Remote help

[Faastwalker]

Never bothered to get my head around Propellerhead Remote for some reason. What's the big deal? Started doing a bit of reading up & looking at some tutorials & it all sounds good. My interest was sparked by Zvork's post on FB that they have made available a remote map for their new Oberon synth. I can see that it's a text file. So presumably I just need to edit this to reflect controllers on my MIDI controller (in this case an Akai MPK49) and drop this into the relevant remote map / codec (still unclear on the difference between map & codec).

First things first though - My Akai MPK49 doesn't auto detect in Reason. Does it need to be connected to my PC via USB? Currently I have the MIDI i/o connected to my Foxusrite Scarlett interface & no directly to the PC via USB. Is this why it's not auto-detecting?! I'm also a bit confused about how the MIDI controller communicates with Reason using Remote. Presumably all the presets information on the controller is ignored & just the actual controller number is taking into account? For example knob K1 on my Akai is sending MIDI CC 002, which obviously wouldn't correspond with what I was trying to control. And do mappings occur on a per device basis? i.e. if my MIDI controller is selected as the MIDI input for a particular device, that has been Remote mapped, then the Remote map will take over that device?

As you can probably tell I'm pretty green on the whole Remote, having largely ignored it until this precise moment! I usually just pick a preset on the AKAI & then either set-up each control to send a particular CC, working my way through the deice, then save as a preset on the AKAI. Or just use Remote overide mapping to map a control to a particular parameter on a device. The obvious drawback here is that it's lost on a new Reason song ........ time to dig into Remote a little better I feel!

[jam-s]

This article will give you some insight on maps vs. codecs: http://www.soundonsound.com/sos/mar07/a ... h_0307.htm

[Faastwalker]

This article will give you some insight on maps vs. codecs: http://www.soundonsound.com/sos/mar07/a ... h_0307.htm

Thanks for the link, Jam. Good, detailed article (as usual from SOS).

[Olivier]

I have the mpk 61. I'm using slightly different settings on it from this guy http://audio.seekone.com/content/improv ... ason-codec . Its an improvement over the default mpk Reason profile.
So yes, it does matter which profile on the mpk you use.

On the mapping side of it, just dive into it. Don't go straight into altering codecs if you are unexperienced. Just start with extending remotemaps. They are text files. Not much can go wrong.
I use a text editor to edit the maps. Notepad++. It has a good undo function and line numberering. Line numbers come in handy when you edit a map outside of Reason, and then re enable the controller in Reason. If you made a mistake there will be an error message with line numbers available under the the red cross where normally you would see a green tick that eveything works.

The main errors i always seem to have is with the number of tabs between statements in a line. Once you are aware how many tabs go where its pretty easy.

For the long run, be aware to backup your maps. I'm positive they don't get overwritten when reason updates, but better be sure.

[Raveshaper]

Remote is a pretty quick way to lose your mind. It's a very deep rabbit hole.

[Faastwalker]

I read through the SOS article. In this they set up a codec so that an Yamaha CS1x so that it could be used as a Remote enabled controller for Reason. Pretty cool but not really where you want to be starting. I'll go with eauhm's advice & start off small I'll make a copy of the AKAI MPK49 codec (in case I screw up the original) & try adding the text to control Zvork's Oberon. The Oberon Remote Map Zvork made available got me started down this rabbit hole so seems like a perfect place to start.

[Faastwalker]

..... Just trying to edit the AKAI MPK49 Remote file with the Remote map template text file provided by Zvork on the product page;

https://shop.propellerheads.se/product/ ... nthesizer/

I've just added a single item at the moment to see if this works. It doesn't ..... yet. I must be doing something else wrong I guess;

[Raveshaper]

Don't use a text editor. Use a spreadsheet editor that can import and export in delineated tab format.

You can mess up the formatting of the file by not using the right number of tabs between text strings.
Each tab will locate text inside a specific cell in the spreadsheet, making format corruption impossible.

Beyond that, check to see if "Oberon" is case sensitive. You may need to make it all lowercase.
Changes that are made in the map file must also be defined in the codec file. Have you done that?

[Faastwalker]

Thanks for the reply, QwaizanG.

