sequencing looped clips: not working for me

[clayton]

How are people sequencing looped clips? what settings are you using for your clips?

this is my issue: i have several looping clips that i am trying to sequence and am having issues with clips cutting themselves off when being triggered by a new sequence.

For example, kick drum clip is in sequence 1 and 2. kick drum clip is set to gate mode and loop is on.

when i go to seq 2 from seq 1, the kick drum clip stops playing, its not retriggered. Given that the clip is in gate mode i expected that it would retrigger with seq 2.

ive tried changing the quantize size for the kd clip but that doesnt seem to help. Ive used toggle mode for the clip and it gets cut off when going to seq 2.

i think i must be approaching this in the wrong way for the workflow that blackbox is expecting?

[Georges]

Hi, I usually record my clips into seqs with toggle set for each clip. If needed to fix any issues I switch to gate or trigger for some of the clips after seqs recording. Another thing to watch out for: release in adsr is sometimes better set to 0% rather than the default 20%

[clayton]

thanks I will try that with the ADSR.

[shankiphonic]

are you extending the length of the events in each sequence to hold the gate open?

[clayton]

yes ive tried a few variations
clip 1bar long and looped with gate mode. sequence is 8 bars. i just have one long note 8 bars long. this doesnt seem to work as when i trigger seq2, the clip stops. as noted above.

now trying to just use trigger mode and shorter notes that are the same length as the clip.

i really wanted to be able to use toggle mode for the clips as it makes it easier to play them and jam them in a live situation but it seems like toggle mode isnt good for sequencing loops. essentially toggle mode is looking for another trigger to say note off.

[shankiphonic]

help me understand why you have an 8-bar drum clip setup to run in two different sequences in the first place....

[clayton]

yes i thought this may come up. i do understand that there are two main ways of sequencing - to have a sequence for each clip and then have combos of them in a song section, or have a sequence with multiple clips in it and then thats the song section. my preferred way is to have single sequences with mutliple clips. each sequence is then linked to a song section. then if i need to change a clip for a section, its easy to put clips in and out without have to re-record the song section. hope that makes sense.

so then I have a kick drum loop, its in both sequences (song sections) - this is where i am having some issues - with the clip cutting itself off.

[shankiphonic]

it makes sense.
However, perhaps you see why your approach is not the prevailing method....

[byrdinbbylon]

For me, when I have something already at the appropriate length to be a looped clip, if I want to put it in a sequence, I change it from a clip to a sample and set the LaunchMode to trigger. Then, to record into the sequence, I just press it like I would a one shot sample. If I set the sequence quantize setting to 1 bar, it's very forgiving on my exact timing for pressing it.

[clayton]

thats an interesting approach to this issue.

[clayton]

i just did some testing with toggled clips. i dont think they are sequencing correctly. if i have an 8 bar loop and put a note on each 2nd bar so note on bar 1, 3, 5, 7.

the clip should start playing on the first note, keep looping, and then turn off when the 2nd note hits. Thats my understanding of toggle. But what happens is that the clip plays for bar 1 then turns off for bar 2, like its in gate mode. then plays again on bar 3. this is strange behaviour for a toggled clip isnt it?

[shankiphonic]

I'll have to play with it.
it sounds reasonable that a 2nd programmed event would serve as toggle "off", (while a pad set to toggle is currently "on") but I don't know if that's really the case.
Steve - do you know off the top of yer head?

[Steve]

Basically, yes. If he is using a Clip (as stated) it could make sense. But there are too many variables in the repro to make an educated guess. This is why I regularly ask for videos. It is helpful to see a person's actual workflow, steps, order of operations, etc.

[Steve]

i just did some testing with toggled clips. i dont think they are sequencing correctly. if i have an 8 bar loop and put a note on each 2nd bar so note on bar 1, 3, 5, 7.

did you mean NOT on 1,3,5,7? Please clarify this

the clip should start playing on the first note, keep looping, and then turn off when the 2nd note hits. Thats my understanding of toggle. But what happens is that the clip plays for bar 1 then turns off for bar 2, like its in gate mode. then plays again on bar 3. this is strange behaviour for a toggled clip isnt it?

I'd really like to see a video of your workflow. It can be difficult (from a post) to determine if this is a user error or a bug. It could be both. It could be neither and you might need to adjust your workflow. Either way, I'd like to see it so I can reproduce exactly your steps. You can share here from YT or send to me directly but at this point, I have a lot of questions that would be more easily answered in a short video.

[clayton]

i will try to post a video.

I played with this some more. I think that BB is not showing toggled clips correctly in the sequencer. Its showing them as if they were gated clips eg note is held for duration of hearing the clip. This is easy to test just by recording a toggled clip into the sequencer. In some ways i can see why, so you can see how long the toggled clip is playing. BUT when you are programming a toggled clip, it makes it confusing because its not showing the normal behaviour for a toggled clip. Should be note on start - note on stop.

With the clips cutting themselves off, i duplicated some song sections and did some testing. For some reason its one song section specifically thats cutting off the kick loop. Will need to look into this more. Its not feeling logical because both the sequences look the same to me and its the same clip in both sequences.

[Steve]

There are also 2 piano roll views. Pads and Keys. If you are using Pads - the box is only capturing start/stop. Duration is not recorded because it is (obviously) controlled by the Clip. If you record into a Keys piano roll, the box will capture the note duration. So it is possible that the first sequence starts it - the second sequence stops it. Could this explain what you are seeing?