Roland Zenbeats by Roland Corporation (Auv3)

wim

@walkie said:
* Are there any big AU limitations I should be aware of? NS2 has pretty good support for AUs, but there are some annoying limitations, like no CCs sent to MIDI AUs and no channel info sent to any AUs. Anything similar for Zenbeats?

AU Midi plugins aren’t supported. They used to crash the app. Now they run, but don’t output any MIDI. No way that I know of to send automation to AU fx unless they have their own internal midi cc support, but you can record AU parameter automation that you create yourself.

ALB

@ALB said:
@Korakios thanks very much. so from what I gather, the workflows could be:
1)Start/play the song in the loop part and record to timeline part
2) use the loops part solely as a live instrument and forget about the timeline.
3) play solely in the timeline and forget about the loops.

Can you move any tracks of the timeline into the loop area?

Also, how does one move audio from AudioShare into the app itself? Was able to move wav files into SampleVerse, but unable to figure out how to move an audio file into the user library itself.

Thanks in advance. I went through the app tutorials, but did not see answers. Sorry for the long post...

Ok - I figured out the audio import from AudioShare part. That’s conquered for now!

Littlewoodg

@excesseye said:

@BiancaNeve said:
Nope I was wrong

For drum kits that you have on desktop, you can 'Save As' and they will appear in your user folder. You can the copy these files to your iOS Zenbeats user drum kits folder and they will be available. When you do a save as like this, the samples are included in the saved file.

Great tip thanks!

wim

@CF3 said:
That being said, I am having some issues. Navigating the file system is sort of a nightmare. I’m getting weirdness with the drop down box and its all white and very difficult to see. Then other times completely black. ?????? I’m not the kind of person who buys prepackaged soundsets, I have a MASSIVE custom library. So getting my own stuff in is extremely important.

What version of iOS? I haven’t had any of these issues on 12.3. I’ve read several reports of things that sound like what you’re describing with apps in iOS 13. Or, it could be, if you have a massive library that it’s running into iOS general lack of ability to deal with huge numbers of files.

You can copy things directly into the Zenbeats folders using the files app. You don’t necessarily have to do it through Zenbeats’ interface.

The import protocol needs to be simplified IMO.

Welcome to iOS where acceptable file management is the exception, not the rule. IPadOS may help improve things in time, but I wouldn’t hold my breath. Just gotta find ways to deal with it.

Also, Is there a way to have ZenBeats be the MIDI Clock master? I need to be able to slave external hardware for recording audio.

Does it even send midi clock? Not sure on that one. But in the Stagelight version, MIDI out was inoperable altogether. So, unless that’s been fixed (I haven’t tried yet), I assume it wouldn’t work anyway.

But, they implemented Link. So, if you have Audiobus, you can use it to bridge that gap. Audiobus can sync to Link and sends stable midi clock to anything your iPad can see. There are other apps like LinktoMidi that can do that too, but Audiobus is the best. (Zenbeats isn’t audiobus compatible, so it can’t be loaded into audiobus, but that doesn’t matter as long as background audio is enabled in both apps.

wim

@ALB said:
I am finding this more usable, possibly just because I changed its skin to something that I like more. One basic question: In the song, there is the clip view and the more linear track view, but they don’t have any interaction that I can see. It seems that you can really have two different songs going per song. What is the rationale behind this and what are possible use cases for this? Can you paste from one view into the other? I am finding this to be a head scratcher...

In addition to recording a performance in the clip view to the timeline, you can copy and paste patterns between the two views. I use the clip view for composing and for quickly trying out combinations of patterns, and the timeline for song structure. I like having the two coexist independently.

walkie

@Korakios said:
@walkie you can resize the interface in the settings . If you can’t find it post back. Check the bugs I mentioned in previous page for midi and AU . As for Linux it used to work via wine (not native) , but with no multitouch support (wine limitation)

Resizing the interface seems to just scale the size of the elements within the same space. It doesn't stretch it to fill the entire screen (i.e. there is still a thick black border around the edges that doesn't go away by changing the scaling).

