Notifications
Clear all
Topic starter
January 31, 2021 1:15 pm
I have no affiliation with the developer, but wanted to share a fantastic tool I found for live midi looping in Unify. Sorry but it's Mac only currently.
In my short time so far with Unify, one of my favorite uses has been experimenting with various instrument layers and effect chains. It's so much quicker than in a standard DAW. The drawback of course is that I'll come up with an awesome riff that is perfect for the sound, but with no way to record it without opening Unify in a DAW, at which point the amazing riff has vanished and the initial inspiration is gone.
Inserting Repeto as a MIDI layer lets me instantly record my riff while it's still fresh from the cosmic oven. The looper overdub features are cool, but I tend to use it more as a simple midi recorder. It also has useful auto-quantize and transpose features.
One of the best things about it is after recording midi you can drag and drop it directly from the Repeto interface onto the desktop. The recent livestream demonstrated doing this within Logic, recording a bar of midi, exporting it to the desktop, and then importing that file into Midibox to compose with. With Repeto this can be done within the standalone Unify. It's a great DAW-free workflow!
The drawbacks of Repeto is the individual notes of the midi loop cannot be manually adjusted, and it doesn't have a click track (as a midi layer how could it). I'm using the melda metronome in the master effects layer for a click, which is easily bypassed when not in use.
If anyone knows of any other MIDI Looper VSTs that can be loaded as MIDI layer I'd love to try them as well. There's a free mini version of Repeto, but I instantly upgraded for the extra features after trying it out. Here's the link: https://www.repeto.net
January 31, 2021 7:24 pm
Very interesting. Thank you for not only pointing out this product, but explaining how and why you use it?
So, do you think Unify should have its own built-in MIDI recorder?
January 31, 2021 8:10 pm
I would like to see Unify have the ability to record MIDI. Being a "hobbyist", I will frequently fire up Unify for a what I expect to be a short time (well, they start as being short) and then make some interesting. For reasons known only to my therapist, I'm resistant to stopping what I'm doing to exit Unify, bring up my DAW and re-create what I was doing in Unify.
If I could pop in a MIDI effect and record what I'm doing to a file, it would keep me more in the moment. If I could save the patch with the MIDI recorder and file, then I'd have a "bookmark" to come back to the idea when I have more time.
Paul
Topic starter
January 31, 2021 8:34 pm
So, do you think Unify should have its own built-in MIDI recorder?
Yes, that would be great! A Paul said, capturing an idea in the moment, as a musical bookmark, is quite useful.
New sounds and instrumentation (what Unify excels at) can be very inspiring. Even when scrolling through a list of presets I find myself coming up with melodies and patterns that go well with a particular sound. Saving those ideas along with the preset is what I've started doing with Repeto, but it would be even better if that capability was built-in to Unify.
karlfranz reacted
February 12, 2021 5:19 pm
+1 vote as well. What a great idea, I also use Unify like the OP and a midi recorder that captures everything without having to be enabled first just incase you come up with gold whilst jamming would be an excellent addition to an already stunning product! If it's not auto enabled then you know what will happen! You'll compose something stunning on the fly, go to enable the recorder... and then promptly forget exactly what it was you originally played 🙂
January 6, 2022 4:42 am
Any progress on this expected in 2022? I'd be keen on using this capability, even if it is a paid option.
January 6, 2022 3:09 pm
Any progress on this expected in 2022? I'd be keen on using this capability, even if it is a paid option.
It's on my list, but I'm not working on it yet.
February 17, 2022 6:33 pm
@getdunne
IMO Yes, it should... It will just make Unify Self Efficient... really for now - the only thing i miss from a daw (when working in Unify standalone) - realtime midi looping/recording... I use Midi Looper built in Reaktor now.... but it is not that perfect...
Wish this thing - in a topic - be cross platform...AND - through the years - Retrospective Record - was the feature that helped me alot... it is much better than regular recording... So the dream - is to have Midi looper with retrospective record...
This post was modified 2 years ago by RO-mix
getdunne reacted
February 20, 2022 2:15 pm
@getdunne
Made video, where i demo my current workflow, using Sequencers and Midi Looper for fluid Realtime composing...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oBowzxy54uI&ab_channel=RomanSmirnov
More sense from 20th minute...it was live.
This post was modified 2 years ago 5 times by RO-mix
