Playing in midi with laptop keyboard

[Rokas]

Hi all,

is there are way to play in midi with laptop keyboard in Waveform 11?

[Peter Widdicombe]

Yes, but it's highly restrictive. Remember, your laptop keyboard has no "velocity" control and so every thing is at full velocity - and you only have one octave to play with. It's possible there are third party plugins to extend this...

Put a .VST on an empty track
Select input for the track to be "other midi track". Select a track with no MIDI on it <grin>
The virtual keyboard shows up on screen. That IS velocity sensitive, sort of. Notes you play at the bottom edge are full velocity; clicking with the mouse near the top are minimal, so you have the range between WITH THE MOUSE.
Now, AFTER you have played at least one note, ASDF on the keyboard are CDEF... W on the keyboard is Db/C#. You can even play chords.

Note that, if you then adjust the patch or do something else, you lose focus. Highlight the input select area again to get the MIDI kbd back, play one note, and you can audition (abeit full volume) that patch... Monophonic patches will behave like a normal keyboard as well, with the ability to do trills like on a midi keyboard, but you ARE limited to one octave.

You CAN actually even record it, but it's painful, as WHEN you hit record, you lose focus, so may need some blank bars to give you time to reselect the input, mouse tap a note, and THEN you can record chords or whatever with the qwerty keyboard.

Note this was for 5, 7, 8, 10. I assume Waveform 11 has the same limitations and capabilities.

[Rokas]

Hi Peter,

thanks a lot for your detailed reply. I've tried various keys like asdf row with vst instrument open before posting a question here and it didn't seem to work, but oh well now I know one has to play a note with a mouse first.

This is really painful method, as you say. And being limited to one octave only without an ability to change octaves is really a dealbreaker. I was hoping for some better way that wasn't documented in the manual, but there seems to be none.

Thanks again for taking time to post this detailed answer.

[JamminFool]

Yes, but it's highly restrictive. Remember, your laptop keyboard has no "velocity" control and so every thing is at full velocity - and you only have one octave to play with. It's possible there are third party plugins to extend this...

Put a .VST on an empty track
Select input for the track to be "other midi track". Select a track with no MIDI on it <grin>
The virtual keyboard shows up on screen. That IS velocity sensitive, sort of. Notes you play at the bottom edge are full velocity; clicking with the mouse near the top are minimal, so you have the range between WITH THE MOUSE.
Now, AFTER you have played at least one note, ASDF on the keyboard are CDEF... W on the keyboard is Db/C#. You can even play chords.

Note that, if you then adjust the patch or do something else, you lose focus. Highlight the input select area again to get the MIDI kbd back, play one note, and you can audition (abeit full volume) that patch... Monophonic patches will behave like a normal keyboard as well, with the ability to do trills like on a midi keyboard, but you ARE limited to one octave.

You CAN actually even record it, but it's painful, as WHEN you hit record, you lose focus, so may need some blank bars to give you time to reselect the input, mouse tap a note, and THEN you can record chords or whatever with the qwerty keyboard.

Note this was for 5, 7, 8, 10. I assume Waveform 11 has the same limitations and capabilities.

very good summary. i really wish they would make this more useable.

The best implementation of a virtual keyboard I have seen is Cakewalk by Bandlab. You can easily adjust octave and velocity. AND it doesnt look focus! Very useful.

I also like how Ableton Live does it.

[chico.co.uk]

Just to clarify a couple of things (this is a variation on what Peter posted, he's right, but just to expand)

You can create a virtual midi input under Settings / Midi Devices (on W11, may be elsewhere in other versions, but same principle) and assign that to a track, as the midi input. No need to use a different track as the input, just use that virtual input, going forwards, on the track you're playing.

If you open the properties panel, after highlighting the midi input, to give it focus, and click the padlock in the top left in the properties panel, that helps retain focus on the virtual keyboard, if you're messing with patches etc. It's not perfect, but better. You will still have issues.

If you want to use different octaves than the default, the "best" workaround is to add a Midi Modifier plugin before the VST that produces sound, and set it to pitch up or down octaves.

I'm not saying this is great, just putting this out there.