January 2004 - Doggiebox - lists.zygoat.ca

1.1 pre-release (1B1)
by Ben Kennedy 03 Feb '04

03 Feb '04

Hi all, I figured it's about time to let you get your hands on what will become the next release of Doggiebox. Things are still evolving, but a bunch of the under-the-hood reworking which was holding things up is now at the point where things are usable again. Here are the notes: • Mac OS X 10.2.x is now required, and 10.3.x is recommended. • The file format for both .dbsong and .dbkit has changed since 1.0.x. Files saved in this and later versions of Doggiebox will NOT be usable by Doggiebox 1.0.x. (However, the new file format has been devised to afford greater backward-compatibility from this point on.) • A much-awaited, new and improved section-and-layout song structuring model makes its debut. Hopefully its behaviour is (or will become) fairly self-explanatory, so no extensive notes are provided this time around. See if you can figure it out, and please provide feedback. • The song editor window has been redesigned for better usability: a) the drum kit drawer has been moved into the main window and is much larger; b) the song name, details and kit are no longer accessed via a separate dialog sheet. • There are some minor bugs and incomplete features in this build which will be addressed shortly, including, but probably not limited to: a) inconsistent Undo behaviour for some actions; b) lack of ability to re- arrange song sections by dragging them in the lists. Grab it here: <http://www.doggiebox.com/beta/Doggiebox-1B1.zip> Please report any feedback, including bug reports, usability notes and improvement suggetions, either here to the list or directly to me. Have a good weekend all, -ben -- Ben Kennedy, chief magician zygoat creative technical services 613-228-3392 | 1-866-466-4628 http://www.zygoat.ca

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My $0.02 attempts
by Eric Bittner 19 Jan '04

19 Jan '04

Hi All, I, too experimented with GarageBand over the weekend. It's way cool and more or less for what I've been looking for quite a while (without breaking the bank). The guitar parts are mostly real instruments (me). The rest is sampled or composed. I posted some mp3s. I did not use doggiebox for the drums. Although, I think I like G-Band's editor somewhat less than D-Box's in terms of control over individual voices for the drum parts. I do like G-Band for editing instrumental sequences and writing parts. What I posted was more or less my attempts to figure out how to use the program in various scenarios. The URL is http://k2.chem.uh.edu/bittner/Tunes/index.html.en Since I'm not a drummer and couldn't write a good drum score to save my life, the sampled sequences provided a good baseline for adding fills, crashes, etc. In the "12-bar-blues", I put crashes and hi-hats in time with the organ/guitar/horn riffs and to give some demarcation of chord changes. For longer pieces, more memory is certainly order. Editing multiple stanzas of "12-bar-blues" caused considerable slow downs every time I wanted to move a sequence or edit a note or two. Cheers! Eric -- Prof. Eric R. Bittner Department of Chemistry Univ. of Houston ph: 713-743-2775 fax: 713-743-2709 bittner(a)uh.edu http://k2.chem.uh.edu/bittner/ ----------------------------------- Please support the 2003 MS150 bike tour from Houston to Austin to raise funds to combat the devastating effects of Multiple Sclerosis. http://www.ms150.org/ms150/donate/donate.cfm?id=13897

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Re: [Doggiebox] Re: GarageBand...
by John Stewart 19 Jan '04

19 Jan '04

Pat; This is a really interesting clip. I have 2 teenaged daughters, a purchased version of DoggieBox, and a couple of Macs about. My kids are really looking forward to GarageBand coming to our house. (so am i) I had three women "air guitaring" it while listening to your clip. Boy, was I embarrased. Usually that's my job :-) I purchased DoggieBox to put into Deck LE (almost purchased last week; delayed it because of DoggieBox) I presume it's easy to haul things like DoggieBox clips in? If you do, can you set "positions" indicating start of bars? (eg, can you skim along to bar 432?) Thanks; JohnS. > http://pat.net/funky1.mp3

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songs with the ns kit
by Sion Morris 19 Jan '04

19 Jan '04

Hello all Since adding the woodblock to the nskit, I've also put a tambourine and cowbell sound on as well. There's a new song called Xris using these sounds at: www.cinnamondesign.co.uk/music/music.html You can download the new kit and some others also as the db from the new improved site. The cowbell is a bit ropey to be honest as it was just found as an 8 bit sample on the net somewhere, so if anyone has a better one, I'd be grateful for a copy. The cowbell sound is one of the greatest of percussion sounds don't you think? Really like the song using the nskit, Bal - definitely the best there and doesn't seem to suffer much from being downsampled. Look forward to hearing more. > > I added two new songs. #8 is done with the nskit(woodb.): great drum. > comment is welcome. > > Bal. > www.thirdson.tk Cheers Sion

