If you’re dreaming of creating your own controller from scratch, there are certain basic elements you’ll need – and a strong case for reusing, not reinventing, the wheel. There are a range of products out there that cater to you DIYers; Livid’s Builder line is certainly one of the most comprehensive. It’s a line of hardware accessories that help you piece together MIDI controllers with all the requisite knobs and buttons and sensors you might like, and its brain just got an upgrade.

The soul of any controller is the electronics and microcontroller that read all of those inputs and let them talk to a computer. And it’s that “brain” that Livid recently upgraded, with their Builder Brain v2. Messages from controls go in, messages to devices like lights go out, all via a connection to your computer that’s USB powered, class-compliant MIDI. (That means you won’t need any drivers – not on Mac, not on Windows, and not on Linux. You could even plug this into one of those Raspberry Pi devices, if you’re lucky enough to have one!) They also operate standalone with a 5V power supply.

The Brain v2 is for some seriously large and complex controllers, with support for up to 64 analog inputs, 128 Buttons, and 192 LEDs. (Fortunately, a companion board called the Omni, and connections via ribbon cables, mean that you won’t create complete spaghetti trying to do that.) In fact, it’s so powerful I’d recommend considering something simpler for less-ambitious projects, but if you’re planning a big controller, it’s tough to beat Livid’s offerings.

New in v2:

• A Bus Board for easier control connections
• LED support up from 48 to 192, extra circuitry for ultra-brights.
• Encoders now work with LED encoder ring support, so you can make a big circle of ultra-bright lights to go around your encoder.
• RGB LED support.
• 5V standalone power is new.

Add those features to cool extras from the original, like accelerometer and velocity-sensitive surface support and programmable MIDI settings.

CDM asks Livid’ Jay Smith to tell us what this is all about.

CDM: Who is this for?

Jay: That’s kind of a loaded question! It’s really for anyone wanting to create a class-complaint MIDI device of their own. An artist, a maker of commercial products, a musician, a visualist? With Brain version 1 we’ve seen a MIDI controlled electric mandolin, Moldover’s Mojo, and The Choppertone to name a few. We’ve also powered some other pretty sophisticated commercial devices for other companies with it, so it’s not just a DIY solution.

With v2 we’ve really expanded the functionality by adding almost any kind of control you’d want to hook up to it, and made the process of doing that much easier. If you are talking about standard MIDI controller type controls, our Omni board support thousands of configurations with just one circuit board. This isn’t just for building “controllers” in terms of software controllers either. We’ve added external power so you can use it to control analog gear and other MIDI controlled devices.

Apart from those examples, what can you build with Builder and the Brain?

Anything that has a button, LEDs, potentiometer, encoder, FSRs, accelerometers, sensors, and more. Single LEDs, RGB LEDs, and “groups” of LEDs of 6,12, or 24 can be created and controlled with one MIDI note or CC or locally controlled with an encoder or pot. As a result, inventive, designs with interesting lighting feedback are possible. VU meters driven by CCs, or a clever array of LEDS that make glyphs or patterns can be arranged with your controls to provide novel, custom feedback that would never make it on Guitar Center’s shelves, but mean something special to you. The omni board provides enough physical limitation that you can think about a “chunk” of a controller and isolates parts of your project into digestible parts, and allows you to sensibly expand and modify your control surface with only 1 brain.

Why would you choose this over another platform?

Frankly there is no other platform for controller building that is this packed with features, well documented and supported, and easy to use. Since the release of Brain v1 three years ago we’ve spent a lot of time listening to our user’s requests, thinking about the features we’d like for our own use, and developing them into a platform for others to use. We didn’t spend much time looking at what else was out there, we looked for what wasn’t and tried to fill in those gaps. When it comes to building your own device, whether for creating music, controlling lights, or something else completely, there are really only other “solutions”, not platforms, which is what we intended to create.

Who is this not for?

If you are looking for an all-in-one solution for your dream controller but don’t want to do any of the labor, this is definitely not for you. We’ve really set out to create the most comprehensive platform that has the smallest learning curve. There are some other great solutions out there, but some of them either have a big learning curve or require programming to achieve results. If you have a smaller project and don’t care about MIDI, the ability to edit, expand, and have a long terms solution, there are certainly cheaper solutions out there. We tried to make the process more streamlined, feature packed, and have taken a lot of the guesswork out of it with Brain v2. With the addition of the Bus Board we’ve added things like resistors, transistors, and chips that make the building process much easier.