Good to know it worked with wine, but a native Linux version would still be cool.

@wim said:

@walkie said:
* Are there any big AU limitations I should be aware of? NS2 has pretty good support for AUs, but there are some annoying limitations, like no CCs sent to MIDI AUs and no channel info sent to any AUs. Anything similar for Zenbeats?

AU Midi plugins aren’t supported. They used to crash the app. Now they run, but don’t output any MIDI. No way that I know of to send automation to AU fx unless they have their own internal midi cc support, but you can record AU parameter automation that you create yourself.

Ah, that's too bad... that might be a deal-breaker for me.

I've been eying Cubasis 2 as well since it seems to have very good AU support + audio, but I liked the clip-launching aspect of Zenbeats and that I could give it a trial run in the free version.

Really appreciate the responses--thanks to both of you!

ALB

@wim said:

@ALB said:
I am finding this more usable, possibly just because I changed its skin to something that I like more. One basic question: In the song, there is the clip view and the more linear track view, but they don’t have any interaction that I can see. It seems that you can really have two different songs going per song. What is the rationale behind this and what are possible use cases for this? Can you paste from one view into the other? I am finding this to be a head scratcher...

In addition to recording a performance in the clip view to the timeline, you can copy and paste patterns between the two views. I use the clip view for composing and for quickly trying out combinations of patterns, and the timeline for song structure. I like having the two coexist independently.

Very helpful - thanks! Getting the hang of this now - I haven’t used it for a long time.

realdawei

Changed window scale factor to 72% and now Zenbeats is my favorite daw GUI. Hope they can fix the aufx crackling issue soon

CF3

@wim said:

@CF3 said:
That being said, I am having some issues. Navigating the file system is sort of a nightmare. I’m getting weirdness with the drop down box and its all white and very difficult to see. Then other times completely black. ?????? I’m not the kind of person who buys prepackaged soundsets, I have a MASSIVE custom library. So getting my own stuff in is extremely important.

What version of iOS? I haven’t had any of these issues on 12.3. I’ve read several reports of things that sound like what you’re describing with apps in iOS 13. Or, it could be, if you have a massive library that it’s running into iOS general lack of ability to deal with huge numbers of files.

You can copy things directly into the Zenbeats folders using the files app. You don’t necessarily have to do it through Zenbeats’ interface.

The import protocol needs to be simplified IMO.

Welcome to iOS where acceptable file management is the exception, not the rule. IPadOS may help improve things in time, but I wouldn’t hold my breath. Just gotta find ways to deal with it.

Also, Is there a way to have ZenBeats be the MIDI Clock master? I need to be able to slave external hardware for recording audio.

Does it even send midi clock? Not sure on that one. But in the Stagelight version, MIDI out was inoperable altogether. So, unless that’s been fixed (I haven’t tried yet), I assume it wouldn’t work anyway.

But, they implemented Link. So, if you have Audiobus, you can use it to bridge that gap. Audiobus can sync to Link and sends stable midi clock to anything your iPad can see. There are other apps like LinktoMidi that can do that too, but Audiobus is the best. (Zenbeats isn’t audiobus compatible, so it can’t be loaded into audiobus, but that doesn’t matter as long as background audio is enabled in both apps.

Yeah, I’m aware of the workarounds as far as Link goes, but any aspiring DAW should support basic MIDI protocols. This isn’t a ZenBeats (StageLight) specific problem. Almost EVERY SINGLE iOS daw has some sort of weird MIDI problems. It’s really uncanny. I’m not a noob. I have decades of experience with all manner of music production and engineering. It’s so strange to me that people think that their app will not interface with the outside world. You can sync ZenBeats to an outside Midi Clock (and it works!), BUT... I doesn’t wait for the clock to start RECORDING. No bueno. (unless I’m doing it wrong, then by all means.... enlighten me)

Guess my quest for an iOS DAW continues. Will be watching ZenBeats. I really like the workflow and interface... But there’s certain features that are nonnegotiable. I work in a hybrid way with all kinds of hardware and software. Everything needs to easily talk to each other. I desperately want to ditch my computer and go 100% ipad as far recording goes. I’d pay full DAW prices for an app that would let me do it. sigh. I dream of the day Ableton or Bitwig release an iOS version.