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drum sample downbeat alignment
by matt k. 19 Jan '04

19 Jan '04

Ben et al.: I have a question regarding the drum sound samples with a downbeat that does not occur at the start of the sample -- such as the 'shaker egg' that comes with Ben's Premier Kit. While trying it out recently I noticed a small rhythmic problem. To compensate for the fact that the downbeat occurs midway through the sample, I had to start the shaker egg a 16th earlier than I would have expected. Even though this worked, it was a pain in the ass. 8-) Therefore my question is: would it be feasible to add an 'offset' control to the drum kit editor? It could control the time before/after the downbeat that the sample would start. This would enable the user to have full control over where in the specific sample the downbeat is. Just a thought. Anyway, happy holidays to those who have them! mjk

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Re: Re: [Doggiebox] Re: GarageBand...
by mcarlyle＠charter.net 19 Jan '04

19 Jan '04

(You'll Deck split)--- this should have read "You'll see Deck split... Sorry if it caused confusion. Even sorrier if this attempt to clarify it causes even more confusion. > > From: mcarlyle(a)charter.net > Date: 2004/01/19 Mon AM 11:20:28 EST > To: John Stewart <freewrl-1(a)rogers.com>, pat(a)pat.net > CC: "Doggiebox List$s$" <doggiebox(a)lists.zygoat.ca> > Subject: Re: Re: [Doggiebox] Re: GarageBand... > > John, > Although your message seems directed to Pat, it made it to the list, which gives me a chance to chime in. > >( The way the full version of Deck works, you need to "add audio to library". That's a menu command that I'm sure you'll find. > > You'll find and select a wav file which you've already exported from Doggiebox. You'll Deck split the file into left and right channels and land in the library. > > >From the library window, you'll drag first the left, then the right channel files into the track editor. For whatever reason, Deck does not permit a track to hold a single, stereo file. > > You can then drag the drum tracks around and line them up with other tracks in your composition. You can also numerically position them, which is great for when additional precision is required. > > Hope this helps. > > > > From: John Stewart <freewrl-1(a)rogers.com> > > Date: 2004/01/19 Mon AM 11:12:55 EST > > To: pat(a)pat.net > > CC: "Doggiebox List$s$" <doggiebox(a)lists.zygoat.ca> > > Subject: Re: [Doggiebox] Re: GarageBand... > > > > Pat; > > > > This is a really interesting clip. I have 2 teenaged > > daughters, a purchased version of DoggieBox, and a couple > > of Macs about. > > > > My kids are really looking forward to GarageBand coming > > to our house. (so am i) > > > > I had three women "air guitaring" it while listening to > > your clip. Boy, was I embarrased. Usually that's my job :-) > > > > I purchased DoggieBox to put into Deck LE (almost purchased > > last week; delayed it because of DoggieBox) > > > > I presume it's easy to haul things like DoggieBox clips > > in? If you do, can you set "positions" indicating start > > of bars? (eg, can you skim along to bar 432?) > > > > Thanks; JohnS. > > > > > > > http://pat.net/funky1.mp3 > > > > > > ------------------------------------------------------------------------- > > Zygoat Doggiebox discussion list - <http://www.doggiebox.com> > > To unsubscribe, view archives or change your options: > > <http://lists.zygoat.ca/mailman/listinfo/doggiebox> > > > > ------------------------------------------------------------------------- > Zygoat Doggiebox discussion list - <http://www.doggiebox.com> > To unsubscribe, view archives or change your options: > <http://lists.zygoat.ca/mailman/listinfo/doggiebox> >

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Re: Re: [Doggiebox] Re: GarageBand...
by mcarlyle＠charter.net 19 Jan '04

