RapidComposer v5 beta feedback and discussion

[musicdevelopments]

Thanks everyone for all the recent feedback , I added a few things to my to-do list.

From now the OpenAI shared API key will not be available in the beta version.

Thanks,
Attila

[BluGenes]

So, noticed that when you set up a new composition, set the scale and so forth (from master track dialog), the AI pop up does not change to the correct scale. It uses what ever you used last.

[lovemusic15]

lovemusic15 - Thanks for your extensive comments.

I'm not in disagreement with anything you've said.

RC has powerful capabilities of it's own, and room to grow and refine them.

RC has also added the AI, most of which I do think is quite cool and clever.

Like everyone, I have personal prefs about what I'd most like to see next, but I'm also very pleased with all the ongoing developments of RC in any case.

Sometimes something that wasn't even on my radar yesterday becomes really important to me next month, and sometimes I find it's already there because it was someone else's gotta-have 6 months prior!

I agree with your assessment of RC, which, despite its unique features, falls short in crucial areas for modern-day music producers. The Markov generator, absent in many other software, holds significant potential, but its algorithm needs refinement for accuracy, especially in creating custom phrases.

Equally crucial is updating other features, such as rests and syncopation, both inside the idea tool and as variations, to align with standards in similar software. As observed in the forum, the user base leans towards traditional styles like orchestral and cinematic, leaving a gap for the needs of modern-day music producers who seek better synchronization and more intricate rhythms.

It's essential to fix existing features in RC for optimal performance. Although Attila has dedicated considerable time to certain aspects of RC, suboptimal results have led users to explore other parts of RC .
This is unfortunate because if users understood the potential, these features could be highly beneficial.

The melody editor is a fantastic tool but lacks customization for rhythm and syncopation. The same applies to the MIDI mutator, which doesn't allow for customizing rests. Rhythm Lab faces a similar limitation, lacking the ability to add rests and create custom syncopation.

Given the diverse rhythms across various music genres, it's crucial for users to input parameters for the generators to generate accurately. This flexibility ensures RC can cater to the unique demands of different musical styles. Therefore, I urge us all to address the prefixed issues before moving on to other suggestions. This approach will contribute to a more comprehensive and effective improvement of RC.

[BluGenes]

I totally agree with Steve on having a way to use or save the prompt explanations. This is especially apparent when creating chord rules.

As an example, I wanted to have chords from the major scale that only included chords were each chord had the same 3rd, or the same 5th. The explanation it gave, just works.. It is really helpful so, yea, I think it should be logged in some way, but, using the the look and feel of RC.. not just a text file.. lol.. now I feel like I am typing to GPT.. lol

[lovemusic15]

It appears that there is an issue with the idea tool when adding parts. As you can observe, I've already generated 48 parts. However, upon navigating to the main screen of the phrase editor and attempting to open all the parts, all previous parts disappear, leaving only the last one accessible.

[BluGenes]

just open the structure browser and double click the top right of that dialog. Optionally, click the track menu and zoom all tracks to workspace.

[sj1]

Here is a feature request that I think would help us to build-out complete compositions rapidly.

For reference, currently we can do 'Duplicate with Content' to take a part of the structure and instantiate a copy, with content right next to it.

RC - Duplicate with Content.jpg

So, for example, this:

RC - Pre-Dup 01.jpg

becomes this:

RC - Post-Dup 01.jpg

Thus, a first implementation of duplicating the content of a section of timeline across multiple tracks has been established.

This proposal builds on that idea.

--

For a next step, I suggest:

'Propagate Content to Sections'
'Propagate Content to Sections as Ghosts'

What these would do is to take the content, across all tracks, of say, a 'Verse' and propagate that content to all Verses.

RC - Structure with Verses.jpg

Basically this would be label-based. So, any sections with the same name (e.g. 'verse' as shown) could be propagated to the others with the same name.

Extensions to the core idea could include: propagating based on partial name match (e.g. 'verse1' matches 'verse2'), and popping up a dialog showing the destinations about to receive data this way and allowing each to be checked on/off before the job is done.

The resultant workflow here would allow an entire composition to be filled in end-to-end after defining only a few key sections. After that, the user could drill down at will in any area to create variations, etc.

[sj1]

Hi,

Searches on "jump" and "beginning" in the HTML view of Keyboard Shortcuts did not reveal items that would be a match for these two icons:

RC - LR Icons.jpg

Can we currently define keyboard shortcuts for these? If so, where?

If not, could this capability be added?

Thanks.

[sj1]

BTW, thanks for explaining in the manual how to add the AI access. Now operational with 5.1 and my own AI key!

[sj1]

Hi.

Currently we can double-click in the empty part of the horizontal scrollbar at the bottom of the Compostion window and the result is to zoom out all the way.

How about when we do that the previous zoom setting is remembered so that another double-click anywhere in that horizontal scrollbar will take us back to where we started.

[sj1]

Hi,

I seem to be observing (in RC 5.1) that a folder placed in the designated CustomPhrases directory is not being shown in the Browser.

RC - No Custom Phrases 01.jpg

Neither clicking the refresh button nor restarting RC fixed this. I'm still not ruling out user error, but I'm currently stumped!

[BluGenes]

Hi,

I seem to be observing (in RC 5.1) that a folder placed in the designated CustomPhrases directory is not being shown in the Browser.

Neither clicking the refresh button nor restarting RC fixed this. I'm still not ruling out user error, but I'm currently stumped!

Hmm, weird, works for me. I navigated to the folder, created a new folder, then just moved a couple phrases from an existing folder to the new folder and it shows up. Once I started RC, they were there.

[sj1]

Thanks for checking Gene.

Does it work for you if the phrases are two levels down?

IOW, for the case shown above, my actual drum phrases are in a sub-dir of 'Phrases-Drums'.

Also, BTW, I'm on Win 10, running the stand-alone, if that matters.

[BluGenes]

what do you mean? a sub folder of a sub folder?

[sj1]

what do you mean? a sub folder of a sub folder?

Yes, but I don't think that's the issue either. Even a raw phrase file in the top directory is not loading into the browser. I'm going to reboot the machine and see if that helps.

Nope, no change after reboot.

Does RC write a log?