I didn't change anything in the codec file. I found a couple of tutorials on Youtube but neither of them mentioned this so it's something else I'll have to look into.

I did notice that the name of synth in the file Zvork supplied is 'Oberon', as you would expect. But when I looked in the list of RackExtensions it's shown as 'Oberton'. The videos mentioned you get the name of the device for the Remote Map from the name as it appears in your Rack Extensions folder. Is this correct? Anyway I changed it in my Remote Map & it still didn't work.

[Raveshaper]

Welcome to the frustrating world of remote troubleshooting.

I'm not going to be negative in this thread, so I'll just say that if you keep at it and try everything, eventually you can get it working.

Is the surface throwing an error? If not, I think what you might need to do is load up the surface, right click the device instance you want to control, and select Lock "your surface name here" to Device.

Otherwise you will need to assign the remote override "Knob 1" that you created to the Filter 1 Frequency control directly by right-clicking Filter 1 Frequency and editing its remote override.

Keep at it. You can do some things with Remote that you can't any other way.

[Faastwalker]

Yep, does seem a bit frustrating. but I've only been at it a day so I'll soldier on.

No errors on the control surface. I un-tick & then re-tick & I get a green tick on the control device.

........ just playing about a bit more - I noticed then when I went into Remote Override Edit Mode I saw this;



I changed something in the Remote Map (actually I changed the name from Oberton back to Oberon) & the Remote Mapping disappeared!! Now I'm really confused! It look like the change I made to the file is being seen in Reason ......... but the control is not doing anything! When I tried to manually assign a control to a parameter on a device that didn't work either. It worked okay before. So all I seem to have succeed in doing thus far is making things worse!

EDIT: I've noticed that if the Knobs on the AKAI MPK49 are assigned to certain MIDI CC it works. So for example patch 1, knob 1 on the AKAI is assigned to MIDI CC 74. that doesn't work. But on patch 2 it's assigned to MIDI CC 02. That does work. Tried it on other devices on Reason & it does seem things behave differently depending on what patch I've selected on the AKAI. I was thinking that Remote mapped a physical control to a parameter based on the settings in the Remote Map. So where does MIDI CC fit into the Remote protocol?! Uber-confused now

[Olivier]

..... Just trying to edit the AKAI MPK49 Remote file with the Remote map template text file provided by Zvork on the product page;

https://shop.propellerheads.se/product/ ... nthesizer/

I've just added a single item at the moment to see if this works. It doesn't ..... yet. I must be doing something else wrong I guess;

Do you have a MPK49 or MPK249 ?
Because right now it looks to me as if you are not editing the right file

Also, the correct scope stanza is this :

Code: Select all

Scope	Zvork	fr.zvork.Oberton

What you learned about checking the right name from the rack extensions folder is a good one

If you are indeed using the mpk49 (and not the new one) i'd really recommend the MPK49EX map and codec. It changes the behaviour of the rotary dials which in the default reason preset on the akai ( i think its preset 2 ) behave as if they have an absolute position. This means that on turning they always send their absolute position. They don't "change" their position when you switch to another device.
So if a dial is at 40, and you switch devices, its still at 40 even though the control its mapped to can be at 100. If you then turn the dial, the control snaps to 40 first.
If you don't want that kind of behaviour check this site.

Happy modding

[edit]

The reason i personally prefer notepad++ for editing maps is because it has very usefull search and replace functions. I can also use it to type on several lines at once which is usefull when controls share the first part of their names.
I'd also recommend going into the view menu and select "show symbol->show white space and tab"

[Faastwalker]

Do you have a MPK49 or MPK249 ?
Because right now it looks to me as if you are not editing the right file

Your right. I spotted that earlier & amended but forgot to mention in my reply. Once I'd started actually editing the correct file I thought I was getting somewhere. The maps are showing up in Remote Override Mapping. But the controls on the MPK49 only seem to work if sending certain MIDI CC. so the MIDI CC definitely seems to be having an influence on what's going on. But am I correct in assuming the Remote Map ignores MIDI CC? Otherwise it would only work if a particular control was set to a particular MIDI CC wouldn't it? I think Remote ignored MIDI channel as well (at least that's what I read in the SOS article).

