Kara-Moon Forum

ok, since now i'm convinced that linux is a solution for a complete daw, it's time to move to the next step....

here is what i'm at the moment.

- hydrogone : propably the best drum sequencer i'm aware of
- Seq24 : yes a nice pattern mode sequencer, but suffers from a couple strange quirks, abandoned it...
- Ardour : a very good audio daw
- Rosegarden : the best sequencer I know
- Qsampler : a great instrument
- Amsynth : a typical am emulation synth, which makes good sounds
- Jack : the best, a universal routing system

So, yes, a great system with unlimited possibilities !
But, what about workflow ?

The next step would be optimize workflow. At the moment, and that's propably just a lack of knowledge of me, I have to spend a lot of time thinking how to do my project, which tools to use, how to root them and how to get to the final result.
And as I consider 'time for technology' as 'wasted time', I think this could be optimised ?

Any ideas, how do you optimise your project setup ?
Perhaps templates ?
One way could perhaps be, not to use Ardour, do everything in Rosegarden ?
Rosegarden has FX inserts on the audio tracks... I din't find how to make a wav file out of a Rosegarden project, something like 'Render all tracks to audio'

Any ideas as how to make my workflow more simple ?

 k

I use templates extensively for almost everything I do on the computer, from standard letter headings on my office machine to startup on my music machine. I've also managed to persuade my window manager to start up programs in a certain order on certain desktops (but that means diving into scripts). I've set file associations so that (say) clicking on a Zyn parameter file will start up zyn with that file installed.

Having said that, I think I have a much simpler set-up than you do, and a lot of things are more variable, so setting defaults is not so practical. What is practical for me is setting up project directories/folders so that all the appropriate files are together.

Cutting out all the waffle - I think you'll just have to work out your own 'preferred' setup ;D

P.S.
I'm disappointed you didn't mention Zyn in your list ::)

I think you're right and it's allso a matter of getting used to the tools.
I've found out how to render to audio from Rosegarden, it's actually very simple, just connect Timemachine to rosegarden's output and press record  ::)

Don't be disappointed, I didn't forget Zyn  ;D
but for the contest I needed only classical instrument sounds, so the qsampler rack with my GIGA files was the quickest solution.
I'm planning to redo the Respect Intro song from scratch and there Zyn will be the obvious solution  8)

I'll redo the Respect song completly in Rosegarden, for the moment I'll leave ardour aside. I think I can get a good result with Rosegarden only.

Now, don't leave us, I think I'll need some of your Zyn presets  ;D

k

Personally, I wouldn't recognize a template if it came up and bit me on the keester! (look that one up on babelfish ;D)

Flow is a function of rhythm and attitude - sometimes the quirky tools suit my personality better than their more streamlined alternatives. That's one reason ZynAddSubFX works for me: that's no ordinary synthesizer! Ardour has a similar vibe, somehow....

I'm going to try to warm up to Rosegarden, because all the cool people on the site seem to favour it, but Seq24 feels like it goes better with army boots and a black hat  :D

Sure, you could use SEQ24 to create the song, record track by track with timemachine and then import the different tracks into Ardour to mix them. Just another way to do things  ;D

OR... you could use Seq24, different instances of Zyn, create a couple of Jack fx racks with different setting that you connect to the different Zyn outputs, send all outputs to timemachine and record the whole song in one take.
Another way of doing things... but if you do it that way, you're actualy doing the same in a complicated way what you could do in one go in Rosegarden :)
Now the advantage of doing it Rosegarden is that if you reload the rosegarden project, everything will be reloaded in one go :). If you go modular like I explained, you'll have to reload all components one by one and load presets one by one for every component.
See the difference  ;D
Or like Will said, you just write a script that loads it all, but isn't that beyond the scope of a musician ?

k
 

"I've found out how to render to audio from Rosegarden, it's actually very simple, just connect Timemachine to rosegarden's output and press record"

Kara,

Is it possible that you're referring to "Timidity" rather than "Time Machine" (an Apple MacIntosh program)?

Nope i was referring to time machine under Linux
See here : http://plugin.org.uk/timemachine/

Actually with Rosegarden this isn't needed as I have found out, because you can bounce directly to wav in Rosegarden
Here is how to do it :
Create a new audio track in rosegarden and set his input to the main out
Arm it for recording
Press play
All tracks that are played will be rendered to your new audio track.