Quick start video:

Find out more:
http://lividinstruments.com/hardware_builder.php

Live electronic musician Moldover’s MOJO is the Sherman Tank of controllers: enormous, indestructible, destructive. It’s also a deeply involved build, costing US$1999.00. If you want to get some of that … um, MOJO … but don’t have two grand lying around, or if you want to adapt it to your own mojo, Moldover’s work is now fully open-source.

If you’re an experienced hardware maker, you could use these files to build your own MOJO or adapt ideas into your own design. (Moldover uses the excellent, powerful Livid Builder line of parts.) If you are a builder, you can get an idea of what’s involved with the build in the timelapse and explanation above. If not, you can live vicariously through Matt.

But builder or not, if you use Ableton Live, you should pay attention: in that big archive are the Live templates, which you could use to adapt to any controller you like, including some tasty effects chains to play with. That means even if soldering irons send you into a cold sweat, this is news worth watching. (Only one criticism: I’d like to see a license included, which would make this proper open source hardware.)

If you do have two grand, meanwhile, boutique controller maker 60 Works is taking over manufacture of the MOJO so you can get your own. 60 Works’ Dave Cross shares details with CDM:

* 1999USD
* hand made (duh)
* improved over Moldover’s original, based on his touring experience. Mostly tech improvements under the hood.

Grab the open source download as an archive (cough, guys, GitHub), and read up on the hardware:

http://blog.60works.com/mojo

Another video details Matt’s personal journey through controllers and shows off what the MOJO is about:

There’s lots of new stuff for musicians. Sometimes, the best thing to do is to leave some of it out, and skip to what’s really interesting.

Neil Bufkin did a great job last year covering NAMM for CDM, shooting some lo-fi, informal videos that got right to the heart of what we wanted to know. So, I’m pleased to share Neil’s work again, since unless you’re following forums (fora?) closely, you might miss it.

He picked out some of our absolute favorites. Highlights: Moog sums up the Minitaur in one, excellent word (“knobby”!), the Arturia shows off its sound shapers, Teenage Engineering flaunt their DIY prowess (hint: you can make your own inputs for next-to-nothing for the OpLab), and we get some up-close highlights of other hardware, too.

Bonus: I’ve included a quick upload from my, cough, phone of the QuNeo hardware. We’ll wait to shoot prettier videos when this gear actually ships. In the meantime, find a really old CRT (maybe from an old Commodore) and plug into that, if you can.

Minitaur: It’s Knobby!

I didn’t get to shoot a video, because I was too busy for the few minutes I had with the Minitaur just playing. The controls are simple, elegant, and – here’s why you know it’s a Moog – absolutely every conceivable position of the parameters sounds brilliant. It’s a bit spooky, or unfair, or something. I’ll have a full hands-on hopefully around April from Berlin. Here’s a tour with the Chief Engineer of Moog.

(For more of why we love Moog Chief Engineer Cyril Lance, see him show us the Moogerfooger Cluster Flux.)

Moog also posted some celeb visitors to their booth jamming away and making this thing sound even better; see other tidbits from their Twitter stream.

Arturia Minibrute

It has a name that sounds Moog-like, and it might be an analog hardware synth, but make no mistake: this synth is all-French, and un-Moog. The feel of playing it different, it has a great rotary-controlled arpeggiator, and the sound shapers and oscillator mix controls can take it into some very different sonic territory. I made repeat visits to the booth just to wrap my head around the feel, and got to really love it.

Akai MAX49

So now that you’re looking for a keyboard with MIDI and CV to go with all these new sound modules, here’s a surprising candidate – Akai. Yes, we’re utterly relieved to see the company that was recently making tiny keyboards for iPhones and things with only USB MIDI on them return to MIDI DIN and CV.

In my hands-on with the MAX49, I was very impressed by the feel. The keybed feels terrific and just springy enough, and the pads are more traditional MPC-style pads shared on the new MPC controllers. They’ve also sorted the velocity response. (That is, they aren’t the pads readers were complaining about on previous Akai keyboards.) Also, the red color that looks so garish in the product photos looks very nice in person; it’s a high-gloss, thick finish that is reminiscent of car paint.