What you learned about checking the right name from the rack extensions folder is a good one

Indeed. So much for Zvork's Oberon Remote Map template. They didn't even get the name of the device correct!!

[Olivier]

But the controls on the MPK49 only seem to work if sending certain MIDI CC. so the MIDI CC definitely seems to be having an influence on what's going on. But am I correct in assuming the Remote Map ignores MIDI CC? Otherwise it would only work if a particular control was set to a particular MIDI CC wouldn't it? I think Remote ignored MIDI channel as well (at least that's what I read in the SOS article).

Actually, those midi CC's are important. They are what is being sent by the MPK. They are then mapped by the remote-codec to the the right knob/fader/switch names names you can then use in the remotemap.
The way the individual controls act, what kind of CC they send, is set in one of the presets on your MPK.
So to get it all to work correctly, MPK preset, Remote-Codec and Remote-map have to be working together.

That said.. for now, all you have to worry about is: edit the right map, have the right preset active on your MPK.
If you ever need some help live, i'm usually on the chat

[Faastwalker]

Do you have a MPK49 or MPK249 ?
Because right now it looks to me as if you are not editing the right file

Your right. I spotted that earlier & amended but forgot to mention in my reply. Once I'd started actually editing the correct file I thought I was getting somewhere. The maps are showing up in Remote Override Mapping. But the controls on the MPK49 only seem to work if sending certain MIDI CC. so the MIDI CC definitely seems to be having an influence on what's going on. But am I correct in assuming the Remote Map ignores MIDI CC? Otherwise it would only work if a particular control was set to a particular MIDI CC wouldn't it? I think Remote ignored MIDI channel as well (at least that's what I read in the SOS article).

What you learned about checking the right name from the rack extensions folder is a good one

Indeed. So much for Zvork's Oberon Remote Map template. They didn't even get the name of the device correct!!

the default reason preset on the akai ( i think its preset 2 )

It is preset 2. I'm going to look completely ignorant now But do I need to select preset 2 on the MPK49 for the Remote Mappings to work? I seem to recall not necessarily having to use this preset with Reason previously. For example I set up my own patch on the MPK49 to control the Viking synth. But to get it to work I used the Advanced MIDI settings. I've probably been doing it arse about face all along!

[Olivier]

Do you have a MPK49 or MPK249 ?
Because right now it looks to me as if you are not editing the right file

Your right. I spotted that earlier & amended but forgot to mention in my reply. Once I'd started actually editing the correct file I thought I was getting somewhere. The maps are showing up in Remote Override Mapping. But the controls on the MPK49 only seem to work if sending certain MIDI CC. so the MIDI CC definitely seems to be having an influence on what's going on. But am I correct in assuming the Remote Map ignores MIDI CC? Otherwise it would only work if a particular control was set to a particular MIDI CC wouldn't it? I think Remote ignored MIDI channel as well (at least that's what I read in the SOS article).

What you learned about checking the right name from the rack extensions folder is a good one

Indeed. So much for Zvork's Oberon Remote Map template. They didn't even get the name of the device correct!!

the default reason preset on the akai ( i think its preset 2 )

It is preset 2. I'm going to look completely ignorant now But do I need to select preset 2 on the MPK49 for the Remote Mappings to work? I seem to recall not necessarily having to use this preset with Reason previously. For example I set up my own patch on the MPK49 to control the Viking synth. But to get it to work I used the Advanced MIDI settings. I've probably been doing it arse about face all along!

It may work, but then it might not.

For remote override mapping any #CC will work. Reason just listens to whats coming in. If it has a name for that control it will use it. If not it just displays a CC number. So that will always work.
But if you want to make your maps permanent to have them always work, you kindof have to be using the right preset.

I gather that you never realised you had more presets in there am i correct ?
Now that you are.. i'm going to be annoying and say again that it really is usefull to get that MPKEX profile(mpk preset) and acompanying codec. I promise i shut up about it now

[Faastwalker]

For remote override mapping any #CC will work. Reason just listens to whats coming in. If it has a name for that control it will use it. If not it just displays a CC number. So that will always work.

