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Drawing automation?
Hello!
I'm looking for an app where I can draw automation over a longer timescale and have a lot of control. I've tried using the Drambo version (Graphic Modulator), but it works more like an LFO, doesn't extend beyond a length of 16 without some messing around, which I don't really want to do, and only has curves for you to move around.
What I'm looking for is just a blank canvas where I can free-hand a shape OR record knob movements and have it be recorded, so not really a drawable LFO, but more of drawable automation that will loop. I also would love the length to be basically arbitrarily long, like 128 bars or 7.25 bars or whatever.
I feel like this must exist because it feels very natural with a touch interface to just draw stuff in, but so far I haven't really found anything.
Please, tell me this exists!
Comments
Probably not what you want, but this is the sort of thing that’s easy in a ‘proper’ DAW. What you ask for is easy in Logic for example. You can use track automation or region automation, which allows you to loop your automation over as many bars as you like. It does need a simple trick to create extra tracks for the same instrument/audio track if you want the region automation independent of the audio/midi regions but it works a treat. Automation in general works really well in Logic.
I tried for years to turn AUM into a DAW. Cost me a small fortune — relatively. And in the end I ended up much preferring a DAW after all. AUM is pretty great, just not as a DAW alternative for me. Personally. YMPV. etc.
Xequence 2 does this if AUV3 is not a must.
You haven’t tried the automation lane in Drambo? You can do everything you describe, record, draw, etc.
The graphic modulator isn’t the “Drambo version”. It’s just a module for small modulation tasks, like an LFO.
The Automation lane gives you much much more flexibility.
Access it here: (or by just recording and moving a knob)
Jeez, now that I mention it, I hope this isn’t a beta feature 🫢
@Edward_Alexander. Nope, it’s been in the public release for a long time. I’m not on the beta.
@bezz_jeens, Audio Evolution Mobile has full automation possibilities as well. Both drawable and touch automation.
Cool, thanks for confirming that. I’ve been on the beta for a long time likewise, and sometimes forget when mentioning features.
miRack has a couple of modules that are XY pads where you can record the automation. I'm not sure how long their buffers are though. And you can't edit the recorded automation.
Is this just accessible within Drambo or can it be sent outside as MIDI CC?
Have you come across mLFO yet? I think it covers pretty much everything you are asking, and perhaps even a bit more.
https://apps.apple.com/gb/app/mlfo/id1602306976
It can be sent outside using the midi cc modules 👍
Aha! I haven't really used Drambo yet so I'm at loss at how to do this? Anyone got an example?
Drambo will also be your sequencer ( obviously ) so you can use the drambo track buttons to choose synths in aum/per track but you can still use generators and capture in drambo for editing and arrangement but vid is showing cc automation/editing.
Once you set up a cc automation. It should be obvious how you set up each track so aum sort of becomes a background to Drambo, in aum. You still have to use aum 1-16 filters in aum channel strips.
Everything will kind of be the same. Apart from easy lfo access to au via Drambo as a host. Just started using lfo myself but think thats where it would be different in aum. You would have to give lfo a number in drambo and then in aum parameters.
Just a weird tweak based on the best synth for sound design thread.
The modulation and fx are way different than the nambu preset.
Im actually fine with a daw! I want this to add small, smooth, super long modulation patterns to pad sounds to make big organic texture layers, which will go onto an Octatrack. What would be ideal for me is to take like, something I’d draw in procreate and then use it as modulation, without having the breakpoints visible. I know they have to exist somewhere at the base resolution of MIDI but I just want to draw my nice line lol. I’ll try this out in Logic for the time being.
Oh cool! I didn’t realize this was what it was, I had recorded automation from a knob before but I hadn’t started from that window. Just tried for a moment, it’s really nice and flexible, but I don’t like that there are breakpoints even with snap off, setting it to snap 64 is the smoothest. I’d ideally like to just go to town making something wiggly and nuanced with the pencil and then have the breakpoints applied behind the scenes.