19 Jan '04

John, Although your message seems directed to Pat, it made it to the list, which gives me a chance to chime in. The way the full version of Deck works, you need to "add audio to library". That's a menu command that I'm sure you'll find. You'll find and select a wav file which you've already exported from Doggiebox. You'll Deck split the file into left and right channels and land in the library. >From the library window, you'll drag first the left, then the right channel files into the track editor. For whatever reason, Deck does not permit a track to hold a single, stereo file. You can then drag the drum tracks around and line them up with other tracks in your composition. You can also numerically position them, which is great for when additional precision is required. Hope this helps. > > From: John Stewart <freewrl-1(a)rogers.com> > Date: 2004/01/19 Mon AM 11:12:55 EST > To: pat(a)pat.net > CC: "Doggiebox List$s$" <doggiebox(a)lists.zygoat.ca> > Subject: Re: [Doggiebox] Re: GarageBand... > > Pat; > > This is a really interesting clip. I have 2 teenaged > daughters, a purchased version of DoggieBox, and a couple > of Macs about. > > My kids are really looking forward to GarageBand coming > to our house. (so am i) > > I had three women "air guitaring" it while listening to > your clip. Boy, was I embarrased. Usually that's my job :-) > > I purchased DoggieBox to put into Deck LE (almost purchased > last week; delayed it because of DoggieBox) > > I presume it's easy to haul things like DoggieBox clips > in? If you do, can you set "positions" indicating start > of bars? (eg, can you skim along to bar 432?) > > Thanks; JohnS. > > > > http://pat.net/funky1.mp3 > > > ------------------------------------------------------------------------- > Zygoat Doggiebox discussion list - <http://www.doggiebox.com> > To unsubscribe, view archives or change your options: > <http://lists.zygoat.ca/mailman/listinfo/doggiebox> >

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Re: GarageBand...
by Pat 18 Jan '04

18 Jan '04

I don't want to pull the list off topic, but I've had a chance to play with GarageBand today. It doesn't include a sequencer of any kind, so it's not really competing with DoggieBox for the drums, but does have tons of loops that you can layer and arrange... I'm new to this loop thing... and I have to say it's the most fun I've had in a long time. Here is my first hack... I think it's hillarious... http://pat.net/funky1.mp3 Pat Niemeyer

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Did you know there was a "drum machine museum"?
by Michael Carlyle 13 Jan '04

13 Jan '04

I came across this site http://www.drummachine.com/ Not sure what to make of it, but somewhere within are downloadable samples of noises from what are now ancient units.

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Re: Re: [Doggiebox] Playing along with DoggieBox.
by John Stewart 12 Jan '04

12 Jan '04

Ok, my results so far with playing along with DoggieBox. Powerbook G4, Griffin PowerWave, Fender MIM P Bass. This powerwave has switches for mic/line level, and hardware passthrough. It can be powered by the USB cable, and through it's own adapter. - With the powerwave plugged in, bass into mic input, real cheap headphones (free from an airline), hardware passthrough switched on, the output level was very low. I purchased a set of Seinhieser (sp?) headphones, and now level is great. line/mic set at line level. This is with running *no* applications. - There is a lot of noise, dependent on what is running on the laptop. My powerwave adapter is packed right now; maybe running on external power would clear this up. - running with doggiebox. Absolutely no problem. Adjust bass level with volume control on bass; doggiebox with any standard mac volume control. - running with SoundStudio, software loopback, gave a neat delay. If I ran with this app, with BOTH software and hardware loopback enabled, I got a really neat slap back echo. ;-) So, other than the noise issue, which *hopefully* can get cleared up quickly once I unpack my power adapter, this box looks ok. JohnS. > >Has anyone tried on of these iMics? Maybe I am using bad microphones (two > >different ones) but I can't get a decent recording. My PowerBook's built > >in mic give me a stronger signal than the iMic. > > > >I'd love to hear other's experiences with the iMic. > > I've had crappy experiences with my iMic lately. Well, I haven't really > used it since I got my 828mk2, but it had always been hit-and-miss. I > think there's something wrong with USB audio drivers under 10.2 and later. > > One thing I *was* using it for lately was recording messages off my > voicemail, using a $20 adapter from radioshack. I returned the adapter > once and was about to do it again when it seemingly didn't work (loud > ground hum noise when I had it connected). I discovered that this hum > went away when I recorded to my iBook running on battery. When connected > to my G4, or to the iBook plugged into the wall, behaviour was > spectacularly awful. Clearly some kind of electrical issue that the iMic > did not isolate. > > -ben > > -- > Ben Kennedy, chief magician > zygoat creative technical services > 613-228-3392 | 1-866-466-4628 > http://www.zygoat.ca > > > ------------------------------------------------------------------------- > Zygoat Doggiebox discussion list - <http://www.doggiebox.com> > To unsubscribe, view archives or change your options: > <http://lists.zygoat.ca/mailman/listinfo/doggiebox> >

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