Hi !
There is a lot of talk around the white whale that is ZynAddSubFx parameters automation. And it often seems to end up with the following comment : MIDI learn is possible ; But I'm not sure of what it means in Qtractor terms. And come to think of it, the only other automation model that I actually used is Ableton Live, and they are exactly the same as far as I recall : A menu in the track controls, that lists the parameters exposed by the plugin for automation. A very fine model if you ask me, thank you very much :) and BTW one reason that is frequently inferred is that there would be like 8000 params to expose, and that would make a really big menu, well, is sort of a half-cooked answer : this is the toolkit/framework's job, I mean, we saw Qt apps with huge menus before, haven't we? This paragraph is a bit hard to read, please excuse me for that.
In the case of ZASFX, said menu has been empty for years, and it does not look like it's going to change.
So my question is (I guess) is there a way around this state of affairs, as the "MIDI learn" answer seem to suggest? I'm guessing no, I'm only asking.
PS - The new Qtractor is fantastic. The link/unling visual hints are a really big ergonomics boost, and it made me think of something. I'm going to make a separate post for that, it has nothing to do with automation.
Re. Setup an "automation only" track?
re. is there a way around this state of affairs, as the "MIDI learn" answer seem to suggest?
yes, being the workaround what has been called "poor man's automation" and in practice way before the TYOQA (but not exclusive to qtractor alone): if you can assign a specific MIDI controller to a desired ZASFX target subject (via MIDI Learn or whatever it may let you do manually), then you can enter or draw a so called pseudo-automation curve as normal MIDI performance data into a MIDI clip, under the designated MIDI controller event type, of course.
the good news are that this kind of solution is similar to regular automation in (sample&)Hold curve mode; the bad news are that all similarities stops there and is not an option ;)
hth.
cheers
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