That's what I thought.

But if you want to make your maps permanent to have them always work, you kind of have to be using the right preset.

Fair enough but even this is not working as it should. For example the Remote Map file shows Fader 1 should control Filter 1 Cut Off. But it doesn't. It controls the Filter Mode, the same as Knob 1. Incidentally both controls are set to MIDI CC 02. But as we've already established this should be ignored by Remote so I'm not really sure what's going on there.

I gather that you never realised you had more presets in there am i correct ?
Now that you are.. i'm going to be annoying and say again that it really is usefull to get that MPKEX profile(mpk preset) and acompanying codec. I promise i shut up about it now

I knew there were 30 presets on the MPk49. I've used a lot of them to set it to control my hardware, which works perfectly as it goes. I'm wondering if at some point I may have tampered with the Reason preset as well. But apart from changing the MIDI CC's assigned to controls Im' not sure what else I could have changed. I wonder if it's possible to restore the MPK49 to factory settings? I can't find anything about this in the manual. Maybe I just need to reload a file from the controller software ...... jeez, been a while since I used that! Don't think I've even bothered installing it on Windows 7. I'll try those files you mentioned as well. Cheers for the heads up

[Faastwalker]

...... ah yes. From the AKAI MPK49 documentation online;



I'm just wondering how I've survived this long without realising the significance of the Reason preset on the damn thing!!

[Faastwalker]

Okay, reloaded the AKAI MPK 49, preset 2, Reason preset from the Vyzex program. It's back to normal & behaving itself now. Obviously I had screwed around with the preset at some time. Doh! Now I think I can get on with editing the Remote Map file to include the Oberon & it should work okay now.

Hooray! Got there in the end, thanks largely to the help from you guys on here. Big thanks to all that posted

[Faastwalker]

.......... erm, strange. Now the Mod wheel on the AKAI MPK49 seems to have stopped working!!

EDIT: Got it - for some reason (excuse the pun) the Vyzex software preset for Reason was set to a range of 127 - 127 for the Mod wheel! Sensible that. It had also transped the keyboard -32. Deep! Fixed it now. Back on track again.

[Faastwalker]

If you are indeed using the mpk49 (and not the new one) i'd really recommend the MPK49EX map and codec. It changes the behaviour of the rotary dials which in the default reason preset on the akai ( i think its preset 2 ) behave as if they have an absolute position. This means that on turning they always send their absolute position. They don't "change" their position when you switch to another device.
So if a dial is at 40, and you switch devices, its still at 40 even though the control its mapped to can be at 100. If you then turn the dial, the control snaps to 40 first. If you don't want that kind of behaviour check this site.

Happy modding

Set things up to use the AKAI MPK49EX / ReasonEx files from the link you provided.

Works so much better this way. Makes you wonder why they didn't do things this way in the first place!

[MDTerps2015]

If you are indeed using the mpk49 (and not the new one) i'd really recommend the MPK49EX map and codec. It changes the behaviour of the rotary dials which in the default reason preset on the akai ( i think its preset 2 ) behave as if they have an absolute position. This means that on turning they always send their absolute position. They don't "change" their position when you switch to another device.
So if a dial is at 40, and you switch devices, its still at 40 even though the control its mapped to can be at 100. If you then turn the dial, the control snaps to 40 first. If you don't want that kind of behaviour check this site.

Happy modding

Set things up to use the AKAI MPK49EX / ReasonEx files from the link you provided.

Works so much better this way. Makes you wonder why they didn't do things this way in the first place!

Now do you know if this will work with the MPK249. I just bought that and went into editing the remote and nothing worked. Im not even sure if my channels are right or im setting up the board right, LOL. I wish there was a complete video (asking for too much) on the whole process because this is my first time trying it. BTW tried it with the Novation Launchkey and promptly took it back after i got the same results.

[Olivier]

I have no idea if those EX maps work with the MKP2## series. I would guess that they don't but who knows

There are however mpk2series remote maps available in reason.
I'd start with trying those together with using the right profile on the MPK. If that isn't even working then i you may have to go set it up entirely by hand.. I dunno..