Hi Everyone,

Largely a maintenance update this time round - a few bug fixes, behavioural changes. As such, reViSiT v0.88.1 features...

·      Improved path support...
Previously, some hosts were ignoring the initial path that reViSiT tried to specify for file loading dialogs (e.g. Open Module, Load Sample, etc.). reViSiT now uses a new method which looks to be compatible with all hosts. Furthermore, reViSiT initially defaults to the paths in the Preferences screen when the dialogs are first used, but will then default to the last path used in that dialog for subsequent uses.

·      IT file loading bugs fixed...
A couple of errors and anomalies introduced by the new Impulse Tracker file support have been now been patched.

For a full list of updates, see the release notes or readme.txt. Please report back with any comments, queries or problems you might have.

Yo!

More impressed with each release. I'm using it instead of IT now for quick things like sequenced sound effects to be recorded into small wave files, and arpeggiations/cascades/rhythmic sounds in various songs. Trackers are a pretty great tool for surgical precision, and ReViSiT's integration with Cubase is so good it makes me cry.

Without any pressure at all, what's your outlook regarding adding the "Mapped MIDI mode" I mentioned a while back? The absence of that is all that's keeping me from starting my next retro gamemusic album with it - In case you're curious, each channel on my ancient synth (yamaha fb01) is set up to allocate a single voice of polyphony to each midi channel, 8 total. To use its patches, I define 48 instruments within the tracker, each of which sends a corresponding program change. Say I want a guitar in voices 1-3, I just use instrument 12 on channels 1-3. That way, I have complete control over every synth channel.

Admittedly, I could get around this by fixing one of the 0-9 custom commands to Program Change, but that ties up the effect column and is nontransparent in function (I change instruments constantly). As a developer myself, I hate being bothered about new features while I'm still working my ass off on making the existing ones work well. But I promise that the music I'll write if you implement this will make you glad you did >

Rock on,
-Jake

EDIT: Oh, it seems the pitch effects (Fxx, Exx, Gxx, Hxx, etc) aren't outputting anything to MIDI either - did you disable them in a recent build?)

Hi Jake,

The "Mapped MIDI Mode" we spoke of is not a big priority at the moment - there are bigger fish to fry, like NNA's, etc. It'll definitely come, as I have another user requesting something similar, but don't hold your breath. I think it'll be 0.90+ (Beta).

Also, eventually (after v1.0), they'll be multiple effect columns, so using one for a Program Change effect won't be such a sacrifice.

As for pitch effects, ensure that you have the instrument's Pitch Bend Range set (in Instrument List --> MIDI/Pitch --> MIDI Settings).

Hope this helps.

All the best,
Chris

Damn, a shame about the mapped mode. I can wait until then, though.

As for the pitch bend issue: I just installed and tested each version separately, and duplicated exact procedures for each to make sure I was not missing anything. My findings are that 0.88 is the first revision with nonfunctional midi pitchbend. I duplicated the problem on three different machines - two at home and one at work - in Cubase SX3, Cubase SX2, Sonar 5, and Fruity Loops - and using 4 different synths, Yamaha MU-100R, Yamaha FB01, SBLive, and Microsoft GS Softsynth. It works up until 0.87.4, but in 0.88 or any later version there are no MIDI messages sent by pitch commands, no matter what I set the Bend Range to in MIDI Settings.

In addition, the handling of pitch bends in those previous versions seems broken, which may or may not have been addressed in 0.88 - the Range control behaves erratically on all of my test machines. If I select "2", which is the default range of my synth, the Exx and Fxx commands are interpreted in reverse. The speed of bends decreases as I increase ReViSiT's bend range, until "6" where it levels out (ignoring Exx and Fxx entirely) and then values above 6 provide increasingly quick bends in the correct direction. Changing 7-bit to 14-bit bend mode doesn't seem to make any difference.

As an example, a note modulated with an F10 command will, with the following values for Bend Range, bend in the following directions:
<===down=====neutral=======up=====>
    1    2    3    4    5    6     7   8   9 ....24

The same effect is observed to scale when changing the synth's bend range via RPN. Apologies if this was noted and fixed, but it might be related to our current issue.

Sorry if I'm still doing something incorrectly, but the MIDI functionality is by far my favorite part of ReViSiT, so I'd like to help make it perfect.
Cheers,
-Jake

There's been some fixes in the MIDI pitch and pitch effect areas recently - hopefully correcting your quirks. Let me know if you're still having any problems.

Chris