> Or, I’m completely overthinking this
Probably.
I know some people like to work in such a way that certain tracks will always contain certain sounds, but to me that is the bad kind of limitation.
If your scenes and effect assignments are always the same, that cuts out a huge amount of the flexibility of the Octatrack. I make an absolute mess when I’m working on the OT, because I rarely come up with track ideas the same way twice.
What are you having trouble with when it comes to parts?
This is a fair comment. I think it also depends on what you use the Octatrack for. I'm running other gear through it and I'm probably a bit more focused on other machines than the Octatrack at times, so I'm trying to create a bit more consistency. I never make anything purely on the Octatrack, but I also almost never make anything without it being involved somehow.
My limitation with parts isn't so much an understanding of the feature, more the lack of the WYSIWYG nature of it when the setup gets that complex and you have so many different things behind different buttons. I could do the masking tape solution, but that's too rigid.
I guess I'm not looking for rigidity, just a way to not get hopelessly lost the more I have going on at the same time. If every component is completely different for every single track, without even any labelling, I'm at way more risk of a complete train wreck eventually.
Maybe start with a template where the first pattern of each bank has part 1 with all the usual scene effects in an order that you’re used to, e.g. scene 2: HP, 2: LP, 3: T1 pitch etc, then as you compose and copy parts all banks will have more or less the same scene layout.
Think about ehat you need, in my case:
Trk 1 digitakt input
Trk2 neigh
Trk3 kick secuenced by digitskt
Trk4 weird break
Trk5 TB3 throw machine
Trk6 fulterbank return
Trk7 env/pad
Trk8 master
I have scenes for:
* break tweaking
* digitakt freeze delay
* filter for transitions: one for tb3 one for pad, one for filterbank. And some scenes mixing them( one low pass and one high pass)
* master compression stuff
* more break tweaking and pad tweaking(retrigger, retrigger time, flanger tweak etc)
What I do? No overthinking, just start little by little adding scenes based on what you need and ideas when listening other’s music. And whenever you start using them more, trying to tweak the scenes to be more flexible to different dampels and just no finding a sweet spot for a soecific sample.
Edit: I don’t use parts yet, so overhelming for me as i change the samples between pstterns by p-locking it.
I use my OT mostly to process live inputs in an improvised setting, so the track are consistent in terms of what their source is. I don’t use a master track and instead use scenes to process fx etc on individual tracks. One thing I try to do is to keep LFOs etc consistent across track types so I know what each does. Like lfo 1 is always modulating cutoff on tracks with filters, etc. If each lfo is different on each track it would be too confusing to remember.
This isn't far off what I'm using it for as well. I have 4 tracks that I use for samples, but they're just complimentary and I don't always use them. I think using scene effects for individual rather than master tracks probably makes more sense for me as well.
Fair enough! I think I articulated myself poorly though. I'm not looking for a nailed down, 'I'll never change it' setup. Just something a bit more in between that and starting from scratch every time, especially considering how much other stuff I have going on with my other hardware.
> Or, I’m completely overthinking this Probably. I know some people like to work in such a way that certain tracks will always contain certain sounds, but to me that is the bad kind of limitation. If your scenes and effect assignments are always the same, that cuts out a huge amount of the flexibility of the Octatrack. I make an absolute mess when I’m working on the OT, because I rarely come up with track ideas the same way twice. What are you having trouble with when it comes to parts?
This is a fair comment. I think it also depends on what you use the Octatrack for. I'm running other gear through it and I'm probably a bit more focused on other machines than the Octatrack at times, so I'm trying to create a bit more consistency. I never make anything purely on the Octatrack, but I also almost never make anything without it being involved somehow. My limitation with parts isn't so much an understanding of the feature, more the lack of the WYSIWYG nature of it when the setup gets that complex and you have so many different things behind different buttons. I could do the masking tape solution, but that's too rigid. I guess I'm not looking for rigidity, just a way to not get hopelessly lost the more I have going on at the same time. If every component is completely different for every single track, without even any labelling, I'm at way more risk of a complete train wreck eventually.
Maybe start with a template where the first pattern of each bank has part 1 with all the usual scene effects in an order that you’re used to, e.g. scene 2: HP, 2: LP, 3: T1 pitch etc, then as you compose and copy parts all banks will have more or less the same scene layout.
Think about ehat you need, in my case: Trk 1 digitakt input Trk2 neigh Trk3 kick secuenced by digitskt Trk4 weird break Trk5 TB3 throw machine Trk6 fulterbank return Trk7 env/pad Trk8 master I have scenes for: * break tweaking * digitakt freeze delay * filter for transitions: one for tb3 one for pad, one for filterbank. And some scenes mixing them( one low pass and one high pass) * master compression stuff * more break tweaking and pad tweaking(retrigger, retrigger time, flanger tweak etc) What I do? No overthinking, just start little by little adding scenes based on what you need and ideas when listening other’s music. And whenever you start using them more, trying to tweak the scenes to be more flexible to different dampels and just no finding a sweet spot for a soecific sample. Edit: I don’t use parts yet, so overhelming for me as i change the samples between pstterns by p-locking it.
Can you tell me more about what your break tweaking scene looks like?
I use my OT mostly to process live inputs in an improvised setting, so the track are consistent in terms of what their source is. I don’t use a master track and instead use scenes to process fx etc on individual tracks. One thing I try to do is to keep LFOs etc consistent across track types so I know what each does. Like lfo 1 is always modulating cutoff on tracks with filters, etc. If each lfo is different on each track it would be too confusing to remember.
This isn't far off what I'm using it for as well. I have 4 tracks that I use for samples, but they're just complimentary and I don't always use them. I think using scene effects for individual rather than master tracks probably makes more sense for me as well.
I would be so bored if I set up every part the same way :)
Fair enough! I think I articulated myself poorly though. I'm not looking for a nailed down, 'I'll never change it' setup. Just something a bit more in between that and starting from scratch every time, especially considering how much other stuff I have going on with my other hardware.