be it but there's no reason to attack the person's intelligence.

Evidently he's clever enough for speed scrabble.
I wonder how in the world you come away with anyone failing to understand the approach. It's 20,000 one bar MIDI items downloaded off the net, and the best he's done is the <average the kit pieces velocity> bit, and just go with that result randomly rather than "approach" drum parts as music in any way.

AND he's using a lot of space with this. Some people are enabling this behavior. If that's what he wants to do, so be it but as an idea of what to do, he's opened the idea up for discussion. It seems like this is not the first time we've seen the 20,000 one bar clips as a topic here, but I could just be losing it.

be that as it may, I'm not going to judge whether or not this person's question is worthy of KvR. I get people questioning why he does this, I get people suggesting he cold speed up his process by learning more, but personal attacks are unwarranted, opening up an idea for discussion does not mean one needs to be subjected to personal attacks.

Did someone ask you to judge whether or not...? That would be interesting.

Nota bene, I know the difference between a personal attack and having at their idea. Someone else may not, whatever. I'm just being clear where I stand, on bullshit as a whole. It's one thing to go on and on about this, it's another to argue bullshit.

my original comment was not directed at you, you had no reason to respond to me at all.

[harryupbabble]

Okay, yes, it takes time because it is rendering each MIDI file. It's not the file write time, it is transforming what seems like a simple bunch of notes into an individual MIDI file, which can be complex. Think about batch audio rendering, it's the same deal; it's not necessarily the file write time that makes it slow, it's the CPU necessary to process everything.

With that said, I'm not sure what other DAW allows an equally easy batch MIDI import and export at all. Cubase, you need a track for each file, from what I understand. I don't have experience with other DAWs but TBH, I think you should abandon trying to use a DAW, and look for MIDI file utilities to programmatically make the changes for you. Something like http://www.gnmidi.com/

Or use this: http://www.goodeveca.net/Midifile_utils.html - basically the ones that convert to and from a text file. That way you can use a text editor to manipulate it. You can use search and replace or more advanced stuff like regular expressions.

Thanks very much for that informative reply. I was hoping more replies like that would dominate this thread.

I am already aware of a software that turns midi files into text files. It's called Midi Disassembler. It's got limitations and sometimes it won't convert back to midi properly because I guess I'm not very fluent in regular expressions but another ancient software that I found is doing the regular expressions job behind the scene but that too has limitations. If all of that can be done inside REAPER, well that would be ideal.

I've heard of GNMidi before. It's not free. I've never bought anything off of the net before but I am making an exception for REAPER 6.0. I will have to take a closer look at GNMidi and see if it is worth buying and maybe buy that too when I buy REAPER. I don't have PayPal and I don't want to get one because now, instead of just planning to buy REAPER and nothing else I am now contemplating on possibly buying GNMidi too, only if GNMidi does all the midi edits that I want it to. I'm on a very tight budget and don't want to be afflicted with GAS. So I need to find someone I personally know that has PayPal and buy it for me onetime only.

I was sort of aware about the midi items in REAPER's Project Bay needing to be rendered. I guess there must be reasons why the REAPER devs do the things they do.

But when copying a folder that contains 20,000 midi files, on my computer it does it in under 8 minutes. I guess the rendering being done there Isn't the same kind of rendering that is being done in REAPER?

I was hoping REAPER could do the same rendering that takes only about 8 minutes. That would be heaven. Is it possible?

[harryupbabble]

If that was a direct answer to what I wrote, just in case: no it doesn't . I didn't touch the subject of having "music skill" at all, or tell you that you have it or don't have it. By all means experiment and see where it gets you. Just be open to considering what might be funny in the way you are rationalizing this.

My comment was pointing out that the comparison you are drawing between pre-generated structures (like 20,000 random drum patterns) and a painter's pallette of colours is confusing different categories, and repeatedly using that discrepancy to rationalize what you are doing. Only one of these categories is actually dealing with predetermined structural elements and form.

This doesn't depend on your definition of skill. If you like, compare your method to visual artists using loads of pre-generated structures as elements in their visual works if you want to make a more valid rationale for what you are doing, but the argument of doing this in order to be a "painter with a wider spectrum of colours" -- and not even leaving it at that but actually describing it in such a literal sense... Well, that doesn't quite fit, and it also doesn't depend on your definitions.

Edit: oh, and I also googled an article on how to play speed scrabble, thanks for that

Ooops, sorry, no, that reply was a general reply to a few posts a few pages back. I need to read your reply about the colur analogy more closely and I will probably reply later.

The "speed scrabble" definition that you found from the net might be different from the speed scrabble that I play. In my version of speed scrabble you lose the game if you take more than 10 seconds to make your word.

[harryupbabble]

@Hink, thanks very much for trying to keep things civil. I noticed you do at other people's threads too. I guess KVR is less of a jungle because of that.

I don't understand the intolerance for my music creation method. It may seem convoluted but once everything is set up, it's quite functional and fast and relies on using my ears and my ears likes the results. Well on the average 1 out of 50 results I like. But it's just an estimate, just like "90 percent" is. It might actually even be 1 out of 25.

What more can I ask? As of now, file saving speed is the thing I ask. Is that unreasonable? Who doesn't want fast file saving speed?

[harryupbabble]

There's one more thing you could do, instead of using project bay.

There's a preference to load MIDI files as references, instead of in-project objects (Preferences->Media->MIDI ->Import existing MIDI files as (*) .MID file reference).

