RePlay/ReCode - fully remoteable devices for scripting

[theshoemaker]

HI all,

I hinted a couple of times, that I'm working on a scriptable remote codec with python like viewtopic.php?p=373642#p373642

The first time I came up with this Idea is nearly 3 years ago or even longer. I saw a post of

About his generated refills. And It immediately startet to grow .. what if ... like in MAX. Okay, not so complex, but some helpers and features.

After longer breaks in between I'm nearing the end of ALPHA stage. Right now, I'm looking for some Ideas to Test or other features to implement, before I really go into BETA. I will do some demos and videos soon. It is very basic right now, and only works with "value" type inputs and outputs.

The remote codec is a python scripting environment which can be used from and interactive shell like Jupyter (which I am using) or a code editor, which also supports executing python statements easily.

How it works:

I've been doing some parsing and generating based on the info files you can Export (from Reason 9.2 >).

What you get is an autogenerated remotemap (codec also to come autogenerated, when I learn more about how to map the types properly).

You can use statements like:

Code: Select all

subtractor.amp_env_attack.rand(min=10, max=50)

And much much more sophisticated stuff.

The single most important features right now are preset saving/loading/radomization/morphing ... yes you read correctly morphing.

And here is the sneak peek:

Patch Morphing

For this to work properly the device has to have all or nearly all control surface items exposed as remotables. Subtractor works like a charm., Parsec, Nostromo too ... and some more. But other don't. So right now I'm looking for a list of devices which are allmost fully remoteable, which I can test and maybe also develop specific scripts.

The patch morphing works on every device, but maybe needs some custom code based on the devices to fully make sense. Subtractor works really good.

do you know about which devices fullfill this properties, as you are very active with the Panorama Remote Maps, you might know this.

This might not also be intersting for Live performance, but also for Modular Patch randomization, as I used the idea of

for multichannel setup. So you can script 16 devices at once without changing the focus. Do I have your permission to use this Idea in a product? Credits are given.

I will setup a subforum later on for BETA testing and post

[theshoemaker]

A more complete example:

Setup first and initial randomization:

Code: Select all

infos_path = join('Reason', 'remote', 'infos')
replay_map_path = join(remote.path, 'Maps', 'RePlay')
map1, channel1 = load(replay_map_path)
map2, channel2 = load(replay_map_path, channel=2)
subtractor = channel1.subtractor_analog_synthesizer

subtractor.rand(exclude="(level|.*fine_tune.*)")

then fine tune:

Code: Select all

subtractor.osc2.rand(exclude="(on_off|fine)")
percussive = dict(
  attack  = [0,60],
  decay   = [5,50], 
  sustain = [0,50], 
  release = [0,50],
)
subtractor.amp_env.rand(percussive)
# or more general ...
subtractor.filter_env.rand(exclude="(amount|invert)")

Then saving

Code: Select all

patch1 = remote.snapshot(subtractor)

# do some more randomization or load a custom patch in reason and then ...
patch2 = remote.snapshot(subtractor)

You can also just change the patch in Reason and save this as a patch
for morphing.

And writing/reading

Code: Select all

remote.write(patch1, 'patches/subtractor/patch1.yml')
# or read from disk
patch1 = remote.read(patch1, 'patches/subtractor/patch1.yml')

and finally patch morphing

Code: Select all

remote.load_patch(subtractor, patch1)
remote.transition(subtractor, patch1, patch2, duration=8.0)
remote.load_patch(subtractor, patch2)

[Carly(Poohbear)]

Hi,

I have VBscript patch randomiser which works however setting it up is a pain as you have to map out all the min and max values.

I dropped that for my ReRandomiser which is a available to download, you can choose what you want to randomise and by how much. details here

The backend is a small bit LUA code and 4 big remote maps

ReSpire and Expanse are massive on the remote side of things, they could be worth looking at.

I have a lot of the remote exports in a db which I'm exporting for someone else, I might see if I can get that added to the http://www.reasonremoter.uk site

The morphing sounds interesting as that was going to be something that I was going to work on next, first a simple solution of taking 2 patches and creating say 20 patches between those two, then I want to do a live morph, just from one control, which is really straight forward to do but needs a quick way to set things up...

PoohBear

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
My Youtube channel https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCqCNsA ... p4cQF4j-8A
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
My Soundcloud Page ....... Nektar Mappings
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

[Catblack]

Please add me to your beta forum! I'd love to play with it!

