Please show which notes are in the active scale on the piano roll
Just been editing in the piano roll on an instrument which had the keyboard set to A Dorian, moving notes up and down to make a variation on a pattern, and repeatedly had two issues:
1. I kept accidentally choosing a note which is not in A Dorian, and
2. I couldn't easily find what I'd done wrong (which note was out of scale)
I suggest, when a track has the keyboard set to a key (scale) that the keys on the left are colour coded to show:
1. the root note, and
2. the notes within the scale.
An option, to be consistent with the UI for example, would be to have the notes not within the scale left as white/grey, and the notes within the scale tinted (semi translucent?) with the track colour... Have the root note tinted much more strongly than the other notes, so it's easy to see perhaps.
Where there is no scale, just leave them all white/grey as is (since you can't tell whether the user is using a scale at all).
I suspect this is relatively easy to implement, so I guess the only questions would be:
1. is there demand for this? Especially from new customers, perhaps making a step from a sequencer like Figure or Modstep to a DAW? and
2. are there better ways to get the same result, without getting too fancy?
Thoughts?
Comments
What happens when you want to modulate to a different mode?
this is definitely on todo list...
I suppose you change the scale and the highlights move. I like this idea better than hiding notes outside the scale.
in gadget it is implemented in way that directly in piano roll you can switch bettween 3 views just by tapping on button which cycles between 3 modes:
"scale off" - you see all notes but still if scale is active, notes out of scale are grey
"scale on" - all non- scale notes are hidden
"in use" - just used notes are shown (this os particularly handy for editing drums)
The way Gadget had the scales set up in the piano roll is perfect imo. I would love to see this implemented in NS2. I do imagine this would take quite a bit of effort to implement though.
A feature like this makes it so much easier to improvise when drawing in notes and is definitely in the top 3 of my personal wishlist.
I would love to have this sort of scale display as well - it would make editing so much easier, especially on the iPhone
@rcarmo good point - options which make better use of screen real estate are well worth considering, so @dendy your post with the three options makes good sense.
I agree, I really miss that feature (coming from Caustic).
The workaround I found is to record a short clip while I swipe a finger along the keyboard.
Then I merge that clip with the one I want to work on, and shorten the result to match the original clip.
The new notes are never played as they're out of the clip range, but I can use them as reference.
Usually I have to duplicate them to span multiple octaves.
A bit tedious, but works.
Having some visual cues instead would be fantastic.
The way Caustic works is to hide the notes that are out of scale within the clip editor. But that's a problem for inserting some out of keys notes, which involves other kind of workarounds (recording the note by playing it, then going back into the clip editor, the row now being visible but highlighted red).
The 3 views solution proposed by @dendy seems perfect.
This is one of the 3 features I miss in NS:
That said, I'm in such absolute love with NS. Can't live without it
+1 on that
A Gadget-like implementation would be very useful to me.