Here’s a more detailed look at all the features via Neil:

Smithson Martin Emulator

It’s likely spendier than what at least some readers will want – especially with the iPad as an everyman’s alternative – but I really enjoy Neil’s detailed look with Smithson Martin at the custom control layouts on the Emulator hardware.

Our friends at The Verge also take a look at the new hardware. (I’ve become a great fan of Joseph Flatley’s general tech writing, so I’m really pleased to see him covering the music tech area … and Joseph, one of these days we’ll be in the same place at the same time.)

Teenage Engineering OP-1 Update, Oplab

While some may resent the gloss of marketing around their work, the truth is, the Teenage Engineers are also doing some great engineering. The OP-1 updates take a synth that was conceptually interesting and make it more musically inspiring and productive, finally starting to realize some of its original potential.

And then there’s Oplab. At $300, it’s not an Arduino – but what it is is a unique, programmable combination of CV, MIDI, and USB hosting (that’s the key) to which you can connect virtually any hardware or custom sensor or hardware creation. Some onlooked misunderstood what it was initially, comparing its pricing to boxes that only to CV-to-MIDI conversion, and missing the advantages of USB hosting.

Here’s a better look at what it actually does, and I can guarantee, having talked to the TE crew, that there will be more details to come. I hope that this will also inspire other DIY projects, even those not involving the Oplab per se, so we’ll document those aspects, too.

Again, The Verge gives us a second look with a nicer camera.

Livid

Livid has been very, very busy of late. And their latest controller, in collaboration with Richie Hawtin and M-nus, is an extraordinary example of what iteration can do for hardware. The first pad-and-fader-and-knob controllers from Livid were very, very good. This is even better. Quietly, Livid is making the kind of all-around controller many musicians will appreciate, even as big makers struggle to find the formula artists want.

Since I hear there’s some association between M-nus, techno, and Berlin, let’s hope we can get a closer hands-on. Anyone interested in that? Show of hands?

Watch This Space

We have more photos and hands-on details of new tech from NAMM to bring you. I’m working through them slowly, as is my speed, so we can go into the stuff we really care about in greater detail. And since I can’t only look at new gear, new music coverage coming, as well. Be seeing you.

What should DJing with a computer look like? We’ve seen over a decade of products that can emulate the vinyl turntable experience, of course. But a native hardware interface for the computer – with all its internal looping, slicing, and effects capabilities – by definition must be different.

DJ TechTools, led by DJ Ean Golden, has mixed writing about technology with designing custom solutions to that problem, interacting with the community on the DJ-centric blog. Ean has released mapping templates for existing hardware, and collaborated on a hardware special edition (Vestax VCI-100) and even a from-the-ground-up product (Novation’s Dicer). I never much liked the term “controllerist,” because the use of MIDI control in computer music is almost as old as real-time music. But what these efforts do is to imagine tangible, touchable interfaces for what the software is doing with the sound.

The custom designs and collaborations culminated in an original boutique controller product, the MIDI-Fighter, a 4×4 grid of mashable arcade buttons. The Midi-Fighter this month gets its first big upgrade: it graduates from being a simple 4×4 set of buttons to adding faders, encoders, and buttons in one of four variations available in the “Pro” series.

Introducing the Midi-Fighter Pro Controllers [DJ TechTools]

The Midi-Fighter Pro will go up against a number of rivals with similar configurations – at their heart, faders + controls + buttons. The Midi-Fighter approach remains unique because of its layer of mapping, but it’s worth considering both the new Pro line and its (friendly) competitors. Together, they’re making what might be considered a new genre of boutique controllers.

Midi-Fighter Pro

Ean Golden announced not one but four variant models in the “Pro” line, replacing what had been a simple 4×4 model. I’m a little partial to the original in some ways – there was a charm to the minimalism of the controller. But these have nice new cases, and of course those additional controllers will come in handy.

The specs:

• US$349 – trade in an existing model to upgrade for $249
• 3 pounds
• MIDI over USB, class-compliant drivers

There are four configurations. They’re pretty similar, differing in fader/knob attributes and mappings.

Beat Masher: Two crossfaders at right angles, one knob (mapped to filter), four preset buttons. Targets Traktor Pro.

XX Fader: Two cross-faders side-by-side, two knobs, four buttons. Targets turntablists.

Cue Master: Looks quite a lot like the XX Fader, but expression faders have multiple parameters in the mappings, and the knobs are dedicated to filter and echo.