Again a workflow enhancement :D

k

One of the greatest features of Time Machine is that 10 second 'pre-record'. I would think this would be especially useful to Oren when messing about experimentally developing on the guitar :)

If I'm feeling lazy, and I know levels are pretty much OK, I'll use it to make a combined recording from Rosegarden's audio side, together with Zyn's output and the soundcard's input.

The thing is, as I think you've both hit on by now, there are just so many different ways to do the same thing 8)

TimeMachine - looks like a handy little tool!

Both my chosen synthetic sound sources, ZynAddSubFX and Hydrogen, have audio-out capabilities, so rendering will not be necessary.

Kara,
Rendering within Rosegarden by recording to an audio track is a very elegant solution  8)

Will,
Very often, when messing around, er, creatively noodling on the guitar, I'll have a backing track and stereo recording track rolling - just in case I do something extraordinary (hasn't happened yet, but preparation is everything :D)

The option of accomplishing a task in a manner that suits the personality of the individual user is a big feature of a Linux O/S. You and Kara, by choosing 64studio, seem to have more freedom to successfully deploy the availalble tools than I do with Ubuntu Studio.
I'm very tempted to make the switch now, before proceeding with setting up the apps in their final configuration.

The 64studio disc asked me to "enable IOMMU" in the bios set-up, but there is no IOMMU setting in the bios of this Asus MN2 mother(board).
Hooped again :'(

Two BIOS things that can cause problems:

Try disabling apic (if it's available)

Also enable memory hole. Don't know why but it seems to work if you have lots of RAM.

If this doesn't help, give me a full breakdown of your setup, which version of 64studio you're trying and what error messages you get, and I'll post it on the 64studio list.

<edit>

Are you trying the live CD or the Install DVD?

Will,

Disabling my ACPI APIC support allowed the installation to proceed. I'm in the process  :-

Thanks, Bro!

Ah. This is very good news. I'll be shutting up shop soon (off to the Linux Audio Conference first thing tomorrow) so this is a good note to go out on  :D

@Oren,

If you do the install of 64studio from the DVD image available on the 64studio site, be aware that this isn't the very last release.
First thing to do is connect the PC to the internet, launch the synaptic package manager and do a FULL upgrade, you'll see that there are 133 package upgrades avialable ! Over a good cable connection, the upgrade takes about 30 minutes.

k

Yesterday I went through four installations of 64studio and three installations of Ubuntu Studio.

There is a fundamental conflict between the video drivers in 64studio and the video card in this new computer that my Linux builder could not resolve, and neither can I. After a successful installation, the monitor displays "out of range".

Ubuntu Studio, however, settles in very nicely, and I feel the best course of action is to proceed with it, and work out any Linux audio software conflicts from within the program, using the Ubuntu forums and my own native ingenuity :D

Thanks to both Kara and Will for their unflagging enthusiasm  :;

if your builder is a linux expert and he can't solve the problem, we won't be of any help i guess  ;D

An out of range message on the monitor is in general related to a refesh rate that it can't handle (normal range 60 Hz - 75 Hz)
A possible solution could be to play with xconfig, but i guess your linux expert allready tried this, so i'm just rambling here  ::) ;D

k

Kara,

64studio is likely the "better" audio processing distribution, but I have high hopes that Ubuntu Studio will mature and improve over time.

Plus, its quirky behavior tends to guide me toward the more capable audio tools - probably a good thing. If I had 64studio up and running, I'd likely have every oddball audio application there is, deployed in an ultra-weird set-up, and then eventually have to scrap it all to go with the more conventional tools  ;D

Somehow I think we're all better off, as it stands....

Another possibility has come to light...

Ardour will record and mix, JAMin will master..... but as far as computer music creation is concerned, Rosegarden and those very capable Linux synthesizers leave me uninspired.