I have a php port of the old 'rendompatch' script, but haven't done much with it. (And the original's templates are tough to work with.) Sounds like your python program is pretty well thought out, Shoemaker.

[theshoemaker]

Hi,

I have VBscript patch randomiser which works however setting it up is a pain as you have to map out all the min and max values.

Hi PoohBaer,

Mine is doing all the dirty work for me automatically, but right now, it is just 0-127. No fancy stuff atm. But I'm going to use all the infos from the info files in the future.

I dropped that for my ReRandomiser which is a available to download, you can choose what you want to randomise and by how much. details here

The backend is a small bit LUA code and 4 big remote maps

ReSpire and Expanse are massive on the remote side of things, they could be worth looking at.

I have a lot of the remote exports in a db which I'm exporting for someone else, I might see if I can get that added to the http://www.reasonremoter.uk site

The morphing sounds interesting as that was going to be something that I was going to work on next, first a simple solution of taking 2 patches and creating say 20 patches between those two, then I want to do a live morph, just from one control, which is really straight forward to do but needs a quick way to set things up...

thats a nice builtin Solution. I really like that. Mine is going to be more advanced, than yours, as I can literally do almost everything you can think of with remotables. I also have been thinking about creating a companion RE, but I don't have any ideas or plans yet. I basically also have 120 midi cc's I'm mapping and using with 9 Control Groups. Which gives me a smacking 9x110 ~ 1000 remotables per device

I both have ReSpire and eXpanse and they are on my todo.

Like I said. My solution is going to be an auto genereating one, from both, remote map and codec, so as soon as there is a new device it will work automatically. I could also create some nice UI, but that future stuff. I could also bridge between a OSC. Any way, thank's for the hints about ReSpire and eXpanse.

If you know more that this. Just drop me a note here. I haven't been aware of your ReRandomizer, otherwise I would have been looking at it before. We do roughly the same with different approaches.

If you develop an extra RE you could totally do the patch morphing. How is the VBscript randomizer working? Also communicating over MIDI?
My solution will be crossplatform and working on both. Windows and MacOS

[theshoemaker]

Please add me to your beta forum! I'd love to play with it!

I have a php port of the old 'rendompatch' script, but haven't done much with it. (And the original's templates are though to work with.) Sounds like your python program is pretty well thought out, Shoemaker.

Okay. I will. Coming back as soon as I'm ready. I put some serious time into figuring out the right architecture, but now I'm quite satisfied with how things work. Adding features with what is doable over midi is really easy right now.

I implemented basic linear patch morphing in 1 hour yestarday with 10 lines of code ... the function remote.transition you see in the sample.

Btw. that's also a feature I have on the roadmap later on. To create patches with the new xml based layout (devices supporting it). Maybe I can also work out the binary format, like Panda did for his patches. But that's not what I focus on right now.

[MannequinRaces]

Wow! I’m really interested to see where this goes! Keep up the work!

[Carly(Poohbear)]

How is the VBscript randomizer working?

The VBscript create patch files, 100 patches in a few seconds. however as I said you need to know the lower and upper limits of each parameter which was written to an input file, that was one of the reasons I went down the remote way as I did not have to worry about that.

Mine is doing all the dirty work for me automatically

You are still having to manually export the remote info file?

I basically also have 120 midi cc's I'm mapping and using with 9 Control Groups. Which gives me a smacking 9x110 ~ 1000 remotables per device

FYI out of the 3000 odd maps there are only 60 devices having over 1000 remotables and even then they are not all usable.
Only 150 devices have over 476 remoteables.

I don't know if you looked at my other videos on my channel ref Randomising, however randomising everything gets a lot of shit results but doing variations works quite well..


Thinking about morphing now LOL

[theshoemaker]

You are still having to manually export the remote info file?

Yes I do that on the go while I try a synth. There is no need to export all unless you need it. This is really just a means of a few seconds. But you can also download them from github here: Maybe I just link to the repo or load them from this url.
https://github.com/KittenVillage/ReasonRemoteInfo

I thinks the repo is from

FYI out of the 3000 odd maps there are only 60 devices having over 1000 remotables and even then they are not all usable.
Only 150 devices have over 476 remoteables.

I don't know if you looked at my other videos on my channel ref Randomising, however randomising everything gets a lot of shit results but doing variations works quite well..

