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Logic Pro : edit articulations remotely ?

Loïc D

Monkeying with libraries
Hi,
I’m slowly building my own control solution based on Osculator, Open Stage Control.
I’ve managed to show & select articulations according to the track selected (SCS, JXL, etc.) but it only works at recording, not editing.

I’m looking for a solution where I can select notes in piano roll (or event list), hit the desired articulation button on my tablet and see articulation applied to this selection.
I’m wondering :
- if there are paid solutions able to do this ? (And which ones)
- if one of you managed to do it in Logic Pro ?

Lately I’ve tried to set articulation using Scripter plugin with no luck. Setting the art is ok, getting the art value shows that it changed, but in piano roll and event list, it’s still the same...

Any help appreciated !
 
I think there are two ways you can assign articulationID to new notes. In the ArticulationSet there is a Switches tab. Those are input switches. When those input switches are received, then the articulationSet will begin stamping notes with the assign articulationID as you record them. So with OSC you just need to send those midi switches and work with the articulation set the way its design to work if you are recording and using your midi controller to change which articulationID to encode as you play.

If you want a way to go back to the piano roll and select notes and then hit a button on your touchpad to set those notes to a certain articulationID...taht will not be as straightforward, I don't think there is a built in way to do it. You might be able to create a Keyboard Maestro macro to do some stuff like that.
 
ps - Scripter only effects actual playback in real time as the notes are being played back..nothing in scripter can change what is in the articulation Set or the piano roll.
 
Aaaah the man himself replies :)
I’ve seen your name on every possible forum related to controlling Logic remotely.

I really wish Logic had a way to easily remotely control it in every way (track selection, articulations, etc).
So far everyone has to deal with a spaghetti of routings and apps for limited results, random stability, and hours and hours of trials & errors.

Do you have Keyboard Maestro ?
It seems nice but I’m afraid to dig another hole with another app and bury hours and hours of non-production.
 
I'm in the same boat, I've wanted this for ages.

It always confuses me why this doesn't exist in Logic remote, seeing as the rest of smart controls have mostly been implemented. If everyone sends this request maybe we'll get it one day!

Metagrid just teased version 2.0 - which has 2-way communication capabilities. It may be possible that Metagird might be able to do this, but it depends if Logic allows access to these controls for 3rd party apps

Keyboard meastro would be doing a bunch of macros and I find that really messy and complicated, as well as unreliable.
 
I am a new keyboard maestro user and unable to say too much about it i just know it has probably the most sophisticated macro facilities out there. It can even use images in the macro to match where to click the mouse, etc. So it’s like the last little glue you can use to automate things that can’t otherwise be automated via easier methods like midi and keyboard commands.

I think it is probably possible with keyboard maestro to select an articulation by name from the pop up on the piano roll. Which would then change all the currently selected notes. But I haven’t tried it yet, so…. I agree keyboard maestro seems kinda messy. I put off buying it for years and still have much to learn. I do tend to think it could get messy quick if you get too tricky with it but on the other hand maybe it would automate some little thing that just changes your world?

You can also assign articulation Id to notes by right clicking on them and select from the pop up menu. Also the event list has an articulation column that is hidden by default but if it’s not hidden then you can set it there too. I’m not aware of any other ways to do it and as far as I know there is no midi controller command to control that, nor keyboard command as of now.

Track selection, however can be facilitated through the control surface Api, check out the oscillator control surface plugin I mentioned earlier.
 
Isn’t this the kind of thing that Patchboard is designed to do? It’s very pricy, but it seems to promised this kind of comprehensive functionality.
 
I don’t think patchboard can do articulation selection either. It does what you can do in osc also which is use the switching facility of the articulation set to switch which articulation Id will be assigned to notes as you record them.

Patchboard has the obvious advantage that it’s already done, the disadvantage is that it may not be quite as flexible to be totally custom in the remote side like you can with OSC if you are willing to spend the time creating it. I might yet buy Patchboard myself I am still sussing things out because of the cost. Patchboard includes a control surface plugin like the one from osculator to handle track selection in cubase and logic. But I think where it has some interesting stuff is the way it builds a database of all the tracks in your template so that you can quickly search for sounds using your touchpad and call up the track. I personally don’t use huge templates (yet) so that may or may not be beneficial to me.
 
I think it is probably possible with keyboard maestro to select an articulation by name from the pop up on the piano roll. Which would then change all the currently selected notes. But I haven’t tried it yet, so…. I agree keyboard maestro seems kinda messy. I put off buying it for years and still have much to learn. I do tend to think it could get messy quick if you get too tricky with it but on the other hand maybe it would automate some little thing that just changes your world?
Dewdman42 completely saved me with his script for assigning articulations via channel changes to EWHO in Logic, so I thought I'd try Keyboard Maestro for changing articulations in the piano roll. I'm not an expert with KM, but I do use it frequently enough that I can write dumb little macros that don't require a lot of programming knowledge. So, the good news is that KM can absolutely select articulations based on name. I'm sending along some examples.

