Crossfading between dynamic layers?

Question

Is there a way to program a midi expression to control crossfading between dynamic layers like on a long string patch? Perhaps a workaround with group tags? Maybe there's a simple answer here I'm missing but I'd love to know how or when this might be possible.

Also thanks for such an awesome tool and great documentation, being able to script sample instruments for free is amazing!

Answer 1

I'm not quite sure what you mean by dynamic layers, but I think the instrument Dave Choir might do what you want. It mixes between "Oh" and "Ah" vowel sounds using a knob/control, which is in turn controlled by the Modulation Wheel (CC#1).

If you look at the .dspreset for Dave Choir, you'll see it uses two groups, one for each vowel sound, and the knob/control element has a separate <binding ... /> element which controls the AMP_VOLUME parameter for each group. One of these bindings also has an added translationReversed="true" attribute, so that the volume of that groups is being adjusted opposite to the other, i.e. when one is at 0% the other is at 100% and vice versa.

Hope that helps (and makes sense!) Although it's probably too late by now, sorry!

Answer 2

I think that you can have 'crossfading between layers' and dynamic crossfading between layers' (where the crossfading is controlled by velocity), but I am not sure what 'dynamic layers' are in this context. Do you mean that the layers are controlled by velocity? Because that is one of the ways that the layers can be defined... by velocity, so the layers are dynamic - by their very existence. Or do you mean that the samples within the layers are controlled dynamically - by a group for example?

If you mean 'dynamic crossfading between layers'? (which is where the velocity is used to continuously fade between one layer and another (where layers are defined by the samples allocated to ranges of velocities)), then Decent Sampler does dynamic 'switching' between layers, not cross-fading. Dynamic cross-fading is hard to create samples for, because during the cross-fade, both samples are playing, and so any pitch or phase differences become very obvious. This means that using synthesized samples is viable (with care in preparing the samples), but real-world samples of recorded instruments are very challenging because you can get audible phase cancellations with the slightest variation in the pitch of the instrument being recorded...