Blender MIDI control?

[ysvry]

yes great ideer , would also be nice to be able to load midi files and have them control actions to easily get riggs dance for instance to have some fun in between work ;). or make screensavers with the game engine.

[Joat]

Midi is not only for playing tunes with whimpy sounds (GM midifiles). It is also the standard used to send controller data from a controller to something that needs to be controlled. For me as an experienced midi user, and having invested on three separate boxes with a lot of knobs and faders to tweak things when making music, it makes a lot of sense to suggest midicontrollers as input sources for Blender. Here's why:

1. Midi is open stadard, and can easily be utilized for the purpose
2. There is a lot of different options as input devices. Cheapest ones start at 20€
3. Moving a slider or tweaking a knob would be a really cool way of recording IPO curves
4. There is a lot more than IPO's to be controlled that way in Blender. Imagine a zoom on a slider on your other hand, and a mouse to tweak stuff on the other. Or rotate on a knob, for that matter
5. As midi is pretty much a standard in computer music, there is a lot of Blender users out there who have the equipment already
6. With midi controllers it would be possible to tweak more than one parameter at a time
7. Parameter data could be saved as a midi file and sent, saved or re-used easily on different machines
8. There is already some motion-to-midi devices and applications available. And they are a lot cheaper (and far more rudimentary, but hey!) than mocap gear
9. You could trig events by pushing a button
10. Moving faders and blinking lights just make your desktop look a lot cooler. =)

Ten reasons, but just a tip of the iceberg. The possibilities would be nearly endless. And the implementation should not be a biggie for someone who has python experience.

Is there something I'm missing or is the whole concept unfamiliar to everyone? If so, google "midi controller", see the images and read the specs. Then imagine what it could do to your workflow to have that on hand when making those IPO curves.

[ysvry]

yes great ideer as i said before, still would also be nice to be able to load midi files and have them control actions to easily get riggs dance for instance .
I own a keyboard and a serial to midi and usb to midi interface so I know what you talk about. Problem I see is bandwith. Whenever I use it i have irritaing lattency between pressing a key and hearing the note. I would ask for usb directx or similar standard controll input instead. (I like playing those midi files too depends on your soundcard and soundlibs how corny they sound main advantage is file size so I say include midi files in blender too.

[LetterRip]

midi control has been discussed before, it just hasn't been implemented by anyone.

LetterRip

[Joat]

ysvry: The problem you describe is not a problem of midi (or you have a seriously messed up system), but more likely a latency issue of your soundcard. Altough midi is relatively slow when compared to modern data transfer rates, it is still more than adequate for the job it is designed to do. Even very old computers can handle large amounts of midi data without noticeable latency or inaccuracy. If there is problems, it is usually due to trying to put too much data through one cable. And USB midi effectively removes this problem alltogether, since the transfer rate can be 10 times as high as on a traditional cable.

If you play VST-instrument, Reason synth or any other form of program that uses computer to actually produce the sound, you get latency.
This is because a computer has to produce the sound according to data you send it. VST - instrument starts producing it straight away when it gets the note on message via midi. But the calculations still have to be made for the sound, all the effects in sequencer program and, most vitally, the result needs to be sent to soundcard which converts the incoming data stream to hearable audio.
Usually the conversion process from system level stream to audio in soundcard is the reason for the latency.
This is also why it is recommended to use ASIO drivers when possible. They are much more efficient than DirectX / MMS -drivers provided by windows.
The latency would not be an issue with Blender midi implementation, since all it has to do is take the incoming controller data and record it.

LetterRip: If I could be of any help in this, I would be glad to. I think that as a start we would need just a simple Python script that listens to incoming midi port, and has the ability to map things to things in Blender.
There could be "Midi learn" as a menu item in IPO curve editor for every IPO curve. So one could just go to IPO editor, select a curve to manipulate, press learn and tweak the knob used for manipulation. That would be it.

I don't know how difficult this would be to add in existing IPO curve editor code. And in fact, I don't know if we even can record IPO's on real time now.
But it definitely would add some intresting new possibilities.

[LetterRip]

There is an ancient blendedmidi script somewhere, don't recall exactly what it does or what its intended use was but did what you described.

LetterRip

[Room335]

try searching BlenderArtist.org for midi importer.

I found this site http://perso.orange.fr/jb.perin/ see the scripts section

http://perso.orange.fr/jb.perin/Archive/midi_importer_v08.zip

http://perso.orange.fr/jb.perin/midi_importer/doc/midi_importer.html

[daslicht]

try searching BlenderArtist.org for midi importer.

I found this site http://perso.orange.fr/jb.perin/ see the scripts section

http://perso.orange.fr/jb.perin/Archive/midi_importer_v08.zip

http://perso.orange.fr/jb.perin/midi_importer/doc/midi_importer.html

Anyone got a real-time solution ?, those links are only fro importing a midi file.

cheers
dl

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