Hi. I’ve been testing VST Live Pro 2 for a while now, and I’m thinking about giving up on it. The problem I have is:
Lyrics and chords don’t work. (It’s been said that a new version of VST Live Mods is coming that will fix this.)
I’m going to use Show Buddy Active and need to be able to run it as an instance within VST Live Pro 2 to control my lights. I have to run it in a host to get the tempo, which is important to me. I’ve understood that it’s not possible to use third-party MIDI instruments.
It’s a shame, because I really like the system. Have I misunderstood something regarding Show Buddy Active? I’ve managed to get it working by sending MIDI to SBA when I run it as a separate instance, but as mentioned, I don’t get the tempo that way.
I guess you are talking that Lyrics+Chords are not in sync with the MODS application? Yes, we are busy working on that Tonic.
It’s possible. Here, I’ve added a MIDI Track and loaded the “Show Buddy Active (instr)” as an Instrument. Therefore, you can send MIDI events to VST3-Instrument and it gets the tempo information.
Im using show buddy active pal it works like a treat. Each song has a MIDI track sending on Channel 16 to a global layer (I only use patch changes - you would need a second track sending on Ch 15 for bank changes). My global layer is an instrument > db audioware > showbuddy active. Works like a treat. Only thing you cant do is change what show your using from VST Live. So you have to open as a standalone to make sure you are running the right show in showbuddy.
Alright! Nice to hear that Show Buddy could works as intended. Yea, it’s the MODS app I have problem with. The lyrics and chords work well in the Windows VST Live application but not in MODS. I see many advantages in VST Live compared to Ableton Live which is my fallback for now. Unfortunately the show is in a month and the rehearsals is going on now, so waiting for a new MODS-version isn’t an option. I’ll probably get back to it at a later moment when the new app is in production and working. Keep up the good work devs!
I’ll try to get that rolling. Have you found a good process to work with structure of presets? I found that the performance buttons would work great cause they respond to the same midi-note number as the number of the performance button. But when I realized that performance buttons is the same for every bank, I’ve started leaning more towards using presets in one bank. I’ve got about 30 songs to set the lights for so I need a solid process. I’m doing the programming at home, and when I come to the venue I need to be able to set the moving lights to the right position without going through every preset. Wouldn’t it be nice to have some global custom values to use for positioning them? I’m new to the lighting world, so I’m probably have the wrong approach.
Yeah this is a bit of a pain. I got around it by not using banks per song and presets per song part, but having a single bank with ‘stuff’. So I have a single preset for ‘spots center’, ‘spots drums’ ‘spots Center and Stage left’ or whatever that is universal for my whole show.
Then at venue I have to spend maybe 30mins just locating spots where I want them for those 5 or 6 presets.
I also have ‘wash blue’ and ‘fancy effect’ type presets. It makes the initial programming of a song a bit of a nause MIDI wise as I don’t just sequentially cycle through, but I have to trigger each individual thing I want to happen during a song. BUT it means when I turn up at a venue I only have maybe 20 presets in total to sync up with the house for the whole show. ‘Big ending blue’ happens maybe 6 times but its only 1 preset i have to change. ‘BUSY RED’ happens 3 or 4 times but only 1 preset. Most of that can be done at home if you have the DMX map anyhow.
I too have been unable to make show buddy work properly with VST Live. I’ve managed to get SBA to receive MIDI using an instrument layer as suggested by @HonkyTonk. I can see the midi note being hit, and the right tempo being received, however, there’s no light output.
I can use SBA with both Reaper and Ableton live, and I can get light output from VstL when using DMX tracks (which I found to be extremely painful to do as there’s no light fixture library or definition for my test device).
What am I missing? Do I need to configure additional outputs or setup additional connections/dmx settings?
