Questions from a Prospective Reaper Convert...

[Nayrb]

(12-14-2020, 03:42 PM)Mattias Westlund Wrote: As long as you're using software instruments, you don't even need ReaControlMIDI, I think that's mainly meant for hardware or the odd VSTi that doesn't reveal its mappable controls to Reaper. If you click the "Param" button at the top of the effects window, you will see a menu with all the parameters you can bind to automation, hardware controllers etc. What you're looking for is the "Learn" submenu. Don't forget though that some instruments even offer this functionality built in, often by right clicking a knob or whatever, choosing "learn" or similar and then just moving the hardware control you want to use.

I was having difficulty using the Learn feature only because it was doing that thing where whatever parameter that is linked is done so universally in Kontakt (similar to the issue I was having in FL with the "omni" situation). The short version of this rambling story is that, when using Learn, sometimes moving the slider I want to move ends up moving a slider elsewhere that I don't want to move. Some of this is probably just my current lack of understanding and the patchy way I've learned how to do things in general. Fortunately, using the included MIDI Mapper (I think it's called) plugin on individual instruments allows me to choose, via a list of CCs, what I want to assign and where I want to link it on the hardware.

I can probably better explain this with some pictures later. But so far, so good.

[Nayrb]

Experimenting with Reaper has been quite rewarding so far. I've really come to appreciate both FL and Reaper for their individual strengths; I think I'll be getting plenty of good use out of both for various applications going forward. Reaper's handling of time signatures seems to be everything I wanted it to be! MIDI focus and configuration is going well. Although I'm sure I have plenty more to learn before I have it all the way I want it, that's also proving to be just about what I wanted it to be.

Here's a question about the mixer. Did I mess something up? I have, like, 10 Kontakts open with 16 channels routed from each. I've hidden/shown the channels appropriately (MIDI on the left vertical track column, audio outs in the mixer proper. The thing is, I have crazy numbers now; Track 1 Violins 1 is track 19 on the mixer. I get WHY this is (everything that came out of Kontakt is technically its own track, and tracks sort of float around in Reaper) but is there a way to clean it up, maybe reset numbers somehow? My mixer track numbers start at 19 and wind up in the 300s... Or did I just do something weird?

[Mattias Westlund]

(12-23-2020, 02:11 AM)Nayrb Wrote: Here's a question about the mixer. Did I mess something up? I have, like, 10 Kontakts open with 16 channels routed from each. I've hidden/shown the channels appropriately (MIDI on the left vertical track column, audio outs in the mixer proper. The thing is, I have crazy numbers now; Track 1 Violins 1 is track 19 on the mixer. I get WHY this is (everything that came out of Kontakt is technically its own track, and tracks sort of float around in Reaper) but is there a way to clean it up, maybe reset numbers somehow? My mixer track numbers start at 19 and wind up in the 300s... Or did I just do something weird?

Sorry, I must have missed this question. Thing is, when Reaper asks if you want to create separate outputs for an instrument and you say yes, it creates ALL possible output channels. In Kontakt's case, that's 64 channels per instance. I've never quite understood why you would need that many outs for an instrument that can only respond to 16 midi channels anyway, but I assume it's to accomodate for multi-out patches like drum kits etc. Once you know how many outs you will need for an instance of Kontakt, I suggest deleting all extraneous outputs to reduce clutter.

Also, I recommend using track templates for multitimbral/multi-out instruments instead of just loading them the default way and doing the channels/routing setup over and over. Once you have an empty instance of Kontakt set up the way you want it (e.g. 16 midi channels routed to it, 16 outputs routed to the instruments slots, all other channels deleted), just select all pertinent tracks, right-click, and choose "Save tracks as track template..." That way you can just load an empty instance when you need it, configured and ready to go.

[Nayrb]

(01-12-2021, 03:23 AM)Mattias Westlund Wrote:

(12-23-2020, 02:11 AM)Nayrb Wrote: Here's a question about the mixer. Did I mess something up? I have, like, 10 Kontakts open with 16 channels routed from each. I've hidden/shown the channels appropriately (MIDI on the left vertical track column, audio outs in the mixer proper. The thing is, I have crazy numbers now; Track 1 Violins 1 is track 19 on the mixer. I get WHY this is (everything that came out of Kontakt is technically its own track, and tracks sort of float around in Reaper) but is there a way to clean it up, maybe reset numbers somehow? My mixer track numbers start at 19 and wind up in the 300s... Or did I just do something weird?

Sorry, I must have missed this question. Thing is, when Reaper asks if you want to create separate outputs for an instrument and you say yes, it creates ALL possible output channels. In Kontakt's case, that's 64 channels per instance. I've never quite understood why you would need that many outs for an instrument that can only respond to 16 midi channels anyway, but I assume it's to accomodate for multi-out patches like drum kits etc. Once you know how many outs you will need for an instance of Kontakt, I suggest deleting all extraneous outputs to reduce clutter.

Also, I recommend using track templates for multitimbral/multi-out instruments instead of just loading them the default way and doing the channels/routing setup over and over. Once you have an empty instance of Kontakt set up the way you want it (e.g. 16 midi channels routed to it, 16 outputs routed to the instruments slots, all other channels deleted), just select all pertinent tracks, right-click, and choose "Save tracks as track template..." That way you can just load an empty instance when you need it, configured and ready to go.

Hey, no problem at all. I actually did that with the track template early on. I was just confused by the numbering system, which I guess makes sense to me now that I understand that there is technically no fixed "mixer" like there is in FL. So it's weird to have the track numbers be all over the place, but it ultimately doesn't seem to make a difference; it's all kind of arbitrary and relative. Believe it or not, my template actually has 100+ pre-routed tracks