How to tame velocity in an unweighted controller??

[Gary75]

I want to use my organ manuals as a controller for some rhodes from my sound module. However due to the unweighted action the velocity transmition to the sound is all over the place from soft to hard in terms of dynamics. Now as Im wanting to use it as a pad only and not a solo lead instrument I don't need the higher velocity ranges.

 

So, is there anyway I can transmit 1-127 velocity range to my sound and have it only play a certain velocity section of the sound. I tried limiting the velocity sensitivity on the sound, but this of course just mutes it if your playing is outside of the velocity range set in the sensitivity range.

 

So can I tame the wild velocity differences in an unweighted board and have it play a certain sample range in my scarbee library on kontakt 2?

 

This makes sense right?

 

The controller organ has no velocity curves to alter so i guess it has to be done in kontakt 2.

[Postman]

Practice?

[Sven Golly]

However due to the unweighted action the velocity transmition to the sound is all over the place from soft to hard in terms of dynamics.

 

I would tend to agree with Postman above... unless you have a damaged controller, the fact that it's unweighted would not result in dynamics being "all over the place".

 

[burningbusch]

Greetings,

 

I'm using Kontakt 3 so it might be a little different than what I describe, but I think both samplers are close.

 

Load the Scarbee library into Kontakt

Open the editor by clicking on the WRENCH icon in the top left corner.

You should see an area called AMPLIFIER and a tab in the bottom left of this section called MOD. Click on MOD.

You should see a section with the label VELOCITY.

The slider in the middle allows you to play with how much KEYBOARD VELOCITY affects VOLUME. Try the slider in different positions to see if it helps.

Also there is a GRAPH icon in the middle. If you click on this you can set the shape of the velocity curve. Make sure you click on ACTIVE and also make sure TABLE is not selected. Try different curve settings.

 

The above is really dealing with keyboard velocity as it relates to volume.

 

If you need to have it affect sample selection, then go into MAPPING EDITOR. This is the layout for samples as they are mapped across the keyboard and at what velocity. You could eliminate certain layers here, making the sound more uniform and less varied in timbre. Be careful. With more complex libraries it's often hard to determine exactly what you're changing. Do a SAVE AS so your original .nki is not affected.

 

Busch.

[Gary75]

I exaggerated when I said all over the place. I meant in comparison with a weighted controller. It's not a case of practicing, thanks Busch, I'll have another look at that, I had tried before, maybe I missed something.

[Al Coda]

 

So can I tame the wild velocity differences in an unweighted board and have it play a certain sample range in my scarbee library on kontakt 2?

 

If I understand right, your keyboard controller is:

 

a)

a non velocity sensitive midi-keyboard:

only one fixed velocity value ( v=64 )is transmitted if you hit a key.

 

or...

 

b)

a non weighted but velocity sensitive midi-keyboard:

 

all velocity values from 1-127 are transmitted, depending on how hard you hit a key.

 

In both cases you need a "midi event processing machine" for:

 

solution a)

transforming/shifting the velocity value v=64 to any other velocity value of your desire ...

 

or ...

 

solution b)

creating a velocity window by lowest/highest velocity values of your desire to play the sound of the midimodule,- p.ex.:

lowest velocity = 25 / highest = 55

all velocity values 0-24 = no sound

56-127 = no sound

25-55 play the sound or the module.

 

Problem:

If the sound of the module itself is velocity sensitive, it doesn´t sound w/ full volume/brightness, which needs full velocity of v=127.

 

Fix:

turn off velocity sensitivity of the module globaly if possible or adjust the preset being non-velocity sensitive ...

 

or ...

 

shift/offset the velocity values of the velocity window by a fixed positive amount until the sound of the module is loud and bright enough.(This is a 2nd step of processing)*

 

 

This could (eventually)* be done by:

 

http://www.midisolutions.com/prodevp.htm

http://www.midisolutions.com/prodepp.htm

 

both can scale and map velocity values (and more) and can be programmed by downloadable software from Midisolutions.

The "plus" version has more features.

 

This makes sense right?

 

Don´t know,- your description of your "prob" is somewhat unclear because you´re talking about to "tame" the "weird velocity" being transmitted of your non-weighted keyboard.

 

The controller organ has no velocity curves to alter so i guess it has to be done in kontakt 2.

 

In Kontakt, you only have a choice of some pre-programmed alternative velocity curves which act like a overlay on the incoming velocity curve/values.

 

If you´re looking for a "machine" which converts a incoming velocity curve/values to a relatively wide range of different pre-programmed velocity curves...:

 

http://www.midisolutions.com/prodvel.htm

 

Download the manuals of the 3 boxes and read if it makes sense or send a request to Midisolutions.

 

I myself I´m using a Miditemp PMM88E 8x8 midi matriss/processor which can do almost any midi processing needed incl. velocity map/ shift/ convert/ split etc.,- but this might be a overkill for you and it´s a discontinued product anyway.

But the features are available in the actual product of Miditemp:

http://www.miditemp.de/english/common_feat_ms.html#midi_matrix

 

A.C.

[burningbusch]

 

In Kontakt, you only have a choice of some pre-programmed alternative velocity curves which act like a overlay on the incoming velocity curve/values.

 

If you´re looking for a "machine" which converts a incoming velocity curve/values to a relatively wide range of different pre-programmed velocity curves...:

 

A.C.

 

Kontakt is not simply presets. You can change the curve in ANY manner. Each point (I believe there are 128) are fully programmable.

