# Spitfire UACC and Finale's Human Playback



## shnootre (Aug 18, 2017)

Forgive me - I'm cross-posting something I just submitted to the FinaleForum, thinking that I may be more likely to get a response here. 

I have learned that when I try to set up Human Playback preferences to work with Spitfire UACC controller codes (where each articulation, across the range of products, has a set controller value for controller #32) Finale sends the information a little bit too late in playback. 

In other words - I've done the test of exporting a midi file from a file that had these HP settings, and opening it up in Logic. I saw that the controller messages were all coming too late to take effect at the right time. 

If I manually set the controller levels it works great - but it's a drag to do, even with keyboard shortcuts created by Keyboard Maestro. 

I guess my question here is, would this be considered a bug? Finale tech support has seemed entirely uninterested to help in any way with integrating third-party sample libraries (even though this would seem to be one of the most important features of the new 64-bit architecture of version 25). 

It IS possible to just use standard keyswitches with the Spitfire libraries, but those libraries don't allow you to customize which articulations a given instrument loads (unlike, say, Vienna Symphonic Library), and so it's often necessary to load two or three pre-set instruments to access all the available or desired articulations for a given instrument. With UACC, you can set it up so that it seemlessly moves between instruments. So for instance, I'd load two violins patches, one with basic articulations, one with "decorative" articulations, assign them both to channel 1, and then have the UACC codes toggle between the two. 

This is so close to working, but there's that pesky bug. I wonder if others have encountered a similar delay in the sending of controller data in conjunction with customized Human Playback preferences. I also wonder if this post makes any sense - it's hard to articulate this stuff in a simple way!


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## Jacques T. (Aug 24, 2017)

Are you using Finale Version 25? If so, MakeMusic really needs to iron out a lot of bugs. I basically had to harass them to even look into this audio export bug. Some softwares make you download a file that acts like a mediator between Finale and whatever programs you use, I had to download a Human Playback and Keyswitch file to make Finale and VSL get along decently (for playback only that is...).


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## shnootre (Sep 9, 2017)

The VSL HP preferences file is pretty basic, and only accommodates the Special Edition libraries. Ultimately, I find VSL the easiest platform to integrate with Finale because of its extreme customizability. Spitfire is maddening - all those great articulations, and a great UACC idea, but one that just doesn't work with Finale. With Spitfire, to have access to all their artics, I need to load several different multis and assign them to the same channel. If UACC worked right in Finale, it would be perfect. But because the signal is sent too late, often times what you get is: silence. 

I sent in a report to Finale tech support today - I'm curious if they're aware of this issue, and if they are, if they care. They don't generally seem interested in making their program easier to use with 3rd party sample library vendors.


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## zilonline (Nov 11, 2020)

Bringing this back into spotlight years later.. has anyone found a way to map these articulations in Finale? Ideally so that Human Playback would interpret them correctly and without having to load 376 instances of instruments to provide a good workflow. Any solutions, as requested by the original poster? I'd like to write in Finale too with Spitfire strings, but all this is still relatively new to me and I don't know how to program MIDI maps in Finale. Let me know if you have any ideas.


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## JT (Nov 22, 2020)

zilonline said:


> Bringing this back into spotlight years later.. has anyone found a way to map these articulations in Finale? Ideally so that Human Playback would interpret them correctly and without having to load 376 instances of instruments to provide a good workflow. Any solutions, as requested by the original poster? I'd like to write in Finale too with Spitfire strings, but all this is still relatively new to me and I don't know how to program MIDI maps in Finale. Let me know if you have any ideas.


Like the OP, I tried to make Finale and Spitfire Chamber strings work together, it worked sometimes, but not all the time. Do yourself a favor and get a DAW. It's what samples were made for.


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