Cheers

McD

OT: I went deep behind the Roland "pay wall"and downloaded the bulk of the Roland Cloud to my Mac.

When I start StageLight and ZenBeats on the Mac neither app sees the Roland AU/VST plug-ins that Logic Pro and MainStage can see. StageLight and ZenBeats list every other AU vendor's products in my list of 20+ vendors. Weird. Roland site specs for the plug-ins show AU version 2. I think Mac's are still on Version 2.

Any clues?

mojozart

@McD did you add their paths to settings / plugins?

I couldn't get Zenbeats to find Melodyne, btw

McD

@mojozart said:
@McD did you add their paths to settings / plugins?

Bingo! Settings -> Plug-Ins -> Scan for new button
All the Roland synths and the Concerto Sampler are visible as external plug-ins now

I couldn't get Zenbeats to find Melodyne, btw

I'm hoping some of the Roland synth assets make their way into the ZenBeats store
for cross-platform projects to use the same sound sources.

I'm not a beat-maker style musician o I just want quality sound sources to play from a
keyboard or with generator apps.

A have a boatload of Roland Assets (in a 30-day trial mode) but I could see the value of
a $20/month subscription. Possibly using the subscription in burst and dropping out. I do that with a lot of video streaming channels. Pop-in and survey the assets (binge the good stuff) and then drop out. No long term commitments.

rs2000

@CF3 said:
Yeah, I’m aware of the workarounds as far as Link goes, but any aspiring DAW should support basic MIDI protocols. This isn’t a ZenBeats (StageLight) specific problem. Almost EVERY SINGLE iOS daw has some sort of weird MIDI problems. It’s really uncanny. I’m not a noob. I have decades of experience with all manner of music production and engineering. It’s so strange to me that people think that their app will not interface with the outside world. You can sync ZenBeats to an outside Midi Clock (and it works!), BUT... I doesn’t wait for the clock to start RECORDING. No bueno. (unless I’m doing it wrong, then by all means.... enlighten me)

It has been like this for ages and it seems that indeed most developers don't consider connecting an iPad to hardware gear a common use case.
Which has somewhat forced me to stick with Gadget, Groove Rider and Genome MIDI when working with hardware. Those Link <> MIDI clock converters are fiddly and they cannot start immediately because LINK simply has not been designed to.

Guess my quest for an iOS DAW continues. Will be watching ZenBeats. I really like the workflow and interface... But there’s certain features that are nonnegotiable. I work in a hybrid way with all kinds of hardware and software. Everything needs to easily talk to each other. I desperately want to ditch my computer and go 100% ipad as far recording goes. I’d pay full DAW prices for an app that would let me do it. sigh. I dream of the day Ableton or Bitwig release an iOS version.

People say that Bitwig runs well on a Windows tablet.
If you insist on using the iPad, you'll certainly have to embrace its limitations for quite a while to come.

hellquist

@ZenLizard said:
@MatthewAtStagelight, are you aware of an issue where upon reopening a saved song, drum sounds are absent on play even though the sequencer midi is still there? Have to go reload the kit (or any kit) and sound is restored.

I’ll go put in a ticket if that hasn’t already been reported.

@MatthewAtZenbeats

I too have noticed inconsistencies like this, and have had that exact thing happening to me too.

The last one was both different and kind of critical for the project I was in though; I had done a record to timeline from clips, and I had then rendered out the midi of my AUv3 instruments into audio, so I could turn off the AU's (dramatically lowered the CPU usage, of course). It has been working fine for a couple of days, and I had started adding more tracks, now on the timeline for other instruments (Beathawk) and using the audio channels as my reference. Today when I opened the project all the actual audio in the audio channels were gone though. The "placeholders" for audio were still there, but they contained absolutely nothing, unless emptiness counts.

