MidiShaper

I ended up purchasing MidiShaper, but I was really hesitant. Getting it to work in your DAW can be really frustrating. The restrictive nature of the demo version did not help at all. For a product this frustrating Cableguys should consider a much less restrictive demo policy like FabFilter uses. It also wouldn't hurt if this included something like loopMIDI or MIDI-Ox. Oh, and I am pretty certain there isn't a manual at the time of this post.

Hello Greg, I am sorry to hear that you have trouble with MidiShaper. You can demo the full program for an unlimited time, the only restriction is that you can only one instance at a time, and that you can't save presets.

We don't have a manual, but we have tutorials here:

http://www.cableguys.de/midi-shaper.html.

MidiShaper outputs MIDI data. Routing MidiShaper to external outboard equipment is simple to do via external MIDI ports.

Using MidiShaper to control software instruments and effects can be relatively simple as in Reaper and Ableton Live, can be complex with pitfalls as in Apple Logic, or needs some special tricks as in Sonar. It all depends on how well the host sequencer of your choice handles internal MIDI routings and automation. If you succeed, you'll get super-flexible LFOs and envelopes added to your favorite hardware devices, to your sequencer's controls and to your software synthesizers and effects.

I've just purchased MidiShaper and it's great! however, i have one feature suggestion. i wanted to control permut8 with it, but permut8 only accepts MIDI notes as control source for bits, not CC, while MidiShaper only works with CC. is it possible to add MIDI note output as well in the future? i would imagine it would work the same way CC does, except for one could optionally set a center note and a range. a scale snap would be icing on the cake, but even basic MIDI note functionality would be excellent to have. this would work great with permut8 as well as synths for doing quick ramps and glide madness.

Hello Burillo, .

thank you for your suggestion. So far we have no plans to add MIDI note functionality to MidiShaper - I am sorry.
However we are thankful for your suggestion and we will keep in it mind when we consider new features.

Best regards.

Hi, .

Any chance MIDI Shaper could be made to work as a MIDI plugin in Logic X?

Cheers.

Ian.

Hi Ian, .

unfortunately there is no universal MIDI FX format. Each host sequencer has its own format.
So we have to consider that carefully. The advantages of these formats can't be denied.

Best regards.

I second that wish for a AU MFX version. Many developers jumped on the train already (Squaredheads, XferRecords, Sugarbytes, Kirnuu and many more). So it would be great to see MidiShaper too in my MidiFX tab in Logic. ☺️.

Absolutely! It's not top priority for us right now, but we're listening.

Sounds great! :) Thank you for listening! Maybe Ian and me can push the priority just a tiny tad higher. :)

Incredibly useful plugin that really needs some additional attention. Here are my suggestions (ranked by importance):

#1 - There should be no explicit "teach" function at all. I find this to a consistent source of confusion and is likely the #1 cause of support questions from your users. This really isn't the way MIDI plugins are expected to work. As soon as you assign a MIDI controller number in Shaper, the plugin should simply start automatically transmitting that control number without me having to explicitly do any "teaching". At the very least, teach should be momentary, e.g. as soon as my DAW "receives" the control number in question, teach should automatically turn itself off. Put another way, the plugin should simply ALWAYS be teaching without me having to explicitly disable it.

#2 - I'm almost in disbelief that there are no preset waveforms to choose from. The plugin should ship with LOTS of different preset waveforms. The presets themselves are pretty much useless because they change both waveforms AND all the control number mappings. This is silly. Once I've established my mappings, changing a preset should NOT modify the mappings.

#3 - Given that assigning the control number is arguably THE single most important function of the plugin, it should be given much more real estate on the UI. Dealing with the TINY numeric boxes is always frustrating.

REAPER on WINDOWS - Purchased this yesterday and I'm very impressed. I was looking for alternatives to Tantra 2 because I wasn't keen on it's built in effects and I didn't see the point of paying for more fx when what I wanted was to control my existing synths/kontakt/fx.

The curve editing is far better than Tantra's and, unlike Tantra, the routing is clearly displayed at all time (providing the know which CCs you used), though that display could definitely be improved not least by being larger.

Crucially, using my standard fx the results I achieved in a few hours were far better than I could achieve after a day spent with the Tantra Demo. Others have said the Midishaper demo was too limited or that it was difficult to set up in their DAW which was definitely not my experience. All was smooth and easy in Reaper despite there being no tutorial for Reaper users.

Curious... Can Midishaper control Curve 2?