Thinking about morphing now LOL

Yeah, I figured there won't be a lot who need more mappings. As for the ranges, that is going to be an issue. Like you said. You have to define somewhere what is suitable. Still I din't have an exhaustive look at it for analysing.
As for the midi stuff it's easy. Because I'm MIDI based like your solution, it's from 0 to 127. Which not always makes sense. But then, look at my example, where I provide a dictionary and randomize amp_env from this ranges. That is something you can reuse on many devices. Anywhay, this is not something holding me back. Because actually it's fun exploring sometimes out of bounds where you normally wouldn't go. I have a nice workflow where I randmize wild initially and then refine.

And I already figured out while trying, that randomising everything doesn't make a lot of sense. That's why I implemented the only and exclude pattern for the SurfaceController or the ControlGroup. This is based on regular expressions. Already thinking about a parser engine, but I want to keep things very simple.

As for the definition files I could either use the xml based repatch format or just something very simple. Right now I could do easily, json, yaml or just plain python. which are all the same but look a bit different.

This would be python code.

Code: Select all

amp_env_attack = [0, 10]
amp_env_decay = [14, 50]
amp_env_sustain = [2, 54]
amp_env_release = [10, 80]

This the yaml

Code: Select all

amp_env_attack: 
	- 16
	- 20
amp_env_decay:
       - 14
       - 50

And json ... roughly the same.

I'm already thinking about creating plugins per device for this, but also I don't think it's necessary. I'm gonna centralize contributions in a central place, where everyone can load the files and use them. Will demo that later on. I will just create proper script code for randomisation, while I'm using the devices. later on, when I implement more of the remote codec capabilities I could also automatically load the proper script file automatically on device switching. There is still a ton of work to do, but a useable version for what I listed is really working good. Had a lot of fun yesterday with subtractor with the primal audio filters attached to it

[Carly(Poohbear)]

But you can also download them from github here:

As I said I have all of these in a database, more than happy to export.
My "Random Bank1.remotemap" are 100% generated from this db.
(also this is how I did the 2200 grab maps for the Nektar).
So I could export in a format ready for you to use if you supply a template of what you what.

[theshoemaker]

Here it is a sneak peak ... I also added it to the first post.

Today I implemented multiple device patches (like combinator) and device callbacks. The second one means, that you can now trigger actions in code when a device sends midi. So that's it. This is the call for a Companion RE.

Another idea I have in mind is a serialization protocol over midi that tunnels all the scripting stuff and saves it inside of a reason patch .. Have to do some more research. Maybe something for V2.

Feedback, comments and ideas welcome.

Have to explore more on the remote details and internals.

[electrofux]

Cool project

Thinking about the Synths currently fully remotable. But most are lacking some remote items. At least the ones that spring to your mind. Thor has the mod matrix items not remoted, with Europa and Grain the Envs are problematic, Malstroen those darn wave selectors, which are not remotable for ages now...

Those could be candidates to work nicely as they have the stuff mapped that others are lacking (like eg Mod target selectors)

Viking 2
Antidote!
Parsec 2
KHS One

Just for understanding. You have a script that generates Midi ccs and links them to remote items, sends this to a codec and then into Reasons and vice versa? Practicably a layer on top of Remote?

[jimmyklane]

HI all,

I hinted a couple of times, that I'm working on a scriptable remote codec with python like viewtopic.php?p=373642#p373642

The first time I came up with this Idea is nearly 3 years ago or even longer. I saw a post of

About his generated refills. And It immediately startet to grow .. what if ... like in MAX. Okay, not so complex, but some helpers and features.

After longer breaks in between I'm nearing the end of ALPHA stage. Right now, I'm looking for some Ideas to Test or other features to implement, before I really go into BETA. I will do some demos and videos soon. It is very basic right now, and only works with "value" type inputs and outputs.

The remote codec is a python scripting environment which can be used from and interactive shell like Jupyter (which I am using) or a code editor, which also supports executing python statements easily.

How it works:

I've been doing some parsing and generating based on the info files you can Export (from Reason 9.2 >).

What you get is an autogenerated remotemap (codec also to come autogenerated, when I learn more about how to map the types properly).

You can use statements like:

Code: Select all

subtractor.amp_env_attack.rand(min=10, max=50)

And much much more sophisticated stuff.

The single most important features right now are preset saving/loading/radomization/morphing ... yes you read correctly morphing.