 

B3boy, I forgot one very powerful alternative. I was suggesting using the velocity curve in the amplifier. This affects only velocity (it happens after sample select). A better approach would be to use the script editor. Select the CHANGE VELOCITY preset. Dial in what ever curve you want or edit however you want to; increase the MIN and decrease the MAX to compress the velocity curve. The CHANGE VELOCITY in the script editor affects sample velocity layers as well as amplitude.

 

Busch.

[Analogaddict]

The CHANGE VELOCITY in the script editor affects sample velocity layers as well as amplitude.

 

Good call! Add some compression too, IMO Kontakt's own compressor can do the job.

[Gary75]

Thanks guys, a lot of good information there, I have not gone a lot into Kontakt editing.

 

Yes it is a velocity sensitive keyboard, I just meant that at unweighted action we all know it's tricky to play dynamically on piano sounds. Seeing as Im not playing it dynamically I just wanted to tame the triggering down to one level so it did'nt matter how hard I played it wouldnt stray above a certain velocity on the sample set. I mean, I could just put my Kurzweil on top of the organ and solve it straight away, but I thought I'd try this first.

 

There's no English manual for the KeyB organ yet so I was pleased to find out it did transmit velocity unlike my old XK3.

 

I love the organ, there is a certain amount of adjustment going from a real Hammond keybed to a modern one as we all know, I usually find it's the differences in the plastics from modern to yesteryear.

 

I won't bother doing a review, everyone can make their own mind up from the various vids and mp3's around. Suffice to say, Im happy now.

 

Their is updates coming, which I am looking forward to, but to be honest, soundwise I can't believe it can get any better, but kudos to them if it can! As DLQ is a small company making them and they are all handbuilt, I can't see any major design changes such as different cabinets, preset keys, I think if they did add preset keys, it would make it pretty long and they would have to scale down the chunky buttons and chunky wheels. Im quite happy without them, I don't know of anyone who uses the presets on an old Hammond apart from the standard Bb/B.

 

Err I just strayed off the topic!

 

Thanks again for the Kontakt tips

[Al Coda]

 

Kontakt is not simply presets. You can change the curve in ANY manner. Each point (I believe there are 128) are fully programmable.

 

Burningbusch...

We all can program everything today, you know...

But the topics starter forgot to mention which kind of modules he want to play by his organs keyboard,- right ?

 

If he uses hardware modules plus Kontakt on whatever machine running in addition,- it´s much easier to buy the Midisolutions Velocity Converter, choose one of the 40 available curves and go.

It can do different curves per midi channel !

 

If he´s using only software as "modules", there´s no need to buy a hardware converter as also not to program velocitys in Kontakt at all because most, if not every host has the functionality to change velocity curves, this already at the midi input of the selected midi track.

 

I always have in mind to get easy what I want and not to run into complex programming, reading manuals for hrs etc..

 

B3boy, I forgot one very powerful alternative. I was suggesting using the velocity curve in the amplifier. This affects only velocity (it happens after sample select). A better approach would be to use the script editor. Select the CHANGE VELOCITY preset. Dial in what ever curve you want or edit however you want to; increase the MIN and decrease the MAX to compress the velocity curve. The CHANGE VELOCITY in the script editor affects sample velocity layers as well as amplitude.

 

Busch.

 

Well, that´s exactly what I ment,- now we have several solutions to change velocitiy curves just only in Kontakt.

 

I tell you what,- I never had to change velocity curves in Kontakt since more than 4 years. If you "tame" the velocity transmission of a non-weighted keyboard just at it´s midi output,- the result rules for all and every module you´ll ever connect to this keyboard and you never have to think about this prob anymore.

I use 2 keyboards in my keyrig which need this kind of processing and I have my experiences.

 

A.C.

[Al Coda]

Thanks guys, a lot of good information there, I have not gone a lot into Kontakt editing.

 

Well, that´s what I had in mind and if you follow the instructions of Burningbusch and Analogaddict you´ll have to learn to program Kontakt, especially because you will have to do this programming again and again w/ each program or multi you plan to use in Kontakt and save ´em separately etc., etc.

I agree, editing scripts is a powerfull feature of Kontakt, but it´s also the most time consuming and complex to learn.

 

Maybe this is what you´re after,- I´m not!

 

Yes it is a velocity sensitive keyboard, I just meant that at unweighted action we all know it's tricky to play dynamically on piano sounds...

I mean, I could just put my Kurzweil on top of the organ and solve it straight away, but I thought I'd try this first.

 

In this case the simple and cheaper velocity converter is enough to do this just right after the keyboards midi output.

You never know what you´ll connect to the organs midi out next time in future. To use such a midi-box is a general solution, - editing in Kontakt is a only Kontakt related solution.

 

A.C.

 

 

[JamesHart]

You can turn any keyboard, organ or otherwise into a MIDI controller with velocity curves by installing extra hardware under the keyboard. It ain't cheap.

[Gary75]

B3boy, I forgot one very powerful alternative. I was suggesting using the velocity curve in the amplifier. This affects only velocity (it happens after sample select). A better approach would be to use the script editor. Select the CHANGE VELOCITY preset. Dial in what ever curve you want or edit however you want to; increase the MIN and decrease the MAX to compress the velocity curve. The CHANGE VELOCITY in the script editor affects sample velocity layers as well as amplitude.

 

Busch.

 

Busch, thanks, that did the trick, I had no idea that was in the script editor, amazing what those little buttons open up when you click them! I just set it to a heavy velocity and this has curbed the dynamics to a soft level.