Have you tried more than 16 steps ( 1 bar )
I would have thought more than 4 bars of the Octatrack, given by Drambo ( plus smooth automation curves )
Would be an upgrade to a menu diving device.
What do you mean by breakpoints? The automation handle points? If you want extra smooth looking modulation curves without seeing lots of those handles you can draw curves in Logic by using the automation curve tool to bend the line between two points.
You can get very smooth curves - pulling the line in different directions with the curve tool gets you different shaped curves.
In track mode the automation curve can be the full length of the project.
This!
No way to get away from breakpoints, it’s just how envelopes work, but I like reducing them to the fewest and use drambo’s lovely curves instead.
You can draw a freeform curve, but it will have lots of points, needed to capture the freeform
Yes, indeed, I think I was kind of unclear.
I don't mind the actual breakpoints themselves, I just want very, very fine resolution. In Drambo it looks like the most resolution per bar is 64 points, and I'm looking for smaller divisions than that, if it's even possible. I just want the smoothest possible movement, occurring in very small increments, over a long period of time, applied to a ton of different parameters, to just really make things come alive. I can do it in Ableton, but using the Apple Pencil sounds so good.
Oh, very cool! Is there any way to get even finer than 64 subdivisions? Ideally I'd be able to draw in 64 bars of automation with each bar subdivided by 256.
@bezz_jeens I don’t get why you want that kind of resolution, won’t it just clutter your project with a million points (to process), with no audible difference than just having fewer points and use curves in between?
4pockets MidiMixer lets you draw in automation, but I believe there are only four channels available for customization. The others are already Assigned to the volume and the panning and other internal effects
FWIW, there’s a much smoother way of drawing curves in the automation lane by using the tools highlighted in the pic I’ve just shared below.
Make sure to switch the control handles to “dual” to be able to draw virtually any kind of curves you could imagine.
@bezz_jeens
The main reason is that I'm modulating the SimplexFM operator mix parameter, which is VERY sensitive, and tiny sweet spots emerge from small adjustments. If the resolution is too low, it sounds very steppy and weird.
Some of it is also, why not? I'm not going to edit the points as points, I'm going to just draw a shape, and if I don't like it, I'll just re-draw it, so it shouldn't clutter too much. Plus, if it's a modular solution, I won't have to see it anyway. I just think that it should exist, I'll do it myself in Max but it's such a pain working with iOS from there.
EDIT: Also, I don't really like the curve method. It's too measured, too smooth. I want high resolution, but I also want to feel the movement myself, give it the shakiness of my hand and the inexact line of my handwriting. I want the sound to feel like it's wavering a little bit and moves between extremes only indecisively. Adjusting the curves with those handles is super smooth, and Drambo does a great job, but it loses the immediate motion and emotion of scrawling your automation across the glass like a drunk impressionist.
Dunno dude.
Thought you might not know what you were talking about but seems its me lol.
You could try using the automation in Drambo as shown by sigma79, draw by hand with all your little mistakes, then throw a slew limiter, or use the automation smoothing parameter so it won’t sound steppy.
Hahahahahaha, no! You DEFINITELY know what you're talking about. I'm just being super picky, looking for an excessively specific tool for my use case when I don't need to. Your suggestions are still really helpful for making me consider what it is I'm actually looking for.
I ended up doing essentially this, with some steps in between. I made 2 tracks with slightly different lengths and looped them, then I drew in some automation with all the little jiggles. Then, I used automation smoothing and sent both automations to the Rozeta LFO, one to the rate and one to the depth. Then, I made a S&H LFO with lots of smoothing and very low depth, and sent that to those parameters as well to add a little jiggle.
Then, I just recorded a bunch of that automation to Ableton and did a bit of editing, and it basically does what I want: small, semi-random movements, but movements that follow the general motion of my drawing, so if I want the overall modulation to increase, or sit higher on average, it works pretty well.
Thanks bezz.
Appreciate.
Hope you sort out a solution.