Note-envelopes

Ideas & suggestions
1

Anyone up for some more advanced control of note-fx’s or note-events or whatever you gonna call it?
Today you have pattern commands to alter the notes(samples) as you wish. This work just great, and is one of the important things that makes tracking unique.
However sometimes it is better and faster to use a graphic UI for this. It can be easier to find the right commands, and its by far easier to experiment with the parameter values.
You can also get a much higher resolution by using envelopes.
Today you can also tweak envelopes in a static way for each instrument in ‘Instrument envelopes’.
However, often you wanna tweak each individual note. You could duplicate the instrument. But in most cases you just type inn note commands like pitchslide, volume, retrigger, panning etc etc.

So what if you could do this in a graphical way as well? Let each note have its own set of envelopes.
My suggestion for this will let you draw envelopes for single notes in the automation window:

I dont know if this is already planned for the upcoming pianoroll.
This could require some heavy recoding(??)… I have no clue.So this is just brainstorming.
Something to keep the discussion alive ;)

Right below the beginning of the envelope window in the Automation window you can see a button named ‘Note Env’. If you activate it, you will see that all the notes in the track will be visible in the automation window. And you will also get an additional panel where you can choose note-fx-envelopes.

The small gray rectangles in the automation-window are the notes in the track. They do not represent the lenght of the note. They are there just to give you an overview of where the note starts (often you dont define any note length by not using the ‘note off’ command).
If you press one of the notes in the automationwindow, the selected note will turn red, and you will only see a green vertical line from the beginning of the note. This is the frame of the note-fx. Click and drag the note, or the frame, to widen it. Choose a fx in the panel, activate it, and draw your envelope.

There are lots of scenarios where this is much faster then typing the commands.
Making long and precise Volume/pitch slides with commands has always been a hassel.
With envelopes this is done in no time.
You could let renoise calculate an exact ‘Glide to note’ envelope by choosing a destination note (see picture).

You can make odd/cool combinations like ‘Retrigger-speed’ + ‘Sample Offset’

You can have endless of more fx’s like ‘Fine Volume’, ‘Fine Pitch’, ‘Tremolo’ parameters etc etc…
Envelope for pitchbend too?

  • Right-click-options to apply to all notes in track/column/block/song. Multi-edit of notes by selecting several notes in the automation window?

Other Ideas:
-‘Follow’ button to automatically switch note in Automation window as you move the cursor over a note in the pattern editor. (also a hotkey for this when you are in the pattern editor, to open automation window and show the note envelopes)

-Maybe somehow show the envelopes directly in pattern editor too?

-Play frame

-Convert note-envelopes to commands. (this will require some fx-column redesign)
-New commands like XYZZ , X=fx-point, Y=Playmode (Linear or cubic) and YY=the value for the point. In other words you only type the envelope points as commands. And no commands between the points (this is Linear/Cubic points like in the automation). But this must be done within a frame. So all in all if this is gonna work I guess you would need separate fx-column for each note column in additional to the common/global fx-column that you already have today.

These ideas might be too tough and a waste of time for some oldschool hardcore trackers. ;) But atleast I’m sure this will affect my way of tracking, for tweaking out every detail of a single note. 8)

Pysj

2

my (old) idea, also available here, is something like this, but it is somehow more “radical”: exposing RNI parameters (pitch, volume, offset, and so on) exactly as VSTi parameters, so that they can be automated.

Also, they could be used to automate something else.

3

Well… I know I’m not inveting the wheel or something. :rolleyes: Just suggesting a way of implanting it in the current user interface.

About the automation of envelopes in ‘Instrument Envelopes’:

I guess one ‘easy’ way to make a basic automation of Instrument envelopes is to be able to switch the envelope points into the standard ADSR buttons.
Then you add a ADSR-metadevice (dont we just love those ;)) and automate like most synths/vsti’s do.

But I guess that should be added in the RNI thread.

4

I find tracking envelopes much more flexible and easy to use than ADSR envelopes. ADSR’s are limiting.

Instead, a “Set envelope position”, like in FT2 (Lxx command), could be used to achieve very interesting effect.

In your view, of course, it could also be automated.

5

Yeah… I totally agree. The good old Lxx is a ‘must have’.
Still… automate the moving of envelope points on two axes can be tricky?
Or maybe not. Anyway… why dont throw in both ? :)
I can see advantages of both systems.

6

This is just such a great idea that I wish it was avaiable right now!

And, it-Alien, I really agree about a improved RNI structure as well. :)

7

This somehow looks like a Pianoroll, integrated into the automation view for me,
but the idea is nice. Not sure though if it can/should replace the pianoroll, that would be visible instead of the patterneditor. The good thing is that it serves the good things of a pianoroll (editing notes/volumes graphically) without removing the patterneditor out of the focus.

8

i like the idea … if this would work with VSTi & MIDI too: realized by pre-defined / or definable controllers for the VSTi/Midi env’s.

but I recommend a larger automation view in general for more “automation”-features …

9

This was not ment in any way to replace the pianoroll.
This is about automating note(pattern) commands.
The point of actually see the notes in the automation window was to be referance points for your note-envelopes.
But hey… if you can edit the the note length and pitch like in a normal pianoroll too, and not clutter everyting up, then why not.
But I think its way too small for this.