Super Knob: Four preset buttons, four knobs, targets Serato cue + effect + sampler controlers or either four-deck or two-deck configurations in Traktor.

The Midi-Fighter line differentiates itself from other grid control rivals in two ways: first, it uses arcade buttons, which have long been loved by DIYers but haven’t seen much (any?) use in commercial music products. Second, the included mappings are heavily DJ-centric and performance-oriented. Other controllers have tended to be more software-agnostic, or, at the opposite extreme, control a range of software functions rather than being configured specifically for performance (as I’d argue is true of the Akai APC and Novation Launchpad for Ableton Live).

To put it more simply, DJ TechTools are the first hardware vendor – big or small – I’ve seen embrace gaming combos as a metaphor for music control. (It makes some sense.) Aside from the aesthetic choice of using game-style arcade buttons, they literally have combos in the fashion of a fighting game – hence the name.

Here’s what that looks like with the “Classic”:

Super Combos – Controllerism meets Street Fighter

And here’s how Ean uses it in his own set, playing with the Pro model with Q-Bert:

Now, a bit on some of the rivals:

Livid’s Block

The Midi-Fighter looks very nice, indeed, but at US$349, it’s getting close to the $399 price of the Livid Block. The two are a study in contrasts. First, the similarities: the Block also combines a grid with continuous (fader/encoder) control, it comes with software for custom mappings, there are custom housing options, and it has plug-and-play USB MIDI that’ll work on any Mac, Windows, or Linux system. (Or iOS, for that matter!) They’re also both boutique controllers produced by independent vendors and made in the US, in collaboration with a community of interested customers. That’s a trend that I think is healthy for this industry as a whole.

Now, some of the differences. The Block has significantly more controls and I/O for your extra $50. You get a light up 8×8 array of pads in place of the 4×4 buttons, additional triggers, and lots of knobs. In fact, I think the Block has the most flexible controller and I/O arrangement of any of its rivals. Add to that MIDI jacks for connecting hardware and expansion jacks, and the Block is powerful.

The Block is still a valid choice for DJs, with Ableton Live and Traktor Pro control templates available (and plenty of customization possible, beyond that).

That’s not to say it’s better than the Midi-Fighter Pro for everyone – some will appreciate the simplicity of the DJ TechTools offering. It’s nice to have different choices.

I covered the addition of expansion on the Block earlier this month:
Control with Room to Grow: Livid Adds Expansion Jacks

(I should also mention the monome, the design of which clearly inspired the grid on the Block. There’s certainly nothing saying you couldn’t combine a monome with other controllers for continuous controls, as many have. Ditto the Novation Launchpad. But I’ll stick to the direct rivals here.)

Electrix Tweaker

Because of its DJ-centric design and marketing, the Tweaker may be of more interest to would-be Midi-Fighter Pro buyers. Like the Block and Midi-Fighter, it combines pads and faders. But it adds a significant twist: velocity-sensitive drum pads.

At the heart of Tweaker lies a grid of 32 rubber pads backlit by RGB LEDs, and 8 velocity sensitive drum pads. There is a channel strip on each side of the grid, and a crossfader centered underneath. Each channel trips is comprised of a fader, three backlit rubber pads, an analog knob, and three push encoders with red LED rings. The navigation section at the top of the unit has a large browsing encoder and a four-way selection push grid (left, right, up, down).

Tweaker is fully USB bus powered and also has MIDI In and Out ports. More info and release date coming soon.

The excellent DJ site Scratchworx has the only shot I’ve seen of a prototype, along with analysis that’s, frankly, better-informed than mine as far as this model — so go check it out!

Electrix are back. The Tweaker cometh…

Other than that, we don’t know much about this beast; stay tuned. My guess is, with the extra controllers, it’ll be significantly more expensive than the other options here.
http://www.electrixpro.com/tweaker.html

Which Controller for You?

These are just a few options. DJ readers, I’d love to hear from you. (And live PA folk, too, for that matter.)

More analysis of the DJTT announcement, also from Scratchworx:
Fighting MIDI and winning – Midi Fighter Pro

(Okay, you’re not really fighting MIDI because it’s a MIDI controller, but … still, it’s a great article!)

