Plugin to extract tweakable envelope from envelope follower? (Cableguys)

[Mr D]

Hi folks,

You've got manually drawable envelopes like LFO Tool and Volume Shaper.

And you've got envelope followers like Shape Box Filter that will create an envelope based on the audio and attack, release, hold, threshold and range.

What i'm wondering is, is there an envelope tool that will first create an envelope based on an audio follower, but will then let you freeze it and give break points that you can further edit, so if you change the audio, the envelope no longer follows the audio?

[Tj Shredder]

How much are you willing to pay for it? Looks like a nice challenge to do in Max/RNBO…

[Mr D]

How much are you willing to pay for it? Looks like a nice challenge to do in Max/RNBO…

I'm afraid i'm not willing to pay anything unless it's a finished product and I'm not an Ableton user anyway!

I was kinda hoping such a thing exists already!

We can already extra midi from an audio loop, why not also an envelope?!

[gentleclockdivider]

So if I understand you correctly , you basically want to freeze- hold the envelope follower and make adjustments to it ?
The most simple method would be to record the output signal of the E.F. ( which is a dc signal) into a buffer .
You can then redraw the recorded dc signal and trigger the buffer which now acts as an envelope , so multiply with your audio signal to get Amp.mod.
Making a spline based curve from it is a bit more complicated , need to put thinking cap on for that one .

[Mr D]

So if I understand you correctly , you basically want to freeze- hold the envelope follower and make adjustments to it ?

Exactly!

Here's an example of when it would be useful:

If you take an old house loop with busy percussion and hi-hats and put it through a gate like FabFilter Pro-G or Waves Smack, you get a cool new loop that's tighter and more modern sounding.

But you might want to let the snare be a bit longer to keep the fatness. Or let a couple of the hi-hats through a bit more. Or have a slower attack but keep the main kick and snare transients.

The ultimate would be if it worked like this:

Firstly, you can freeze it and then you get an infinitely smooth curve to which you can now add points (Cableguys style).

And there should also be a "reduce" slider that, when you pull it down, it adds hundreds of points, and as you pull it down further, the points disappear and the curve simplifies. And there could be a global switch to changes the general point type from smooth to half smooth to smooth (Cableguys style).

And actually, while i'm dreaming, there should also be a mode that gives you bar graph-like segments that you can quantize and pull up or down as well as drag wider or narrower plus a smoothing knob.

And MIDI trigger.

So, a morning's worth of coding i think!

[Tj Shredder]

If you want to tweak it anyway, you could as well just use a transient designer… Easier to get a similar result…

[Mr D]

If you want to tweak it anyway, you could as well just use a transient designer… Easier to get a similar result…

nope.....

[SeeingInMidi]

Stillwell sculpto can kinda do what you're asking.

[jens]

Isn't Hornet Autogain doing exactly that basically?

https://www.hornetplugins.com/plugins/hornet-autogain/

[gentleclockdivider]

Isn't Hornet Autogain doing exactly that basically?

https://www.hornetplugins.com/plugins/hornet-autogain/

Does it do this ?

[_al_]

I seem to remember Blue Cat's Analyser being able to output the audio envelope as an automation lane

[Mr D]

@gentleclockdivider ............ cool!
If you're making a plugin, please please also do MIDI trigger including legato mode and one-shot!

@jens: re: Hornet Autogain...... that's really cool and interesting, and the price is right.
I didn't try it yet but if i understand correctly, it's just an envelope follower that uses it's DC output level to control a slider in the plugin, so if you record that slider as automation, the DC level gets recorded to your DAW. If so, that's kinda genius, i never saw a plugin that did that (automatically move a knob or slider which could then be recorded as automation).
I'm not sure i see a lot of difference, audio-wise, between using that or just a sidechain compressor, but the advantage of Hornet is you get the tweakable automation curve. Definitely gonna buy that plug to test.

@SeeingInMidi: .....I tried Sculpto. Damn, that plugin could use an update! And the faux leather background on the website!

@_al_ ..... nice, so kinda like what Hornet does?

Anyway, what i'm needing is a little different from these envelope-to-automation tools.
I need a MIDI triggerable envelope that has the same features as a synth or sampler multi-seg envelope, including legato, one-shot, looping etc ...... gentleclockdivider gets it.

[gentleclockdivider]

@gentleclockdivider ............ cool!
If you're making a plugin

I am not

[Ah_Dziz]

Many ways to convert audio ABS to midi. From midi you can convert to automation in many hosts. I'd use reaktor or ologies to set this up fast. The end result would be host automation though. If that's not what you want then you'll need to do a good bit of reaktor/max/PD or whatever setup to store your envelope data.

[EcHo2K]

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