Launch quantisation question

Hi. I am trying to work out how row launch quantisation works...it is not working how I expected and I cannot find anything in the manual to explain.

What I was expecting (similar to Blackbox 1010 for example) was :
Select 1 bar, row launches at next bar.
Select 2 bars, row launches on the next odd numbered bar (Bar 1 + 2 etc).
Select 8 bars and the row would launch after a multiple of 8 bars from bar 1 has passed. (So bar 9, 17, 25, etc.).
But this is not happening.
For example I have 16 bar clips in a set to 8 bar quantisation. I would expect the next row to launch half way if triggered in the first 8 bars, or after the end of the clip if launched in the second half of the clip.

I hope that makes sense, but could someone help me understand how it works because it is not as I thought it would.

I do understand what you're saying, but you're wrong.

If you launch a row, it starts that row from the beginning of the row regardless of when you launched it.

If you want a half-row, you have to create that half-row separately.

I must be misinterpreting what you're saying, because I think it works just like you say you expect it to work. After pressing a row launch button the row launches at the next possible multiple of X bars, whatever Launch Quantize is set to.



At least my Force works like that.

But it's worth noting that changing the Launch Quantize setting, or launching clips with 1 Bar quantization, does NOT change the logic, and it does NOT reset anything. The global bar:beat counter is not reset, and that's the only thing the clip launching cares about.



You can see the global time position in the Arrangement. EDIT: not necessarily. At least not if the arrangement loop is very short.

If you want to have parts with 1, 2 or 3-bar structures in between parts with 4-bar structures, this cannot be done, because the song position counter is not reset.

The part that's wrong is the "I would expect the next row to launch half way if triggered in the first 8 bars" bit.

Rows don't launch half-way through. They launch de novo every time (well, give or take factors like the AB slider).

If the clip is 16 bars and launch quantize is 8 bars, and a row is launched during bars 1-8, then the launch will happen exactly halfway through the clip, just like the OP says. Or after the end of the clip if launched in the second half of the clip, exactly like the OP says.

Everything is exactly right, except that the OP may think that the bar counter is sometimes reset - it's not, it's global. The launch counter is not relative to the clip's start time, but to the global time that's seen in the arrangement.

Dang. I just checked it, and the arrangement's playhead position does not necessarily show where the global counter is going. I set the arrangement to a 1-bar loop and global launch quantize to 8 bars. Weird things happen. It seemed unpredictable, I couldn't figure out when the row will actually launch. Maybe then it's relative to when I press row launch?

It does come from the arrangement playhead position. For extra weird launch quantization, try setting an arrangement loop length that's not divisible by 4, and see how launch quantization of 4 bars works now.



With the arrangement looping bars 2-16, you get your row launches at bars 2, 5, 9 and 13 of the arrangement playhead. Regardless of where the playhead is in any of your clips.

So there. Force Launch Quantization demystified. That's how it works, whether you like it or not.

For best results, make sure your arrangement loop starts from bar 1, and has a length that's a multiple of 8 bars.

Akai needs to give us more Launch/Clip options like:

-Scence Playlists=Set the scenes order & how many times each will repeat. Basically MPC song mode kinda thing. Having multiple Playlist all with their own automation would be insane, but I guess we would more than 1 arranger like the hacked OS.

-Longest Clip=Plays the longest clip before changing to the next row you selected.

-Launch & Stop=Plays a row once & stops the sequence. Even better if we could program it to stop for set amount of bars & then it launches again or plays the next row you selected. So, Launch Stop & Play.

-Have the Launch Quantization be set to any amount of bars or at least more than 8.

Any other suggestions?

IMO, feature suggestions are quite pointless. Concentrate on what you can do with the product you have, right now.

I'm wondering if it's possible to reset the arrangement playhead position from outside with the Force as MTC slave. This could provide some kind of a means to have understandable and predictable launch quantization of longer than 1 bar. When there's a song part with a shorter length, an external MTC clock could decide when it lets the Force hit a launch spot. Or maybe not.

The suggestions was really to keep things interesting on this dead ass page. But you never know who's reading this dead ass page. The Mockba hackers might take one of these ideas & run with.

Are you part of their discord?

MTC sync can indeed be used for resetting the arrangement playhead to bar 1, and thus reset launch quantization. But how to do that in a useful way in musical sync, is a different question. The Force doesn't seem to react to Song Position Pointer, so can't do it with MIDI Clock. With Ableton Link maybe? Hacks and workarounds.

I think it's best to just use 1-bar launch quantization, and not bother with anything else.

HouseWithoutMouse wrote:MTC sync can indeed be used for resetting the arrangement playhead to bar 1, and thus reset launch quantization. But how to do that in a useful way in musical sync, is a different question. The Force doesn't seem to react to Song Position Pointer, so can't do it with MIDI Clock. With Ableton Link maybe? Hacks and workarounds.

I think it's best to just use 1-bar launch quantization, and not bother with anything else.

I currently mainly so use 1-bar launch quantization, but I still want those other options I suggested, but let the hackers & Akai deal with that, but money is on the hackers, sorry Akai. Hope they got something major coming out this year. They should hire you & few other on here. I like that you be testing shit & making graphs all scientifical and everything. I know your beats must be insane!

Koekepan wrote:I do understand what you're saying, but you're wrong.

If you launch a row, it starts that row from the beginning of the row regardless of when you launched it.

If you want a half-row, you have to create that half-row separately.

I don't want a half row, sorry if I wasn't clear.

Koekepan wrote:The part that's wrong is the "I would expect the next row to launch half way if triggered in the first 8 bars" bit.

Rows don't launch half-way through. They launch de novo every time (well, give or take factors like the AB slider).

I meant the row changes to the new one halfway through the playing one, not that i want to launch a row that starts half way through.

HouseWithoutMouse wrote:I must be misinterpreting what you're saying, because I think it works just like you say you expect it to work. After pressing a row launch button the row launches at the next possible multiple of X bars, whatever Launch Quantize is set to.



At least my Force works like that.

But it's worth noting that changing the Launch Quantize setting, or launching clips with 1 Bar quantization, does NOT change the logic, and it does NOT reset anything. The global bar:beat counter is not reset, and that's the only thing the clip launching cares about.



You can see the global time position in the Arrangement. EDIT: not necessarily. At least not if the arrangement loop is very short.

If you want to have parts with 1, 2 or 3-bar structures in between parts with 4-bar structures, this cannot be done, because the song position counter is not reset.

I haven't even looked at the arrangement screen yet, I have only just got the Force and was trying to create a set in launch in mode.
You seem to confirm what I was expecting to happen though.

But what I was experiencing was that with quantisation set to 8 bars, if I triggered the next row around 10 or 11 bars in to a 16 bar clip (all clips created as 16 bars) it would restart the same row after the end of the clips and then changeto the new row a couple of bars in.

I have not had a chance to try again yet but will report back if I can understand further what is happening.