Topic: help with vsti multi-out set up

@confusador wrote:

hi zynewave. thanks for the quick response. if i understand the difference correctly, i would like to bounce record in realtime. i have the option to enable recording of vst plugin midi output checked, but i can’t figure out how to select jamstix midi output as the record source for the top group track “drums” – it should also be monitoring all it’s child tracks of course – but it’s doing that currently. the parent group track is the only jamstix MIDI track in the sense that it’s the only track where i want to print the midi output of jamstix (at least until it eventually gets replaced by the final drum submix). i can always freeze a midi arrangement in js though, so what is more important to me right now is figuring out how to get the child tracks to record the audio they’re receiving from js four stereo outs.

Unfortunately setting up realtime-bounce recording is a bit cumbersome at the moment. You need to manually draw in the sound event for the recording, on a track that is hidden by default. I have an item on my todo list concerning this, and I really should deal with this soon 😳 . Is it not possible to render offline with JamStix?

also, i have a question about the way it presents the multi-out incarnation of jamstix as a separate instance on each child track. this is a little disconcerting as i’m used to the parent or folder track containing the vsti, and the child tracks just getting receives from it, whereas in podium it seems the vsti is not represented at all on the top group track where all it’s output is routed in the mixer, but is instead shown on each individual child track receiving it’s inputs. i think i can adjust to this presentation, but i would like to confirm that this is simply the graphical presentation of a single multi-out instance of jamstix? there are not actually four instances of js running simultaneously right?

You have multiple mappings, but they all relate to the same instance of the plugin, indicated by the “#1” in the mapping name. This gives you the flexibility to set up tracks only with the outputs and MIDI channels that you actually need to use. If you want to use additional plugin instances, you use the “new instance” right-click command in the device list, which will give you an identical set of mappings with “#2”, “#3” etc. in the name.

The signal flow in the Podium engine follows the visual arrangement of tracks: Everything (audio, midi, parameter automation) flows from the bottom track branches, towards the topmost master root track. The output of child tracks inside a group track is mixed together and routed up through the group track. When you want to bounce a multioutput plugin, with the intent to save the CPU usage of the plugin, then you should enable the bounce mode on the group track. That will bounce the mixed output of all the multi-outs. When the group track is bounced, it will mute all child tracks, and this is what reduces the CPU usage. All tracks that have mappings for the plugin instance need to be within the bounced group to reduce the CPU. If you just bounce an individual output track inside the group, you will not reduce the CPU usage by much, as the plugin MIDI tracks are still playing.

I’ve made a note to myself, that I need to create a YouTube video showing how to set up and bounce multi-out/multitimbral plugins. It is simple enough to use once you get the hang of it, but it can be difficult to break through for newcomers that are accustomed to other DAWs.

@confusador wrote:

ok, that all makes sense. is there a thread somewhere about how to show the hidden track and draw the event to enable realtime bounce?

1/ Enable the “realtime record bouncing” mode on the group track.
2/ Right-click the empty “effect” button on the track header or the inspector, and select “options > hide track lane”. That should reveal the hidden bounce track with the “B” button on the track header.
3/ Draw the sound event on this track.
4/ Hide the bounce track lane again, to tidy up.
5/ Select “Arm bounce recording” from the bounce menu.
6/ Enable record mode in the transport toolbar.
7/ Start playback.

Step 2 to 4 will not be needed once I implement the automatic creation of the sound event.

is it possible once you’ve drawn the events for the realtime bounce recordings to save the whole setup as a track or track group template?

It should be. If you enable the copy events option when saving the group track as a template.

i’m not sure about rendering offline with jamstix. i haven’t been able to get it to work as far as i can tell, but i’m clearly missing something here, so it may well be possible. thanks for the detailed response regarding the presentation of the multi-out instance of jamstix. i think this is related to the global/insert plugin architecture detailed in the manual yes?

Yes.

After playing with it some more, I can’t seem to get around the problem that it only writes MIDI note events on C1 for all instruments. The same happens when trying to export its output to a MIDI file, also in energy XT and Reaper demo…

But like I said, I’ve got zero experience with Jamstix, so it might just be user error. :-k
The upside is that all those kickdrum hits it produces for me can be very easily bounced to audio. 😉

You said you get a signal on outputs 1+2 – did you disable the “downmix” option in the Jamstix mixer?

@thcilnnahoj wrote:

Okay, here’s a non-flashy video of how to set up Addictive Drums as multi-output instrument: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RbrtFct9b38

Excellent! =D> I added that as a favorite on the ZynewaveDotCom channel.

Some tips, that you may already be aware of:

In the start of the video you rename the individual mappings. You can rename the folder (e.g. from “Addictive Drums” to “AD”), and all mappings will be renamed accordingly, provided that you do it before customizing the individual mapping names.

I initially did not notice how you extended the loop range. You could also have right-clicked the loop button and selected “set loop around selection”.

Maybe Frits would like to do a video for GPO? Because Kontakt & Kore Player are not nice to work with… 👿

Just curious: What don’t you like about Kontakt & Kore Player?

@thcilnnahoj wrote:

I initially did not notice how you extended the loop range. You could also have right-clicked the loop button and selected “set loop around selection”.

Now that, unfortunately, I couldn’t, because the dropped MIDI event is 1/16th, 1/32nd, or whatever too short (you know that by now :lol:), which would’ve resulted in a weird loop…

Oooh, touché. 😆

Just curious: What don’t you like about Kontakt & Kore Player?

Mostly I find the routing extremely confusing. Besides that you have three different DLLs for different output channel numbers, the “host channels” in Kontakt seemingly cannot be configured or at least renamed, and so some instruments end up being routed through “Kt. aux n” (though they aren’t used as busses anymore).
I’m also getting nasty intermitting distortion (as if a CPU overload occured) even with just one instrument loaded and generally rather high CPU use – that doesn’t mix with recording video on my poor computer…
By the way, there also seems to be something Kontakt Player is doing that causes Podium to always ask to save changes upon closing the project, even after you just saved.

When exiting, Podium requests the preset data from plugins, and if the data is different from the last saved data, it asks to save. Some plugins return different data every time it is requested. That can be because they put a time stamp in the data, or som other forms of counters/randomness related to copy protection.