Now it was only for my "test tune" (which I created a video for the other day, posted at the end of this post), but I had started fleshing it out as I was thinking there was an embryo of a proper tune in there. Now I'm not sure I dare repeating the process of taking myself to the same point I was at 2 days ago, so I can continue fleshing it out, in Zenbeats, or if I simply should just recreate it in Auria or something instead. It is that uncertainty that you guys need to chip away at I guess.

ZenLizard

@hellquist said:

@ZenLizard said:
@MatthewAtStagelight, are you aware of an issue where upon reopening a saved song, drum sounds are absent on play even though the sequencer midi is still there? Have to go reload the kit (or any kit) and sound is restored.

I’ll go put in a ticket if that hasn’t already been reported.

@MatthewAtZenbeats

I too have noticed inconsistencies like this, and have had that exact thing happening to me too.

The last one was both different and kind of critical for the project I was in though; I had done a record to timeline from clips, and I had then rendered out the midi of my AUv3 instruments into audio, so I could turn off the AU's (dramatically lowered the CPU usage, of course). It has been working fine for a couple of days, and I had started adding more tracks, now on the timeline for other instruments (Beathawk) and using the audio channels as my reference. Today when I opened the project all the actual audio in the audio channels were gone though. The "placeholders" for audio were still there, but they contained absolutely nothing, unless emptiness counts.

Now it was only for my "test tune" (which I created a video for the other day, posted at the end of this post), but I had started fleshing it out as I was thinking there was an embryo of a proper tune in there. Now I'm not sure I dare repeating the process of taking myself to the same point I was at 2 days ago, so I can continue fleshing it out, in Zenbeats, or if I simply should just recreate it in Auria or something instead. It is that uncertainty that you guys need to chip away at I guess.

>

Disappearing audio. It happened to me last night. I’m on the iPad 13.1 beta right now so I was prepared for things to go wrong. Obviously this is a BIG issue. The audio may still be somewhere, right? I remember desktop DAWs needing to reacquaint themselves with the source audio for tracks sometimes.

hellquist

@ZenLizard said:

@hellquist said:

@ZenLizard said:
@MatthewAtStagelight, are you aware of an issue where upon reopening a saved song, drum sounds are absent on play even though the sequencer midi is still there? Have to go reload the kit (or any kit) and sound is restored.

I’ll go put in a ticket if that hasn’t already been reported.

@MatthewAtZenbeats

I too have noticed inconsistencies like this, and have had that exact thing happening to me too.

The last one was both different and kind of critical for the project I was in though; I had done a record to timeline from clips, and I had then rendered out the midi of my AUv3 instruments into audio, so I could turn off the AU's (dramatically lowered the CPU usage, of course). It has been working fine for a couple of days, and I had started adding more tracks, now on the timeline for other instruments (Beathawk) and using the audio channels as my reference. Today when I opened the project all the actual audio in the audio channels were gone though. The "placeholders" for audio were still there, but they contained absolutely nothing, unless emptiness counts.

Now it was only for my "test tune" (which I created a video for the other day, posted at the end of this post), but I had started fleshing it out as I was thinking there was an embryo of a proper tune in there. Now I'm not sure I dare repeating the process of taking myself to the same point I was at 2 days ago, so I can continue fleshing it out, in Zenbeats, or if I simply should just recreate it in Auria or something instead. It is that uncertainty that you guys need to chip away at I guess.

>

Disappearing audio. It happened to me last night. I’m on the iPad 13.1 beta right now so I was prepared for things to go wrong. Obviously this is a BIG issue. The audio may still be somewhere, right? I remember desktop DAWs needing to reacquaint themselves with the source audio for tracks sometimes.

Indeed. For info I’m on 12.3.1

ZenLizard

@hellquist,

I sent Roland a bug report and mentioned I wasn’t alone. And I forgot to mention here that my audio disappeared after I froze just one guitar track, before saving and closing the song. The curious part was the audio was also gone from a second, unfrozen track, but the audio recorded last, on a third track, was still there. All three tracks were using only an instance of iFX Rack AUv3 for tone.