This means that the MIDI files that you load are edited "live", so to speak. Well, not 100% live, but you get save and revert buttons in MIDI editor toolbar, so that you can explicitly save your edits to the MIDI file that is already on the hard drive. This means no batch exporting of 20000 files from project bay.

Then you need to make a custom action that looks like this:

* File: Save file (MIDI file mode only)
* Activate next visible MIDI item

And after that you can make a quick Lua script that will run THAT custom action 20000 times.

It should probably work faster than render from project bay...

Hiya ED. I am going to try your method later on. I bet it will work too. Thanks very much in advance even if it doesn't work. But I bet it will. You really know your REAPER stuff. The lua script part might be a problem because I'm no scriptwriter but maybe my keyboard and mouse recorder can do the job.

I have to go now, I'm a couple of hours late for other stuff, be back later. Thanks again (I must have typed those two words to you at least 5 times now!!!).

[yellowmix]

But when copying a folder that contains 20,000 midi files, on my computer it does it in under 8 minutes. I guess the rendering being done there Isn't the same kind of rendering that is being done in REAPER?

Correct. Think of a file copy as copying a book to a blank book. You are copying the letters and arrangement, but the blank book already exists. The time required is for finding the space and copying data only.

Reaper rendering a MIDI file requires creating a book to suit the new arrangement. The time required is for creating the arrangement, finding space for it, then writing the data.

Also, if you watch the screen closely you may be able to see a window pop up for each file. The title of the window is "Rendering..." but it's really fast before it disappears. So some of the work is in putting that window up, which is resource intensive (it has to do with Windows GUI resources and graphics rendering). It looks like the render from Project Bay is basically calling the render dialog and filling it out and submitting it for you repeatedly so there is additional overhead.

[yellowmix]

Also, to address your core goal, have you considered generative drum sequencers? Something like Liquid Rhythm? https://www.wavedna.com/liquid-rhythm/

[harryupbabble]

Also, to address your core goal, have you considered generative drum sequencers? Something like Liquid Rhythm? https://www.wavedna.com/liquid-rhythm/

That looks like a great software but it seem to be made only for Ableton Live. I am determined to Buy REAPER 6.0 and it will cost me 60 American dollars. That's a lot of money to me.

Liquid Rhythm is 99 American dollars, almost twice the price of REAPER and I can't even test Liquid Rhythm on REAPER. Maybe someday when I can afford it and if they make that available for REAPER then maybe I will consider buying it.

Thanks for the link. Interesting software, judging by that web page's description.

[harryupbabble]

There's one more thing you could do, instead of using project bay.

There's a preference to load MIDI files as references, instead of in-project objects (Preferences->Media->MIDI ->Import existing MIDI files as (*) .MID file reference).

This means that the MIDI files that you load are edited "live", so to speak. Well, not 100% live, but you get save and revert buttons in MIDI editor toolbar, so that you can explicitly save your edits to the MIDI file that is already on the hard drive. This means no batch exporting of 20000 files from project bay.

Then you need to make a custom action that looks like this:

* File: Save file (MIDI file mode only)
* Activate next visible MIDI item

And after that you can make a quick Lua script that will run THAT custom action 20000 times.

It should probably work faster than render from project bay...

This method seems to work. I don't know how to create a lua script. So, instead I created a shortcut for the custom action, the letter E, and pressed that really fast 40 times. It worked!!!!

But REAPER created 40 .bak files. Is there a way to disable that. I don't really need .bak files because I always make a copy of the folder that contains the 20,000 files before I do any edits, just in case anything goes wrong.

I'm guessing that if REAPER did not need to create those .bak files, it might do the job even faster.

Tomorrow, I am going to edit every single one of those 20,000 midi items and use the custom action to save them with the help of a keyboard and mouse macro recorder/player (to simulate a lua script). Looks like it might take a lot less time compared to the 5.5 hours needed if done via the Project Bay.

Evill Dragon, I bet a lot of people would have given up on REAPER if you weren't around to help us newbies out. Thank you, thank you, thank you.

I'm getting dizzy from lack of sleep so I guess I'll lie down and see what happens. I'll report back tomorrow about how well your method worked with 20,000 midi items instead of 40. Okay then, bye.

[jancivil]

please leave the personal attacks out of it, if you dont agree with or understand his approach so be it but there's no reason to attack the person's intelligence.

Evidently he's clever enough for speed scrabble.
I wonder how in the world you come away with anyone failing to understand the approach. It's 20,000 one bar MIDI items downloaded off the net, and the best he's done is the <average the kit pieces velocity> bit, and just go with that result randomly rather than "approach" drum parts as music in any way.

AND he's using a lot of space with this. Some people are enabling this behavior. If that's what he wants to do, so be it but as an idea of what to do, he's opened the idea up for discussion. It seems like this is not the first time we've seen the 20,000 one bar clips as a topic here, but I could just be losing it.

be that as it may, I'm not going to judge whether or not this person's question is worthy of KvR. I get people questioning why he does this, I get people suggesting he cold speed up his process by learning more, but personal attacks are unwarranted, opening up an idea for discussion does not mean one needs to be subjected to personal attacks.

Did someone ask you to judge whether or not...? That would be interesting.

Nota bene, I know the difference between a personal attack and having at their idea. Someone else may not, whatever. I'm just being clear where I stand, on bullshit as a whole. It's one thing to go on and on about this, it's another to argue bullshit.

my original comment was not directed at you, you had no reason to respond to me at all.

Who knows what you're thinking.
The one who was saying something about his brain might get the picture from that right there. Was it very reasonable or reasoned to tell me about my reason?