creating a step sequencer

[jimdrake]

hi,

i am new to the lemur editor, it seems very hard to use.

i want to make a step sequencer with 16 buttons going left to right.

the current step should be highlighted in some way (changing colour of button or whatever).

i am currently sending to the lemur note on/off messages, note numbers 0>15, for each step.

i can't work out the midi mapping thing at all.

how does it work?

[mat]

Hey Jim,

I have some experience in building stepsequencers on the Lemur. So just some of my thoughts...:

If you are new to the Lemur a project like a stepsequencer might be to hard and frustrating. I know that I had the same in mind and was frustrated too. See - a stepsequencer is (or can be) a real complex tool. And unfortunatelly there are only rare tutorials (something I always say to the Lemur company - may it be Jazzmutant or Liine - give the users more tutorials to learn how to make use of your great tool!)
So maybe start with some more easy projects for scripting....like a range attached to a fader to range the output. That way you will finish your projects more easy, learn a lot and have more fun than being frustrated. If you can not wait for your stepsequencer a good way is looking into working modules from the community, how they have build it. For example here is a little stepsequencer I made 3 years ago (don´t ask me for explaining the code....long time ago): http://liine.net/en/community/user-library/view/89/ or have a look at this sequencer by totalmeltdown (pretty much the most complete sequencer on lemur only): http://liine.net/en/community/user-library/view/214/ (but it might be to complex to start learning how it works) Another idea is JMs old stepsequencer: http://liine.net/en/community/user-library/view/7/
You can also use these modules and change only parts of it. That was also how I started to learn about scripting on the lemur.

However - there is another potential source of frustration I should mention here: Stepsequencers on the Lemur only are limited. Most important is the timing which will never get as tight as you wish. That is why I started to do build the stepsequencers in max and use the Lemur "only" as a control surface. Maybe some of my Sequencomat series might be interesting for you (max patches are also open for editing). I just released SequencomatV1 for iPad: http://liine.net/forum/viewtopic.php?f=26&t=1225 and more info about V3 and V3lite you will find here: http://music-interface.com/?page_id=273

all the best and hope you do not loose your spirit and enthusiasm by my clear words... just remember "Rom wasn´t build in a day"

mat

[bxsj]

Hi Mat,
As you have stated correctly, tight timing is an issue for creating stand-alone applications like a step sequencer. The “on frame” expression can be used to send out timing information, but depending on the complexity of the template the rate of 60 frames a second (60 calls of a script on frame) can only be achieved for an empty template. That is depending on performance (and the complexity of the template), the on frame script may be called on the 1/60 of second or not (saying that makes the use of a timer variable base on the frames rather complicated if not unusable).
Please correct me if I a misunderstood this behavior.

By all means, woudn't it be nice to know what is Lemur’s internally priority to call expression based scripts?

Anyway, my next project (after finishing a tedious sysex control app for my Roland V-Synth) is a template that would allow sending out controller data synchronized to an external MIDI clock. E.g. changing the filter cutoff frequency for a synth in sync with the timing of my DAW. Any ideas would be highly appreciated.

Again, thanks for your thoughts and insights about this topic!
Cheers,
B.

Btw I dearly wish I could spend more time messing around w/ Lemur app ... but darn I gotta feed my pet cat and me

[mat]

Hey bsxy,

you are totally right with the framerate problem.
At least, this is how I understood it....and the more the poor lemur got to do, the more unstable the clock gets

If you are looking for a

template that would allow sending out controller data synchronized to an external MIDI clock. E.g. changing the filter cutoff frequency for a synth in sync with the timing of my DAW. Any ideas would be highly appreciated

check out Modumat 16step: http://liine.net/en/community/user-library/view/59/
It sends step sequenced Midi CC variations. There is a synced version that listens to Midiclockinput on Target0 and a unsynced version.

Modumat might be also interesting for creating a step sequencer on Lemur in common:
It hosts a Container called Midiclock. You can copy that to other modules.... it is based on the Midiclock in JMs stepsequencer.
For sure you have to change the output variables but the clockwork might work....

Here is a screenshot of the section:


If I remember right, I put a lot of effort in fitting the sixteenth variable

Code: Select all

(songpos+tick/6)/(16/Time.out)+(Time.out/8)

It contains a +() term that corrects midiclock linear delay quite well for my setup, but might be changed...
As said before, I am no more into that coding, haven´t touched that for years... So a tutorial on building a sequencer or LFO stuff on lemur would be appriciated. There are some nice tutorials in the JM section (http://www.jazzmutant.com/workshop_tutorialslist.php), but not so many, if you think of all the years the hardware lemur existed.
I hope that there will be some on Liine in the future too.

@ Jim. Are you still with us?

all the best & enjoy petting your lemur

mat

[bxsj]

Thanks for all the information, looks like a brilliant starting point. Guess it will take some time before I get my head around the external sync stuff
Cheers,
B.