Littlewoodg

@ZenLizard said:
@hellquist,

I sent Roland a bug report and mentioned I wasn’t alone. And I forgot to mention here that my audio disappeared after I froze just one guitar track, before saving and closing the song. The curious part was the audio was also gone from a second, unfrozen track, but the audio recorded last, on a third track, was still there. All three tracks were using only an instance of iFX Rack AUv3 for tone.

Are all the tracks that are disappearing include AUv3 FX?

ZenLizard

@Littlewoodg said:

@ZenLizard said:
@hellquist,

I sent Roland a bug report and mentioned I wasn’t alone. And I forgot to mention here that my audio disappeared after I froze just one guitar track, before saving and closing the song. The curious part was the audio was also gone from a second, unfrozen track, but the audio recorded last, on a third track, was still there. All three tracks were using only an instance of iFX Rack AUv3 for tone.

Are all the tracks that are disappearing include AUv3 FX?

So far.

ALB

Generally, I do a fair amount of saving with this app, but occasionally something will disappear. Last night I was playing around with the default drum kit and the midi notes and automation remained but the kit was gone and I had to reload it. I’m also finding cutting and pasting within the Drum midi window to be hit and miss (mostly miss). Not a problem with the instruments other than the drums. This and some other strange and occasional behaviors keep me on my guard. Mostly, I’m enjoying it.

Littlewoodg

@ZenLizard said:

@Littlewoodg said:

@ZenLizard said:
@hellquist,

I sent Roland a bug report and mentioned I wasn’t alone. And I forgot to mention here that my audio disappeared after I froze just one guitar track, before saving and closing the song. The curious part was the audio was also gone from a second, unfrozen track, but the audio recorded last, on a third track, was still there. All three tracks were using only an instance of iFX Rack AUv3 for tone.

Are all the tracks that are disappearing include AUv3 FX?

So far.

I wonder if this is the case generally, that all lost tracks have AUv3 fx associated

ZenLizard

@ALB said:
Generally, I do a fair amount of saving with this app, but occasionally something will disappear. Last night I was playing around with the default drum kit and the midi notes and automation remained but the kit was gone and I had to reload it. I’m also finding cutting and pasting within the Drum midi window to be hit and miss (mostly miss). Not a problem with the instruments other than the drums. This and some other strange and occasional behaviors keep me on my guard. Mostly, I’m enjoying it.

I won’t use it at all if it loses my recorded audio tracks even occasionally, but once that is fixed I see myself getting a lot of good use out of it. It adapts well to my personal way of composing. In the mean time I’m just not going to record any audio tracks in it. Instead I’ll export stems and continue in another app. So now it’s more like the NS2 situation

Korakios

Fortunately .no audio tracks or midi notes are lost, but the clips I recorded look empty (on saved project) . They play fine but was scared for a sec...

EDIT: New bug ,avoid using the 'hold' button on the keyboard , since changing the view to other track ,ZB forgets those notes (the button is cleared) and have to stop the song.

@Korakios said:
Still same issues

• midi in works only for selected track
• When drawing notes by holding and swipe right it creates notes ,but you can’t change any parameters on some (velocity,pitch etc) . edit (disabling grind lets you edit them
• iCloud Drive must be enabled for browsing samples
• Weird behavior when setting loop region and mess with pitch, stretch on audio tracks. Audio sometimes gets muted for part of region. Can’t always reproduce it.
• Zooming on the waveform of the sample to make fine adjustments causes the waveform to disappear.
• Region selected on a sample drum does not reflect the actual part of the played drum sound when on reverse & vinyl mode .

iOS 12.3 iPad 2018

hellquist

@Littlewoodg said:

@ZenLizard said:
@hellquist,

I sent Roland a bug report and mentioned I wasn’t alone. And I forgot to mention here that my audio disappeared after I froze just one guitar track, before saving and closing the song. The curious part was the audio was also gone from a second, unfrozen track, but the audio recorded last, on a third track, was still there. All three tracks were using only an instance of iFX Rack AUv3 for tone.