10

I’ve actually thought about something like these noteenvelopes in the pianoroll a long time ago. But the pianoroll have been on hold for a long time now though. The problem I didn’t see how to solve then, was to avoid making this a feature that only existed in the pianoroll, since we don’t want to separate what parts of the document that the patterneditor and pianoroll can edit too much. Adding it as automatable parameters with some new metadevice doesn’t give you the connection to notes. A good solution to this could probably be found as part of the possible upcoming(?) redesign of the document structure.

You might’ve noticed that I haven’t been active for some months here now. I’ve had enough to do with studies and all, so my participation in Renoise is on hold for the moment. But I’m looking forward to the final Renoise 1.5, and discussing future directions next year. How much I’ll be able to participate then is uncertain at the moment.

11

I ‘updated’ this idea by drawing another image with more zoom and view options:

First you can see that the lower frame is slightly bigger because of the extra scrollbar. I think you should be able to expand the lower frame as you wish by dragin it up. In a 1280* resolution there are plenty of room for a bigger lower frame.

Above the automation window you can see 5 new icons.
1 Show/hide track envelopes
2 Show/hide notes
3 Show/hide clips (note-envelope-clips and Audio-clips)
4 Show/hide multiple envelopes (show single or multiple envelopes at once)
5 Show information from single/multiple columns in track

In this picture you can also see an audio clip in the automation (audio clip = a streamed sample or track).
In the pattern editor the cursor is inside a frame.
This frame shows the lenght of the audioclip.
In track 03 you also see a frame. This is a normal ‘note envelope frame’ just like the picture in the first post.

Below the Automation window you also have new icons:
1 Disable/enable Follow song position.
2 Disable/enable Auto-zoom to clip under cursor. (when you move cursor in pattern editor to a note that has envelopes (= a frame) then it will autozoom into this frame)
3 Zoom to selection
4 Zoom all out
5 Zoom to current pattern
6 Zoom in
7 Zoom out

In the scrollbar you can also see the pattern bounderies/number/names.
In the scroll bar dropdownbox you can set how many patterns to be shown inside the scrollbar…
You can choose something like: Entire Song, 8 patterns, 4 pattern,3 patterns, 2 patterns, 1 pattern…
This makes it more practical to use the scrollbar if you use a lot of patterns in your song. You usually wont zoom out to more then 1-3 patterns anyway.

In this picture you also see about the last 1/3 of pattern 2 and 2/3 of the beginning of pattern 3.

A good use of the mouse functions are essentional for a fast and good multi-use of the automation window.
I would highly recommand to set cursor possitions (song position) by left-clicking an empty space in the automation window. This is because when you finetune your envelopes, you already have your hand on the mouse.
It would be a hassle to switch back to arrow keys to navigate up/down to have a quick listen to your last envelope change.
This is also very useful when dealing with audio clips.

If you have enabled to see multiple envelopes, then left click one time on an envelope to first activate it. Then your next click has to be close to the line to add a envelope point. To switch focus to another envelope, simply left click it to activate it (or if its crowded you just hide things or switch focus by clicking the parameter-name in the lists.

Left click an empty space and hold. Then drag to make a selection (the same kinda selection you do in sample editor). You can now zoom to this selection. Or you use this to select a part of an envelope for copy/pasting.

Do the same as above to make a selection of several notes (or ctrl + left click directly on each note).
Selection of several notes will open a big frame that ranging from first note-frame to end of last note-frame. Any envelopes drawn in this frame will affect all selected notes within its own range.

Right click and hold a note or audio clip to move it.

Right click and hold an empty space and drag to scroll left/right.

Mouse scroll to zoom in/out.

ctrl/shift + mouse scroll to scroll left/right.

Double click an empty space to select all (in view).

alt + double click to select all in pattern.

shift + double click to select all in song.

I dont see these functions as an competitor for neighter ‘envelopes directly in pattern edtior’, pianoroll or arranger.
Event though this is almost like a small mixture of all those features, it has many benefits.

You have instant access to it. No matter what you have in middle view.

You can use this for both pianoroll and pattern editor.
Even if you have an arranger in middle view you can only have envelopes and other detailed stuff at a certain zoom level. If you zoom out too much in the arranger, then this extended automation window can give you the detailed information you need for a single track.
In other words you can have benefits from different zoom levels.

Well… thats all for now :)

cheers

12

It looks cool Pysj!
If this becomes some sort of lame horizontal against vertical poll, I’d prefer to have the waveform over(-/under-)lay, automation envelopes, etc directly on the track, instead of having to shift focus from the middle to the bottom and correlate where everything is (though I realise that wouldn’t be much of a problem for most).

I’d feel it more natural with everything placed on the actual track, having a toggle button to filter the display of the waveform, envelopes and events (or combinations).

Why not have a popup window that would feature what you have drawn into the bottom view? That might work really well.

Maybe both could be done, but with this contra the vertical all-in-one idea, you’d have to expand and contract the middle or bottom view every time you wanted more screenspace allocated to either, and that seems a bit cumbersome to me.

I’d rather see it as a popup or better yet, integrated into the piano roll.

Du må tilgi at jeg opptrer litt defensivt. Ble skremt. Det ser helt ekte ut. B)

13

Nice presentation, I like that idea.

And I agree on also having it as a popup.