I’m still getting used to trackers so bear with me:
I was under the impression that setting automation in one pattern affected that pattern only, but it is changing parameters in previous patterns too.
An example that occured today was that I increased the distortion on pattern B and went back to pattern A (where I had not explicitly set it) to find that much to my dismay it had also increased.
Is this supposed to happen?
Do I have to explicitly set the automation on a given parameter in a pattern if I do not want it to be altered by changes in other patterns?
It would seem more intuitive to me for it not to change globally.
eg. effect automation parameters are locked on each pattern even if not explicitly set. That way I don’t get surprised when a previous pattern sounds a lot different and I can’t remember how I had it set.
Also I’m finding that on a track in a given pattern, even if there is no 08XX command on that track in that particular pattern, and I stop the track, reset it to center and restart, it is defaulting to something other than center.
My only guess is that it is getting this value from this track in some other pattern.
Is that what is happening?
I noticed that panning column commands aren’t working on vst instruments. Is the 08XX command the only way to pan a vst instrument?
yes unfortunately Renoise reads forwards to get the first value if there is any later automation of that parameter. It’s a pain, and mean you need to remember to set the start value if you go to automate it later.
Sorry don’t know. There is an option to read value from other position in song. If there is a position marked behind it it will take that, otherwise it will take the next one forwards (which is what caused the problem above.) Personally I use the automation envolopes most of the time so don’t know if this actually relates to pattern effects, but I believe they are treated the same. (also just tested and they do)
I believe the track has values for panning, volume and pitch, so you can automate it through there. Not sure if you can do this in the pattern, as it would be 00zz (in the XYzz notation from the tutorials) Unless 08xx is actually routed to it. Just checked, 08xx seems to effect the track dsp, using the panning collum doesn’t.
Hmm maybe I imagined seeing that option above, can’t find it now :-/
without it (as it was in previous versions), it would be way worse: a song with complex automations would turn into a jungle, believe me. Now you just have to take care of setting the initial values, which is also way more coherent.
3:
yes, this is not a VST command, and there are obvious reasons for this; anyway, you can easily pan VST instruments using MIDI CC messages (see tutorial about MidiCCdevice, for example)
I don’t mean to be obtuse, but I’m having a difficult time imagining many scenarios where the advantages of an effect parameter adjustment in one pattern affecting the others outweigh the disadvantages (at least with my compositional methodology).
I don’t enjoy going back over previously done patterns that sound different and trying to figure out why it doesn’t sound good anymore.
It would be better to me for things to remain fixed by default for each pattern unless I come back to it and change it.
Unless there are some showstopping complications in implementation, why take away the option at least?
The advantage is, if you go back and edit your paterns with out i you would have to play through the song to get all the right changes in parameters for it to play that pattern correctly, whereas with it as it is it will atomatically adjust the parameters when you change patterns. Totally needed in my opion!
The button will disappear, the toggle will not and will be moved to a static position in one of the preferences menus as hardly anyone probably uses that button very often in one session to switch between the two modes.
There will be another button for it in place and i don’t think anyone would cry about that.
For every track and attribute that involves automation, I will always go to the first pattern in my song and declare (and modify) the automation track regardless on how I intend that attribute to behave in preceding patterns.
I don’t have to concern myself with unwelcome changes because of the ‘reverse chronological inheritance feature’. It’s a workflow preference.
I think I have an incorrect understanding of exactly what automation follow does. :retarded smiley:
I tried disabling it and still, if I have not explicitly defined the automation for a parameter, it changes in other patterns.
I was under the impression, apparently incorrectly that disabling automation follow would stop this from happening.
Ex. I crank the send on reverb all the way up in pattern 1 in the automation window, and I go to pattern 2 where I have not defined it and it is cranked there too even though automation follow is off.
Explicitly defining automation for each parameter in your initial pattern (cumbersome but do-able)and cloning from there DOES create the situation I want, but in addition to a whole lot of clicking, pattern cloning takes MUCH longer the more things you have explicitly defined.
Perhaps this is an extreme case, but I took about 7 effects (native dsp’s only), copied that dsp chain to 12 tracks total and then set the parameters so that they are out of the signal path by default in the automation windows.
When I clone that pattern (with no note commands in it whatsoever) it takes 60+ seconds.
On a pattern with little to no explicitly defined automation it takes about 2 seconds.
I’m not complaining here, I’m just trying to find a way to set-up renoise so that each pattern is “an island unto itself” (figuratively speaking) in terms of effect automation without a lot of mouse gymnastics and wait time.
I like to generate a lot of variations on an idea in a short period of time, so the long wait really interrupts my flow.
Perhaps I should have worded things more simply for the sake of clarity.
I turned off automation follow, and things are still changing in other patterns if not explicitly defined.
Defining each parameter explicitly for each effect on each track, while giving each pattern the automation independence that I want, is labor intensive and slows down my comp significantly when cloning patterns.
Courting redundancy, my question is, is there a way to set renoise so that I don’t have to use that cumbersome workaround (manually entering every parameter) and still have each patterns automation unaffected by changes I make in other patterns?
You adjust automation to value X in pattern 1. Now, when you play the song, the automation you have set up sets parameter A to value X, as it should. When the song playing process goes on, you notice that the parameter A stays in value X as the patterns play through 1 to [end]. That means that if not changed, when played, parameter A will stay in value X from the point A was last modified, until modified again.
If automation follow is turned off, you can put parameter A to have value X in pattern 42, and when you then proceed with your song, and make it like 174 pattern song, and then play it back, all the patterns after pattern 42 will have A in value X, because you haven’t needed to change A after that, and you had no idea that A had value X, because automation follow did not set A to X in pattern 43, because it was turned off, so when you played just pattern 43, you could not hear it. Now you have to do extra work.
This is very simple example, but basically tells you the benefit of the feature. And basically, you always have to set beginning and end values for automation anyway, so just take into account the automation follow feature when doing this, you are pretty much clear then.
And if your changes in pt.1 change things in pt.2 wrong way, maybe not using clone patterns help?
