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FamiTracker
I decided to start using famitracker. I have found that when using famitracker, the time I take writing a song has decreased (as opposed to the time writing MML in ppmck). Thank you jsr! I taped pieces of paper to my keyboard with all the notes, and I'm getting used to it. It's nice to not have to play around on the keyboard or guitar and then type all the notes in...I can just start playing right into famitracker!
At first, the sound was very choppy and the application ran slowly, but I found that it runs very smoothly when I change it to 8-bit instead of 16-bit, and lower the frequency. I guess my computer is slow. So if you're having problems with that, try changing the sound settings.
One thing that is hard getting used to is that I frequently use 32nd notes and triplets. Is there any other way to use these notes excessively without doubling/tripling the tempo?
Is there a way, or could a way be added, to export FamiTracker files as MML or some similar format that allows fine control for things like triplets, 32nd notes, etc? That way the song could be input and edited in FT and then fine-tuned manually only where you need the finer level of control.
If you want the entire tune like that, why can't you just increase the tempo from the beginning? Of course it'd be nice to have a "stretch" option if you do need that, which doubles the tempo but also doubles the distance between already-plotted notes.
Hi tadpole and thanks.
What kind of computer are you using? I tried it on an old 200 MHz Pentium, and was possible to use if I lowered the frequency and increased the buffer size. But I think the window drawing routines is somewhat related as it's very unoptimized right now.
I guess I should write some minimum/recommended system requirements somewhere.
MML file export would be possible to a certain degree, the instruments are made up of MML-like strings for example, but there's other things like automatic portamento that won't work (as I'm aware of).
I don't know of an easy way to do odd length notes. If someone knows any tracker that handles it in a good way then just tell me.
I can't remember the exact stats of my computer...I bought it in 2001 or 2002, it's Athalon 1.5 Gig or so... it's not that old of a computer, seems to run most things just fine. I'm not really a computer person, though. That's why I'm happy that there are people like you and the others who use their technical knowledge and hard work in order to bring such a wonderful gift to us NES musicians.
Today I was writing a song that had a "rap" style beat in famitracker. I got it to sound "swingy" by using the "G" command which delays the note by how many frames you specify. That seemed to work.
That computer should work without problems in full quality if you just increase the sound buffer a bit. I'm not sure why, but some sound cards and drivers are a little picky about the buffer size.
Okay, so! Triplets, tuplets and etc. I might be covering some old ground here, but hear me out. Current methods:
1) So far the only reasonable way I've seen for simulating other rhythms is by changing the speed setting to F05 (for quintuplets) and F04 (for triplets) from the default of F06. This does work well, but doesn't allow for a great amount of control, as you have to mess with the amount of rows in each pattern that uses the technique - you have to add or take some lines away if you want to stay in the same time signature (of sorts). Plus, it's not track-specific (and certainly shouldn't be), so you can't have triplets happening on one line with straight rhythms happening on another. It's basically just manipulating tempo to simulate triplets rather than actually using triplets... which DOES have its own uses, but it's not ideal.
2) Another method is using some crafty envelope shaping on an instrument to simulate a series of on/offs in a non-straightnote pattern... though of course this can either work perfectly or not at all depending on what tempo you're working in. It's fiddly and doesn't make a lot of sense anyway, since your melodies would have to be written as part of the instrument... more trouble than it's worth IMO.
3) Finally, you can add a tonne of frames as the default for each pattern (maybe 256 even), whack the song speed up to something like F03 (and maybe increase the tempo too), then space your notes out to compensate, so that you can include smaller note divisions. Working this way would get incredibly confusing though, I think... though it does solve the problem of not being able to have simultaneous triplets and straight notes. Still, I'd never use it, it seems very masochistic.
I do have an idea though - maybe you could incorporate a solid-state gridsize setting. Say, you select over a number of rows on a particular channel, then on an option/menu somewhere you could change the grid size of that selected segment (say you selected four of them, you could change that to 6, 8, 12, 16, 24 etc (and not forgetting 5, 10, 20 etc for tuplet fans ). [url=http://lunar.shakal.net/temp/famitracker_triplets.gif]Here is a picture I've made to exemplify.
However, doing this raises some other issues:
1) Smaller divisions would not correlate with the hex numbering system on the rows. Whether this is a problem, I'm not sure, I can't think of any big problems it'd cause. Maybe I'm forgetting something though. I do know that triplets would only correlate on the first and fourth notes (seen on the screenshot as row 00 and row 02), double time ( "8" ) would only correlate on the first, third, fifth and seventh notes, and quintuplets wouldn't correlate at all aside from the initial first note. Perhaps row specific events/effects (like tempo changes, frame skips, etc) would have to be disabled from use on notes that don't line up properly. Either that or just let the odd divisions use those effects anyway, at the expense of user-friendliness, and let anyone who wants to end up with funky crap happening take advantage of it.
2) You'd also have to incorporate some functionality so that you could zoom into the more closely distanced notes - to make the page stretch vertically. As you can see on the screenshot it's a little fiddly, so it doesn't bear thinking about having to work with anything smaller without having some way to make the view longer vertically.
3) Another issue to consider... I chose a very convenient number of four rows in this demonstration - how would the tracker respond if you changed the gridsize when you selected 5 or 7 rows? Something to consider.
I have no history with trackers so I'm not sure how much weight this holds or what golden rules of trackers this would break (aside from the aforementioned hex disregarding), but it seems a reasonable way of implementing other rhythms. While it might not be perfect, it'd definitely be usable, I think. Thoughts?!
Thanks for the long post. Something like that has already been suggested actually, but has been put on the back burner as more prioritized things had to be fixed first (it would require some complicated changes in both the tracker and the NSF player code).
But I'll look on it and try to do something later!
There are three good ways of using triplets as far as I know:
1- Changing the module speed to create certain sensation of "swing"
E.g.
F05
- -
F03
F04
F05
- -
F03
F04
etc.
2- Using the note delay (Gxx) and adjusting the effect parameter properly. This works specially in faster tempos.
3- A third option would be not using traditional "x4 measures". If you use measures of 24 rows (for a 4/4), you can easily define 12 triplets (one each two rows).
The bad thing about this is that you have to have in mind if you're going to use these type of things in the moment when you begin a module. It's really tiring having to rewrite all channels (beats, tempo, speed, effects, etc.) just for the fact that you need three triplets in a whole song.
In my opinion, adding strange options to the most basic tracking standards (as the gridsize setting) is not a good a idea. It's too complex and innecesary imho
). [url=http://lunar.shakal.net/temp/famitracker_triplets.gif]Here is a picture I've made to exemplify.