Novation ReMOTE / Mackie Control (MCU) Trick

[t3]

Hi all!

Playing around with my new and very adorable toy, the ReMOTE 49, I searched desperately for some ways to use all those knobs and buttons with tracktion.

Especially for some minor T2 shortcomings like to have no KB shortcut for Solo/Mute...

Ok. So, after some resarch I found a way to use the ReMOTE in place of the Mackie Control Universal... at least in a specific way. In fact this is (sort of) possible with any other (programmable) external MIDI-Controller and as I found no descripttion elsewhere, I'd like to share it:

• 1) You NEED an MIDI-Input dedicated to the controlling functions. For the ReMOTE this means another MIDI-Input to your computer beside the USB-Connection (if you use it like most people would do I think). And, oh, by the way: Only the buttons make sense for this one, but you may use the Knobs and Faders in their normal way though!
  
  2) Connect one unused MIDI-Out of the ReMOTE to the computer an tell Tracktion on the "external controllers" page that the MCU is connected to this input (the output is not needed and makes no sense too...). Fortunately Tracktion does not test for the presence of a real MCU...
  
  3) Program your ReMOTE in the following way:
  Each Button used should send "Note On/Off" ONLY to the MIDI Port that is now dedicated to the MCU. Let the MIDI Channel at "1", set Velocity to "127" and set the Button-Type to "Momentary" (this means Note-On event at pressing and Note-Off at depressing) and then set the Note Number according to the function you want.

Here are the functions I found out:

Code: Select all

Nr.  8 - 15  Solo Track n (1 - 8)
Nr. 16 - 24  Mute Track n (1 - 8)
Nr. 25 - 32  Select Track n (1 - 8)

Nr. 46       Shift n to prev. 8 Tracks
Nr. 47       Shift n to next 8 Tracks

Nr. 93       STOP
Nr. 94       PLAY
Nr. 95       RECORD

Some "specialities" with that functions:

• Unlike clicking the Solo-Button in Tracktion this Solo is "added" (like CTRL-Click), same is true for the Mute function.
  
  Unlike the Stop-Button in Tracktion or the MMC-Stop command this Stop jumps to the start of the entire edit if Tracktino is already in stop-mode (in play-mode, it just stops).
  
  If you press Track-Select, the track is not only selected, but also the first filter/synth in the track is opened.

Ok, thats it for the moment. Hope someone will find it helpful!

Greetings from Vienna, Gerald

[spacefox]

Nice work there. Will test this soon.

Question: can't a virtual MIDI loopback (i.e. Midiyoke) be used, instead of connecting the Remote to a new physical MIDI port?

[t3]

Nice work there. Will test this soon.

Question: can't a virtual MIDI loopback (i.e. Midiyoke) be used, instead of connecting the Remote to a new physical MIDI port?

Hi. Problem is that the MCU uses simple Note On/Off commands. If you don't use different MIDI-Channels on the ReMOTE you may use one MIDI-Channel for playing and another for the buttons, but you then need a filter in the chain which splits the data according to their channel to different virtual ports. But it should be possible this way...

[djsubject]

PS, pitch bend on channels 1 to 8 are volume controllers

Subz

[spacefox]

Just had an interesting idea:

Maybe someone can use this to write a simple MCU emulator for Tracktion, for all the "where's my mixer" crowd. A simple interface with faders and buttons, sending the messages t3 and djsubject so kindly offered.

This idea can be further expanded if this app support MIDI learn - kind of a generic control to MCU converter. I guess it can also have built in filtering/ splitting to allow using the controller with a virtual port (as per the suggestion by t3).


(edited for typos)

[djsubject]

cc 60 is jog wheel & pitch bend on channel 9 is master volume

cc's 16 to 23 are pan (thease will move with the mute's & solo's using the +&- 8 keys)

Subz

[t3]

http://manuals.info.apple.com/en/Logic7 ... ceInfo.pdf

As the Logic Control from emagic is exactly the same as the MCU (as far as i know) this could help. In fact it would have saved me a lot of time if I've found it a few days earlier

At the end of the document is a complete MIDI-Implementation which describes what messages are sent and how.

For Tracktion i found nearly every aspect can be controlled via the MCU interface. All sort of switches, even window-switching (project/settings/edit) is controllable through specific note events...

g:gerald

[SaviorNeeded]

t3 said: "Unlike the Stop-Button in Tracktion or the MMC-Stop command this Stop jumps to the start of the entire edit if Tracktino is already in stop-mode (in play-mode, it just stops)."

Awesome. Thanks!

Tom

[djsubject]

if you are using anyhing in mcu mode then there is a soft display out there called huskervu

http://www.xmlconsulting.co.nz/husker/huskervu.htm

Subz