In the never-ending quest to find just the right combination of faders and knobs for piloting your music, here’s a thought: add expansion capabilities. An upgrade to the Block, a grid grid and knob control surface by boutique Texan maker Livid, does just that. And for good measure, they’ve got a short-run iPad dock alternate, too, for those of you who want touch control and apps but want hardware control, too. That raises another set of ideas gaining traction this week: why not add tangible controls to these multi-touch tablets and such?

Room to Grow

At the heart of Livid’s controllers is something they call the Brain – the basis of a modular control surface. DIYers can build controllers from the ground up as part of their Builder system, or you can buy a controller like the Block that works out of the box. What Livid has done on the Block is effectively to give you both. You can use the controller out of the box, but you can use the 1/4″ jacks to connect sensors or foot pedals, and a pin header connection that adds eight more sensors. It means you can do a smaller DIY project for just the stuff you need, but without having to do all the hard stuff necessary to get the knobs and light-up pads the Block already has. More details in the Livid blog post, or see the demo video below.

Block Expansion Jacks

So that’s taking a tangible controller and adding to it. But what about the tablet and multi-touch control surface craze? Musicians are subverting the very feature of these tablet computers that supposedly makes them popular. DIYers are liberating control from those shiny, black, hermetically-sealed consumer goods, a bit like cracking into some alien artefact. We’ve already seen hardware from one commercial maker – Akai – that sits an iOS device in a keyboard dock (the SynthStation line). New options go still further:

Beyond the Tablet

Livid is doing a very limited run of the Block that includes a place to sit your iPad. (I’m actually a bit sorry that they make the space form-fitting, rather than have just an open shelf – in case you later swap tablets to something that’s a different size, for instance. But it’s a limited-run, and I guess if I want that, I’ll have to just commission Livid.)

As seen on Synthtopia, the design is now available. You get a class-compliant, driver-free controller that’s USB powered, features MIDI in and out jacks, 64 programmable, light-up pads, and the aforementioned expansion jacks. It’s a pretty full-featured product for US$460.

Block Station Hardware

It’s just a prototype, and may never be available, but Livid also mocked up how their Code (a big array of knobs) would work with the iPad. I love the Moog-style angling of the shelf and the smaller footprint of this design. And it does appear that it’s a design that could accommodate different tablets, in case you have an iPad and an Android tablet. (Well, that’s true of a bunch of people who went to Google’s developer conference this week, if sadly I wasn’t one of them.)

From Touch to Tangible

Tablets, by merging display, computing, and touch control, make software easier to control. What they can’t do is provide the function tangible controls do. That is, they do what the mouse and display and keyboard do better in some instances, but they can’t replace knobs and faders.

A research project by Mike Kneupfel for New York University’s ITP digital media program investigates these issues.

Touchscreens like those found on smartphones and tablets have enabled a new generation of versatile user interfaces. My thesis project, Extending the Touchscreen, aims to further this versatility by using conductive materials to construct a series of physical, mechanical, and electrical devices that touch, interact and communicate directly through the touchscreen interface. My goal in constructing these external devices is to make touchscreen interactions more tactile, physical and potentially more expressive and fun.

As seen in the videos, he takes two approaches. One works directly with the sensing capabilities of the touchscreen itself, augmenting it with different hardware that would come in contact with the screen. The other makes use of the hardware connection.

For all the Apple fetishism, I think that Google may be able to pull away some folks tinkering with this with their new, far more open approach to hardware development. But what’s nice about Michael’s project here is that Google’s announcement this week that they were vastly expanding hardware I/O capabilities validates his research, and suggests lots more potential that can work even in a consumer, not just a tinkerer, context.

Lots of crazy stuff on his blog; see also the thesis page and coverage in Creative Applications.

Side note: it seems some of the add-on hardware you plop on a touchscreen doesn’t work all that well; see Victor Agreda, Jr.’s disappointed review of those stick-on joysticks. (CDM readers had tipped me off about those before.) But the other approaches here do show potential.

And whether a tangible controller or touchscreen tablet, having control that has room to grow has some serious appeal.

In a world of disposable computers and electronics, making something “custom” is an antidote to throwaway hardware, a way of putting one’s own handiwork, care, and attention into the object with which you play music. Of course, it’s one thing to say it, and another thing to do it, but Nick Francis falls squarely in the “doer” camp. A jazz-focused radio broadcaster from Seattle’s KPLU, Nick says he’s been chopping up audio since he was doing it with razor blades and tape. Naturally, his digital music controller has the kind of craft in wood that you’d normally find on an acoustic instrument – and his music remixes of choice tend toward artists like Coltrane.

