Studio one ,Aautomation lanes versus (midi)clip automation , inconsistencies

[gentleclockdivider]

Some weird automation hierachy
THere are currently two ways of automating parameters in studio .
One is using the automation lane with the read , write, touch method .
The other one is by creating new midi tracks and pointing these to the same instrument , record enable the tracks, press record on the transport and start twidlling knobs from the gui .
THis one is my preffered method because the automation is automatically put in a midi clip which canbe freely moved around , and there is no hassle with touch, write , record etc...and the vst doesn't need to be set to read .
If you want to disable the midi automation , you just mute the track ,all in all a much easier workflow compared to the automation lanes .
So I decided to delve a bit deeper into the hierachy of the regular automation versus midi clip atomation .
In the screenshot you see I created 2 regular automation lanes for cutoff and resonance (blue) , both with a value that's decreasing .
The pink tracks are midi tracks , also automating cutoff and resonance buth with a value that is increasing , these are muted so no values are send .
All tracks are controlling the (AWESOME) Gforce SEM .
Here's the inconsistency ( screenshot 1 )

When the blue automation lanes are disabled but set to read , and the vst is also set to read and the pink (midi automation ) tracks are muted , it will actually follow the automation from the automation lanes (blue) , while these are disabled .
But it gets weirder , when I move the muted PINK midi automation out of the loop area , there is no automation going on ,which is imho what should have happened in the first place (screenshot2) .

Somehow the muted pink(midi) clips are forcing the regular automation to send their values (while being bypassed )
Anyway , I am just going to just use the regular midi automation with no write , read hassle but just thought this is pretty weird and inconsistent behaviour .

[jamcat]

I prefer the "part" automation too, but that is of course only available on MIDI parts.

If you need to automate your channel fader or pan, or an effect plugin on an audio channel, you have to use track automation, which sits directly on an automation track, without parts that can be copied, duplicated or moved.

Part automation overrides track automation. But as soon as the MIDI part ends and there is no automation of that parameter in the next MIDI part (or there is no MIDI part), then track automation starts working again. It gets even more confusing because you can automate some parameters with part automation while automating others with track automation. As long as there is no automation data for parameter A in the MIDI part, track automation will control parameter A while part automation is controlling parameter B.


I wish they had part segments for track automation, and let you move the automation parts around, copy&paste, duplicate and move from one track to another freely.

PreSonus also ought to add the ability to reassign the parameter destination in the part automation lanes.

For example, lets say you decided to swap out your GForce SEM with the Arturia SEM. You already automated the filter cutoff knob when you were using the GForce SEM, and now you want to use that cutoff automation on the Arturia. To do that, you have to copy the orphaned GForce cutoff automation data, add the Arturia cutoff parameter, and then paste the data into the new parameter lane. You really ought to be able to select the cutoff parameter, right-click it, and get a "Change" option in addition to "Remove" and "Add..."

To really understand just how critically this is needed, consider the following....
You have a full orchestral piece using SWAM solo instruments. There are 60 instruments, with each instrument having 10 to 20 parameters automated at all times, for a total of around 1000 automation parts. You've recently upgraded from SWAM v2 to SWAM v3, which are of course seen as different plugins, so the new versions need to be added as new instruments to the piece. All of the existing automation data must be manually copied from the v2 parameter lanes to newly created v3 parameter lanes.

[Bartone]

This method where automation is inside midi clip looks very interesting! I have read about it before but totally forgot it! Gonna try it thanks!

[jamcat]

I can’t believe no one else is using automation in Studio One.

[gentleclockdivider]

I think a lot of people do use the automation and are not aware of the midi clip method ( just my thoughts )
It would be great if the automation appears in a self contained clip like the midi automation method or the way reaper handles it ,but then again I never liked the read,write method etc..
BUt like you said , there is no way around it when automating effects .

[gentleclockdivider]

A nice trick is to use the stepsequencer for automation purposes only ,the resolution obviously stepped but that's part of the charm

[jamcat]

A nice trick is to use the stepsequencer for automation purposes only ,the resolution obviously stepped but that's part of the charm

Can you explain this a bit more?

[gentleclockdivider]

A nice trick is to use the stepsequencer for automation purposes only ,the resolution obviously stepped but that's part of the charm

Can you explain this a bit more?

Sure ,
Create an instrument , record some notes in a midi clip.
Create a new midi instrument and point it to the same instrument , create midi clip , right click: convert to pattern .
Go into the step seq pattern and click on the three dots in the lower left corner ( at the left of velocity etc..), a dialogue will pop up to assign controllers for the instrument
Don’t enter notes , just step seq controller data .
Done

[jamcat]

Thanks!
I just tried it out. That's pretty wild. It's not too often I lean something new in Studio One.
I see you can convert it back to a Part from a Pattern, too.

I've never worked with Patterns before, it's not really my thing. But I think this can be very useful for quickly automating things like slight pitch imperfections from note to note on strings, or bi-polar bowing expression in SWAM strings.

Unfortunately, you can't just make a copy of the automation Part and point it a different instrument, because the automation will still be tied to the original instrument and parameter. That's the same problem I was talking about a few posts earlier.

[gentleclockdivider]

Yeah ,it’s something I use almost all the time in loomer architect and even the cirklon ,different pattern lengths -polymeter for note and controller data .