And here is the sneak peek:

Patch Morphing

For this to work properly the device has to have all or nearly all control surface items exposed as remotables. Subtractor works like a charm., Parsec, Nostromo too ... and some more. But other don't. So right now I'm looking for a list of devices which are allmost fully remoteable, which I can test and maybe also develop specific scripts.

The patch morphing works on every device, but maybe needs some custom code based on the devices to fully make sense. Subtractor works really good.

do you know about which devices fullfill this properties, as you are very active with the Panorama Remote Maps, you might know this.

This might not also be intersting for Live performance, but also for Modular Patch randomization, as I used the idea of

for multichannel setup. So you can script 16 devices at once without changing the focus. Do I have your permission to use this Idea in a product? Credits are given.

I will setup a subforum later on for BETA testing and post

The morphing is super cool, however you’re way over my head with the Python scripting. How will end-users approach this without a coding background?

[electrofux]

HI all,

I hinted a couple of times, that I'm working on a scriptable remote codec with python like viewtopic.php?p=373642#p373642

The first time I came up with this Idea is nearly 3 years ago or even longer. I saw a post of

About his generated refills. And It immediately startet to grow .. what if ... like in MAX. Okay, not so complex, but some helpers and features.

After longer breaks in between I'm nearing the end of ALPHA stage. Right now, I'm looking for some Ideas to Test or other features to implement, before I really go into BETA. I will do some demos and videos soon. It is very basic right now, and only works with "value" type inputs and outputs.

The remote codec is a python scripting environment which can be used from and interactive shell like Jupyter (which I am using) or a code editor, which also supports executing python statements easily.

How it works:

I've been doing some parsing and generating based on the info files you can Export (from Reason 9.2 >).

What you get is an autogenerated remotemap (codec also to come autogenerated, when I learn more about how to map the types properly).

You can use statements like:

Code: Select all

subtractor.amp_env_attack.rand(min=10, max=50)

And much much more sophisticated stuff.

The single most important features right now are preset saving/loading/radomization/morphing ... yes you read correctly morphing.

And here is the sneak peek:

Patch Morphing

For this to work properly the device has to have all or nearly all control surface items exposed as remotables. Subtractor works like a charm., Parsec, Nostromo too ... and some more. But other don't. So right now I'm looking for a list of devices which are allmost fully remoteable, which I can test and maybe also develop specific scripts.

The patch morphing works on every device, but maybe needs some custom code based on the devices to fully make sense. Subtractor works really good.


do you know about which devices fullfill this properties, as you are very active with the Panorama Remote Maps, you might know this.

This might not also be intersting for Live performance, but also for Modular Patch randomization, as I used the idea of


for multichannel setup. So you can script 16 devices at once without changing the focus. Do I have your permission to use this Idea in a product? Credits are given.

I will setup a subforum later on for BETA testing and post

The morphing is super cool, however you’re way over my head with the Python scripting. How will end-users approach this without a coding background?

If it is scriptable then there can also be a gui of some kinds.

[jimmyklane]

If it is scriptable then there can also be a gui of some kinds.

With an actual GUI (can be dead simple with stock radio buttons and sliders) this would be an incredible tool for me! I’d want to use this with the EMI to provide patch morphing for my synths that accept MIDI CC....but even if it’s just internal Reason devices, it’s still an amazingly powerful tool.

Awesome work OP!!!

[theshoemaker]

If it is scriptable then there can also be a gui of some kinds.

With an actual GUI (can be dead simple with stock radio buttons and sliders) this would be an incredible tool for me! I’d want to use this with the EMI to provide patch morphing for my synths that accept MIDI CC....but even if it’s just internal Reason devices, it’s still an amazingly powerful tool.

Awesome work OP!!!

GUI is already on the roadmap. And right now I'm implementing the features, you see in the video. To use a Reason Device for this triggering the actions. I'm just finishing the code cleanup. I need more knobs ... What you see in the video with Duration and Morph/Reverse is code that get's executed in the script when I click the button, or twist the knob. I'm actually thinking about creating a RE where I have more buttons and knobs (or sliders). Maybe one of you knows an RE that has many buttons and knobs exposed as remotables? So don't worry. You will get your UI.

Another feature I'm working on is randomization presets and patch morphing presets. Is just need more buttons. And being able to open a file save/load dialog.

Patch morphing for real hardware . That's a killer feature I never have been thinking about ... I could totally implement that ... even no need for a EMI device as I already speak MIDI ... Let me think about that. I'll come back to you. It really depends on the hardware ... but I could create a "controller" for real hardware as well. I just need the CC's of the hardware.