Nick’s work also combines resources from the Web. He says he got started because of a post here on CDM, then went to Livid’s DIY solution, the Builder DIY system, and DJ TechTools’ arcade buttons.

Nick has build details on DJ TechTools, as posted in March:
The Chopper Tone – Classic Arcade Custom Controller [DJ Tech Tools]

Updated: Livid, whose Builder series powered the guts of the project and made it possible, did an extensive Q&A.

And today, he shared his work on his own KPLU radio station site, sharing how he works with remixing classic jazz tunes on the controller.

Mix it up: KPLU music director invents ‘The Choppertone’

Nick shares some additional thoughts for CDM – and I reproduce them, really, because just as he feels indebted to CDM, I feel personally indebted to everyone who shares their work with us on this site and in this community in general:

This project never would’ve happened had I not stumbled upon your website in 2009 or so. I really love your wide-open approach to this whole world of geeks, tinkerers, engineers and artists who make up the core of your community.

Regarding the actual build of the Choppertone, I pretty much covered it in detail in my initial postings to the forums at Livid and DJTT. The whole build process was really challenging, yet extremely rewarding. Nothing beats the feeling of spending months of detailed work on a project, finally getting it done, and then seeing it work!

I basically recorded the video for a few friends who had no idea what controllers were about. I tried to find something simple enough musically to demonstrate it. One of the fun things about jazz is that historically, from the get-go, these musicians were the original “remixers”; they could take a melody, tune or phrase, and tweak it, rearrange it and make it their own. I had been lately been listening to a lot of Fats Waller, so “Honeysuckle Rose” was a good fit. I found at least 20 versions of it in the KPLU library, and chose four that were close to the original key and tempo. From there it was just a few days of chopping everything into 4 bar phrases, then finding the ones that seemed to play well with the others.

As for how I thought the video would be received by the midi controller community, I had no idea. I sensed that this project was going to come off as either really cool…or really stupid. All I knew is that it worked for me.

The positive response to the video has simply blown my mind, and the video’s reach has extended far beyond what I imagined. I could not believe my eyes when I received an email from the Ableton offices in Berlin a few weeks ago. That was so incredibly cool. I’m also quite amused by the many comments regarding my age; I have to tell you that my creative spirit is as vibrant now (at 61) as it was when I was an aspiring film student at UCLA at 21. These days, I’m quite aware that my days on earth are limited and that the present moment is to be savored. That’s all you got.

I imagine a number of the sentiments there will be familiar – and I certainly find interests in our wider community that transcend age (and other) barriers.

Nick says he’s woodshedding so that this is something he can use in live sets. He also says he welcomes questions, so readers, if you’ve got them, let’s hear!

Analog and digital, gadgetry and module, DIY and ready-to-play, today in Austin we’re blessed with a get-together at the insanely-amazing Switched On music store. Austin’s noisiest manufacturers are dropping in to show some of their wears.

If you’re not in Austin, have a look at the lineup below and see if you have any questions for these makers, and I can bring back those answers to our readers around the world.

The event is free, 4:00 – 7:00 pm. It’s very informal and intimate – just sound geek boys and girls hanging out.

The Victory Grill Cafe
Across from 1111 E. 11th Switched On
Austin, TX

Switched On: a place where your money goes to die, but vintage synthesizers and circuit-bend video machines and other goodies replace it

I’ll kick of the proceedings with the MeeBlip, our fully open-source synth – which, now after several months of use and creative users, I can now say quite a lot about.
http://meeblip.com

Then…

Bleep Labs is a locally owned & operated manufacturer of some of the most creatively unique sound toys, some of which can be interfaced with CV supported hardware. His Thingamagoop 2 light controlled Analog + Digital Synth Friend is a hot item in every store who carries it. Please come check out some of his other gadgets that will blow you away!
http://www.bleeplabs.com/

Livid Instruments has been crafting controllers for electronic music in Austin, Texas since 2004, and offers a line of commercially available control surfaces and DIY products through dealers and distributors worldwide. Livid will be demoing it’s product line with software tools like Ableton Live, Max/MSP, Reason, ArKaos, and Traktor.
http://www.lividinstruments.com/
http://www.lividindustry.com/
http://www.lividdesign.com/