There are a few places where you can change the articulations, but I chose to use the contextual menu in the piano roll that appears when hovering over a note. The reason I chose this place instead of the info panel to the left of the piano roll is that I feel like this is where I wind up when I select notes and I couldn't think of any good reason why I should have to move the pointer over to the info panel at all. So, to use one of these macros, just select the notes you want to change and leave the pointer on any of the selected notes - this last step is important, because the contextual menu changes if you aren't over a note. I used the keys, command-option 1, command-option 2, command-option 3 and command-option 4 as triggers for my examples, but you can change these to whatever you want or use a different kind of trigger. The macro is dead stupid. It simply opens the contextual menu, moves to the Articulation menu and then selects the articulation itself by typing in the first 3 or 4 letters of the articulation name. You'll have to adjust the typed letters to accommodate your own articulation names. The examples I'm sending are simple. They use SUS for Sustain, STAC for Staccato, TREM for Tremolo and HARM for harmonics.

To add these to KM, select File -> Import Macros Safely, navigate to the attached file and hit OK. If the macro names are gray, right click and select the Enable menu item. After that, just take a look at them and customize the triggers and articulation names to work on your system. They're very simple. You won't have any trouble figuring them out. I won't be surprised if someone here can do a more efficient version, but these at least get the job done.
 

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  • Logic Pro Articulation select.kmmacros.zip
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Dewdman42 completely saved me with his script for assigning articulations via channel changes to EWHO in Logic, so I thought I'd try Keyboard Maestro for changing articulations in the piano roll. I'm not an expert with KM, but I do use it frequently enough that I can write dumb little macros that don't require a lot of programming knowledge. So, the good news is that KM can absolutely select articulations based on name. I'm sending along some examples.

There are a few places where you can change the articulations, but I chose to use the contextual menu in the piano roll that appears when hovering over a note. The reason I chose this place instead of the info panel to the left of the piano roll is that I feel like this is where I wind up when I select notes and I couldn't think of any good reason why I should have to move the pointer over to the info panel at all. So, to use one of these macros, just select the notes you want to change and leave the pointer on any of the selected notes - this last step is important, because the contextual menu changes if you aren't over a note. I used the keys, command-option 1, command-option 2, command-option 3 and command-option 4 as triggers for my examples, but you can change these to whatever you want or use a different kind of trigger. The macro is dead stupid. It simply opens the contextual menu, moves to the Articulation menu and then selects the articulation itself by typing in the first 3 or 4 letters of the articulation name. You'll have to adjust the typed letters to accommodate your own articulation names. The examples I'm sending are simple. They use SUS for Sustain, STAC for Staccato, TREM for Tremolo and HARM for harmonics.

To add these to KM, select File -> Import Macros Safely, navigate to the attached file and hit OK. If the macro names are gray, right click and select the Enable menu item. After that, just take a look at them and customize the triggers and articulation names to work on your system. They're very simple. You won't have any trouble figuring them out. I won't be surprised if someone here can do a more efficient version, but these at least get the job done.
Thanks for sharing this; if I come up with any refinements, I'll be back with my discoveries. I've used KM for a few years–hardly a power user, but sometimes two heads are better than one (three better than two, and so on).

My motive is always to save myself mousing wherever and whenever possible. I want to be able to select notes and tap a button on Metagrid to set the articulation, as even a pop-up menu slows me down and adds wear and tear on my deteriorating wrist and hand.

You and Dewdman42 both have got my gears turning. I'd thought I was looking for an Articulation ID-based solution, but selecting by name might be even more elegant. I might try moving from the contextual menu to the event list, because of the behavior change depending on mouse position. I can imagine myself bumping the mouse a split second before triggering the macro often enough to go nuts. Also Keyboard Maestro can be fussy about selecting interface elements, for people afraid to learn its advanced scripting features (like me).
 
I’ve come up with a stable solution to apply articulations on selection.
I plan to do a tutorial about it.
Basically : I’m commanding articulations from outside Logic (Open Stage Control) and I’m using KM to open the articulation dropdown and select the one I want.
 
I wrote a new version that doesn't rely on mouse position. It always goes to the articulation box in the info panel of the piano roll. I'm also thinking about whether I want to have the macro automatically select articulations by name or position or just open the articulation box and allow the user to select with the arrow keys or by typing the articulation name. The problem with automatically selecting by name is that different instrument families have different articulation names, so it might be easier to just select by position rather than have a different macro for every possible articulation name. If I can easily get to any of the first 10 articulations in a set, I feel like I can manage most things I'm trying to do without mousing over to the articulation drop down. Of course, I'm sure that won't work for a lot of other people. It depends on how they set up their articulation sets and prefer to work. Also, I'm just using keyboard commands to call the macros and I believe the Loic D was interested in making articulation changes from an external controller - which shouldn't be too hard if he uses a MIDI trigger instead of a keyboard trigger. Anyway, if anyone wants to take a look at these, let me know. I'll be interested to see Loic D's solution. I'm glad this discussion came up. It takes way too much effort to change articulations with the mouse. Using a macro is much faster and more convenient.
 
I’ll publish my macro once I’m back at my music machine.

To sum up :
1. I fire a Midi CC message where the value is articulation number
2. I process a bit the value, adding a dash and verifying that it’s ok
3. I locate the “Articulation” dropdown menu on the screen and click on it
4. I simulate typing the articulation number

That’s pretty simple and the “Found image” works pretty neat.

Of course, ahead of this, all my articulations maps are normalized with each articulation prefixed by #x where x is the unique articulation number.

And on O-S-C, my articulations grid adapts to the track I’ve selected.
 
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