[theshoemaker]

The morphing is super cool, however you’re way over my head with the Python scripting. How will end-users approach this without a coding background?

Believe me, the kind of coding you have to do is super easy! That's why I chose python. You get a huge flexibility ... is kind of like a Modular ... if you understand that metaphor.

But besides that, as I already answered: GUI is planned. I just want to get usefull features first. Than I'm going to think about UI. Not sure, what Technology stack I'm going to use for that.

[theshoemaker]

Cool project

Thinking about the Synths currently fully remotable. But most are lacking some remote items. At least the ones that spring to your mind. Thor has the mod matrix items not remoted, with Europa and Grain the Envs are problematic, Malstroen those darn wave selectors, which are not remotable for ages now...

Those could be candidates to work nicely as they have the stuff mapped that others are lacking (like eg Mod target selectors)

Viking 2
Antidote!
Parsec 2
KHS One

Just for understanding. You have a script that generates Midi ccs and links them to remote items, sends this to a codec and then into Reasons and vice versa? Practicably a layer on top of Remote?

Exactly! And the best thing ... I'm autogenerating them from the Remote Info files. So new device .. just export the Remote Info file and regenerate the remotemap. Done. You can script your device.

Thanks for the hints. Will have a look at them later. I know about Parsec. That's been the first synth I used for testing. Just using subtractor out of simplicity.

[electrofux]

With an actual GUI (can be dead simple with stock radio buttons and sliders) this would be an incredible tool for me! I’d want to use this with the EMI to provide patch morphing for my synths that accept MIDI CC....but even if it’s just internal Reason devices, it’s still an amazingly powerful tool.

Awesome work OP!!!

GUI is already on the roadmap. And right now I'm implementing the features, you see in the video. To use a Reason Device for this triggering the actions. I'm just finishing the code cleanup. I need more knobs ... What you see in the video with Duration and Morph/Reverse is code that get's executed in the script when I click the button, or twist the knob. I'm actually thinking about creating a RE where I have more buttons and knobs (or sliders). Maybe one of you knows an RE that has many buttons and knobs exposed as remotables? So don't worry. You will get your UI.

Another feature I'm working on is randomization presets and patch morphing presets. Is just need more buttons. And being able to open a file save/load dialog.

Patch morphing for real hardware . That's a killer feature I never have been thinking about ... I could totally implement that ... even no need for a EMI device as I already speak MIDI ... Let me think about that. I'll come back to you. It really depends on the hardware ... but I could create a "controller" for real hardware as well. I just need the CC's of the hardware.

Hamus Modpanels have the most knobs buttons and faders.

https://shop.propellerheads.se/rack-ext ... rol-board/

[theshoemaker]

The morphing is super cool, however you’re way over my head with the Python scripting. How will end-users approach this without a coding background?

But besides that, as I already answered: GUI is planned. I just want to get usefull features first. Than I'm going to think about UI. Not sure, what Technology stack I'm going to use for that.

Qt5 with QML it's going to be. But that shouldn't be any of your concern. Decided I'll start with the UI sooner than planned.

[theshoemaker]

If it is scriptable then there can also be a gui of some kinds.

With an actual GUI (can be dead simple with stock radio buttons and sliders) this would be an incredible tool for me! I’d want to use this with the EMI to provide patch morphing for my synths that accept MIDI CC....but even if it’s just internal Reason devices, it’s still an amazingly powerful tool.

Awesome work OP!!!

Something like this here? Bidirectional realtime changes. also with text edit mode.

replay.jpg (259.91 KiB) Viewed 3041 times

[Sterioevo]

Excellent!

[theshoemaker]

I need more knobs ... Maybe one of you knows an RE that has many buttons and knobs exposed as remotables? So don't worry. You will get your UI.

Another feature I'm working on is randomization presets and patch morphing presets. Is just need more buttons. And being able to open a file save/load dialog.

Hamus Modpanels have the most knobs buttons and faders.

https://shop.propellerheads.se/rack-ext ... rol-board/

I got them now. Lucky/Unlucky coincidence, they are free now. Works like expected. No need for a own companion app at the moment. Thanks for the hint.

[theshoemaker]

Here is a demo on how I actually use the environment right now. I will do more Let's REndomize videos with the REs I own and stock devices first and later on grab a subscription to present new ones every month.

[Ahornberg]

very interesting