Dann Green of 4ms will demo synthesizer modules, including the Rotating Clock Divider, Shuffling Clock Multiplier, and the soon-to-be-released VCAMatrix. The RCD and SCM are hackable microcontroller-based timing generators for creating complex rhythm patterns, and the VCAMatrix is a 4×4 CV-controllable analogue signal mixer/router.
http://4mspedals.com/

Mickey Delp will be demoing several Delptronics products including the Guitar Meister, which plays real guitar sounds on a PS2 guitar controller; and the Bender Sequencer, a step sequencer designed for DIY synth builders and circuit benders. Mickey will also be showing his custom synthesizer created for Dorkbot’s SXSW event. The synth was sponsored by, and built with parts from Radio Shack.
http://delptronics.com/

bubblesound is proud to be joining this line up a month after we relocated from NYC, and we will be showing off our new oscillator: the VCOb. This is the first time the VCOb will be demo’d in public, so come on down. The VCOb will be joining the rest of the bubblesound line; the SeM20, the uLFO, the cvWS and the LvL+rm. It starts shipping in April.
www.bubblesound-instruments.com

Renoise, the tracker-style music production host, has gotten a massive injection of customizability, scriptability, and hackability. If all you want to do is plug in some controller hardware and have more tangible control of music making, that scriptability can be nicely hidden away. But if you are ready to hack on your music app, this is some enormous news.

For that reason, Renoise 2.6 is being called even by its makers the “Renoise Geek Edition.” But if this hackability catches on, it could mean a music tool that’s more fun to use for everyone – not just scripting geeks.

2.6 has been released into a private beta for registered users, with the full release anticipated soon.

The video at top sums up why the open API is potentially a big deal for everyone. Right now, you can use a pre-built script for two-way integration of hardware like Novation’s Launchpad. As other folks get into the tools used here, though, that could (if hackers get so inspired) lead to lots of other hardware support and musical ideas.

The other big news, at the opposite end of the spectrum, is that longer samples now “autoseek.” That’s best seen in the video below, although I can put it this way – this means if your music isn’t all microsamples, you can now more easily produce and perform in Renoise.

Here’s my personal take on the 2.6 changes. Keep in mind, I’m just wrapping my head around this stuff, too, so take this with a grain of salt. But I can at least express why I’m excited about digging into this release, having followed these developments for some time:

Script everything – using a truly open API. Firefox has extensions. Renoise has Lua scripts. You can customize the user interface, manipulate musical elements in your song, control MIDI, audio, and OpenSoundControl, or actually dive in and create features Renoise doesn’t have yet. Those ready to code can use the elegant scripting language Lua, which means that – while you’ll definitely need some basic coding chops – the results are surprisingly simple and readable.

http://code.google.com/p/xrnx/

You don’t need a separate add-on product, and the API is fully documented, free, with a whole bundle of scripts and snippets under an open source MIT license. Renoise itself remains proprietary, but that means the scripts themselves are free to remix, and coders are free to distribute their work to all Renoise users.

That approach contrasts with the solution devised by Cycling ’74 and Ableton for Ableton Live. Live is not directly scriptable; the so-called “Live API” used by hackers was a set of private APIs. Max for Live provides some, but not all of this functionality, and it’s a paid add-on, so you can’t distribute your work to all Live users. On the other hand, the Lua scripting engine is just a scripting engine – it’s not the synth, sequencer, effect, and multimedia-processing platform that Max is. For some, that may actually make the simpler, more direct Lua interface more appealing; they’re just not directly comparable.

Two-way control of everything.

Using these scripting features, it’s possible to get much richer, two-way communication between control hardware and Renoise software.

That means one of two things:

You don’t care about code. No problem — grab control templates from a community of people who do care enough to hack things together. If you’ve got a Behringer BCF/BCR, Novation ReMOTE, Nocturn SL, or Launchpad, or Livid Ohm 64, you can get started right away. For everything else, watch for the community to fill in the gaps. (monome?)

You’re a coder. Dive in and make things work the way you want. What’s ground-breaking about what Renoise have done is that everything is built atop an open, extensible API for the software itself – rather than kludging together various protocols and tools, which has been the traditional industry solution (if you’re lucky, and there’s any customization at all). Renoise’s Duplex uses an object-oriented system for describing hardware and software and communicating events bi-directionally between them. It’s all built in the API, so it’s all customizable. There’s even an onscreen tool so you can mock-up interactions with hardware you don’t yet own (or haven’t yet built).

