# Automation Dejour



## PepAX7 (Mar 11, 2008)

OK, let's see..... Stage automation.... yea.... that's it!:whistling:

I've got a six piece band on stage. Nothing is automated besides guitar players pedals! I've got three (3) FOH (front of house) projectors sometimes in unison, sometimes with three different video feeds. 

The drummer goes off time intermittently and ( I believe) needs a "clik" track. I also want to trigger some synth percussive sounds in sync with what's happening in the video feed running "Media Shout" software on a 32bit WinXP PC.

Talk to me Guys and Gals...... better yet.... Help:crying:


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## jonathanm (Mar 24, 2010)

I used to do something like this.

My band had a Yamaha SY85 on stage for this (it was a while ago, lol, there would be better choices around nowadays). We had the onboard sequencer programmed to play the odd synth or strings part, percussion, a click track, and midi automation of the guitar rack fx rack, etc

one pair of audio outputs went to the FOH desk, and the other went to a small onstage mixer that fed the drummer's in ear monitor (me!). the midi out went to the FX.

The guitarist would hit play on the SY85, and I would hear a count in of 8 beats - the last 4 I would vocalize or click so the band knew where to come in. The guitarist was then free to roam the stage for the rest of the track with all his patch changes being taken care of by the sequencer.


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## jonathanm (Mar 24, 2010)

I might add that this was around 1992, so no chance of doing this with a computer on stage. 

You could obviously do something similar with a laptop now, with a lot more flexibility - though it would be a lot more expensive that getting hold of an old hardware synth with onboard sequencer like above.


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## PepAX7 (Mar 11, 2008)

Now we're talkin'! I have done similar things back in late 80's with MC-500 sequencer (dating myself!) but there were no live people. Just 9 synths playing. We had a slide projector but it wasn't being sync'ed.

My brain is staring to warm up! Keep it coming!


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## jonathanm (Mar 24, 2010)

Playing with a click is tougher than you would expect for a lot of drummers - and even harder on stage. If you're playing right in the pocket then you can't hear the click at all and you only hear it when you start to drift off it. This can be quite unnerving the first few times, as you start to panic and think it's broken.... I preferred to use a fairly dense percussion part with shakers and congas as you could feel the groove even if you were right on top of the click.

What options does your video software have for control and sync?


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## PepAX7 (Mar 11, 2008)

Yea.. your right. I play drums also and you do lose the sync. I've never used an in-ear but when I was learning, always practiced with a metronome to develop my "chops".

I've seen guys doing it from Mac laptop and they don't seem to mind it.

I remember talking with the drummer from Ricky Scaggs electric bluegrass band and he just used it to set the initial tempo of the songs. After that... the drummer leads it all! He is the perfect sync no matter what kind of day he's having.

I appreciate your comments!

Pep


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## PepAX7 (Mar 11, 2008)

I forgot... I think Media Shout has the usual.... Midi Time Code, maybe SMPTE, not sure... I'll dig deeper!

pep


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