Enter Jackbeat, a JACK client that seems to perform well in Ubuntu Studio.
Sample some audio, plug it into Jackbeat, arrange the samples, and set the tempo. I get to create (record, EQ, effect) the audio samples, so the sound is uniquely mine - and I'm working with audio (which I know), not MIDI (which I can't seem to get excited about). Interfaces effectively with Jackrack and Meterbridge.
Sort of like my own Linux band-in-a-box. :;

Sounds like a good solution to me  8)
Pretty simple setup, stable and flexible.

Now let's hear some of those sounds  ;D

k

The first few samples I'll record and edit in Audacity. Then switch over to Ardour...
I hope to have something recorded and sequenced by Thursday  O0

Just spent an evening with Ardour.  Heavy going ::)

Rather than rely upon Audacity, I've begun recording the source sounds (all from my trusty guitar) that will be effected and edited into samples for JackBeat sequencing. Drum (percussion) and bass samples will come from guitar sounds, all appropriately EQed and pitch-shifted in Ardour to provide me with a custom-created pallette of audio material from which I'll assemble backing tracks.

At least, that's the plan.... ;D

Ardour is a bit heavy when you start with it, a lot of possibilities and you have to find your way trough the wood  ::)
But once you get the picture it is a powerfull application.

Looking forward to hear the results  ;D

k

I have been following all this Linux business. Good on y'all for digging into it.

Kara: ..for a hardware guy, you really got the whole package up and running fast!

Very impressive.

Wyatt

I propably was very lucky that allmost everything worked out of the box  ;D

k

Hmmm.

I wonder if it's time I flexed my fingers and tapped in some of the installation tricks I've learned over the last few years.

Hmm could be VERY interesting :D

k

Great idea.  :- :- :- :- :-

Wyatt

I second that emotion...

There could be a lot of folks who would benefit from such an effort, as Linux will undoubtedly become a popular O/S here at Kara-Moon.

Uhh, Ohhh...

Will I never learn to keep my big mouth shut ::)

OK, I'll see what I can put together.

I'm not sure how much detail I should include. Are we aiming at total newbies or people who already dipped their toes in the water?

I think maybe do it in parts, and when people tell me they don't understand something,  I should modify the original text, rather than have alterations scattered down a thread.

How does that sound?

''' How does that sound?  '''

Sounds perfect to me, let me know if i can help

k

What if you wrote the article especially for people who have Windoze DAW experience, and want to migrate to LINUX?? ..that seems like a good focal point.


I think this is going to be a very important tutorial..and it will gather more popularity in the near future as more and more people get a clue.

I would like to see it be a contiguous article that can be made sticky at the beginning of the appropriate board.

Just my 2 cents,

Wyatt

Of late, Audacity http://audacity.sourceforge.net/ has changed from being my principle open-source audio application to the "fast and loose" option, great for audio file conversion and editing, and the ideal vehicle for the Lame codecs http://lame.sourceforge.net/index.php .
The fact that it is not an entirely JACK-compliant http://jackaudio.org/ application makes integrating it into my current recording/editing/mixing/mastering set-up troublesome, but it is still an indispensable stand-alone tool.

Ardour http://ardour.org/ is so solid and versatile, with apparently endless capabilities. It has taken Audacity's place as my  audio workstation.

And now JAMin  http://jamin.sourceforge.net/en/about.html is finally integrated as my mastering application, coupled with Ardour. It is so comforting to be able to make those subtle adjustments in EQ, compression and overall level, hear the improvement, and then have the results verified numerically and graphically. Beautiful ;D

(the meters and graphical readout on JAMin are so complete, I don't know if Meterbridge http://plugin.org.uk/meterbridge/ will ever be necessary)

I also use audacity mostly as a quick&dirty trimming/haircut/format-change utility, but then I work mostly in the MIDI realm.

I had been using JAMin for <ahem> a short while before I realised you could save the entire setup  ::)

The only reason I use meterbridge these days is because it looks nice and reassuring (I have it set as VU meters)

Meterbridge is pretty :D

Jamin actually allows you to save an EQ/compression "picture", and also ten different variations on that theme, in the same package.
So, the general sound for an album of music can be planned out, then specific settings for each song saved. Then, as required, the settings can be adjusted to get the right over-all balance from song to song.
An extraordinarily serviceable tool that interfaces with JACK flawlessly, and works in combination with Ardour or Rosegarden to create a tone-tweaker's dream.

Gotta love it :-