Everyone can share their work at a centralized site:

http://tools.renoise.com

OSC Support

Renoise joins MOTU Digital Performer, the open source DAW Ardour, and a host of visual apps that support full, native OSC. That means support for networked, transparent control from anywhere to anything. You can even send Lua scripts as OSC commands, so this new API is really controllable from anything.

Better Linux Support

Linux now adds DSSI plug-in support, bringing a full complement of Linux plug-in compatibility, as well as 64-bit Linux support.

More Support, Tweaks

Mac, Linux performance enhancements (especially on 64-bit Linux), and better support for hardware-based plugins (which I’m assuming means latency compensation) round out this update.

Needless to say, this is all something we’ll be covering more. Stay tuned here.

Thanks to Johann Baron Lanteigne and everyone who sent this in.

From the source:
http://www.renoise.com/about/what-s-new-2-6/

Livid Instruments has just revealed their next hardware controller. Well, sort of revealed – this evening on Twitter, they declared that it was a “Top secret sneak peek of our new controller.” Top secret – you know, just on the Internet. No one will see it there. It’s full of encoders, if that’s your thing. It’s called, cleverly, the “Code.” In addition to accompanying Livid’s own grid controllers, put this next to a monome, and you can manipulate continuous parameters alongside triggers. I could imagine someone doing some insane granular patch with an absurd number of parameters using this. Update: those encoders are both pushbuttons and encoders, says Livid, opening up still more possibilities.

Update – yep, judging from reactions so far, people like them some encoders.

But it’s doubly worth posting early partly because of this:

Boulier by Yann Girard was one of the nicer entries to our musical future competition with Portugal’s Digitopia at Casa da Musica. Unbeknownst to Yann, Livid was already working on such a design before his entry. At the same time, I prefer his mock-up, entirely made of encoders with nothing else, and with LEDs embedded in the cap. (Knobnome, anyone?) Of course, the Code has one significant advantage — it’s real. But who knows, maybe someone will realize this alternative design, too.

Hint: Livid’s own Builder platform would be one option, as it’s got guts related to the Code and is wired for just this sort of array o’ stuff.

For more pictures:
Code First Looks [Livid Instruments @ Livid]
Via Livid Instruments

Just remember, don’t tell anyone.

Tired of needing xx more knobs or yy more pads or a specific feature in your control hardware? Ready to dive in and build your own? You’ve had a variety of options for some time that can help get you started, but Livid’s new Builder set of modular platforms is uniquely well-suited to the kinds of gear people now want to build. It’s loaded with inputs and outputs – necessary for the button- and knob-laden controllers of today – while at the same time uses modular boards and smart software to ease the learning curve. It’s probably still a little advanced for your first project (for that, you might try connecting a few knobs to an Arduino first), but if you’re ready to build something fancier, this should definitely be high on your list. We’ll have a more detailed look at this hardware in the coming weeks, but here’s a first look.

• The Brain: USB-powered, bi-directional MIDI board – class-compliant, with no drivers needed (including on Linux). Use open-source software to configure and program it, then connect what you need – even more-complex features like multiplexing buttons and LEDs. (Hint: it’s tricky to do on your own unless you’re a pretty advanced hardware person.) Connect to your computer or hardware via USB and standard MIDI in/out DIN (so yes, this works for hardware synth and drum machine fans, too). Note that this chip also supports OSC (OpenSoundControl), so support for that in the future isn’t out of the question.
• Add-on boards: Push, Slide, Turn, and Breakout modular boards make it easy to tack on features, like buttons, faders, pots, and monome-style grids, in any combination you desire. Once you use the board, you can choose an arrangement you desire – including even deviating from the grid.
• Components: Finding the right parts can require some trial and error, so Livid will also sell the ones they use on their control surfaces. Sure, LEDs aren’t difficult to select, but getting the right rubber keypad or potentiometer can be a lifesaver.

More information:
Blog post
Product page
Parts

Wiki for the Brain
Brain Quick Start

Pricing is actually (happily) a little south of where I expected – in USD:
Brain $189
Push $12
Turn$12
Slide $12
Breakout $12

By the way, Livid, I hope you realize you now have to do a simple side product called Pinky.