Are all the tracks that are disappearing include AUv3 FX?

Not for me. No fx at all, AU or otherwise. Just plain audio.

hellquist

@ZenLizard said:

@ALB said:
Generally, I do a fair amount of saving with this app, but occasionally something will disappear. Last night I was playing around with the default drum kit and the midi notes and automation remained but the kit was gone and I had to reload it. I’m also finding cutting and pasting within the Drum midi window to be hit and miss (mostly miss). Not a problem with the instruments other than the drums. This and some other strange and occasional behaviors keep me on my guard. Mostly, I’m enjoying it.

I won’t use it at all if it loses my recorded audio tracks even occasionally, but once that is fixed I see myself getting a lot of good use out of it. It adapts well to my personal way of composing. In the mean time I’m just not going to record any audio tracks in it. Instead I’ll export stems and continue in another app. So now it’s more like the NS2 situation

Me too, I see my music creation process as a split series of events. For my ”sketch/tune making” part I think Zenbeats could be perfect. Then spit it all out to a timeline, import elsewhere to continue polishing/adding and finally mastering. But that creation step (which is after ”initial basic idea sketchpad”) Zenbeats could be perfect. If I could trust it...

Korakios

https://www.roland.com/backstage/#/zenbeats-support

Seems to work now, I send some bugs

MatthewAtZenbeats

Thanks to everyone for reporting the missing audio issue. We're investigating it and I'll report back on it soon.

@hellquist said:

@Littlewoodg said:

@ZenLizard said:
@hellquist,

I sent Roland a bug report and mentioned I wasn’t alone. And I forgot to mention here that my audio disappeared after I froze just one guitar track, before saving and closing the song. The curious part was the audio was also gone from a second, unfrozen track, but the audio recorded last, on a third track, was still there. All three tracks were using only an instance of iFX Rack AUv3 for tone.

Are all the tracks that are disappearing include AUv3 FX?

Not for me. No fx at all, AU or otherwise. Just plain audio.

@ZenLizard said:

@ALB said:
Generally, I do a fair amount of saving with this app, but occasionally something will disappear. Last night I was playing around with the default drum kit and the midi notes and automation remained but the kit was gone and I had to reload it. I’m also finding cutting and pasting within the Drum midi window to be hit and miss (mostly miss). Not a problem with the instruments other than the drums. This and some other strange and occasional behaviors keep me on my guard. Mostly, I’m enjoying it.

I won’t use it at all if it loses my recorded audio tracks even occasionally, but once that is fixed I see myself getting a lot of good use out of it. It adapts well to my personal way of composing. In the mean time I’m just not going to record any audio tracks in it. Instead I’ll export stems and continue in another app. So now it’s more like the NS2 situation

Samu

Just curious, can Zebeats be used at all without an active internet connection?
I ask this since Zenbeats seems to have a mandatory log-in thing...

Also can it do time-stretch and/or pitch adjustments audio clips on the time-line?

Korakios

@Samu said:
Just curious, can Zebeats be used at all without an active internet connection?
I ask this since Zenbeats seems to have a mandatory log-in thing...

Also can it do time-stretch and/or pitch adjustments audio clips on the time-line?

Works on Airplane mode fine

@Korakios said:

@Samu said:
I've not had the patience to watch thru all the tutorials...
But can we freely stretch and pitch audio on the time-line?

If you mean drag the waveform to stretch it , no . You have to change the bpm of the audio file manually. You can change the pitch also but none of those can be automated (it also skips audio for a second to recalculate every time you change a value, so no real-time )

On the bright side I like the algorithm, not Serato class but descent...

EDIT: But another huge miss is no reverse....

Samu

@Korakios said:

@Samu said:
Just curious, can Zebeats be used at all without an active internet connection?
I ask this since Zenbeats seems to have a mandatory log-in thing...

Also can it do time-stretch and/or pitch adjustments audio clips on the time-line?

Works on Airplane mode fine

Hmm, but what if there is no internet connection when launching the app?
I mean it does require a log-in when starting up right?

Or maybe it's one of those 'have to sign in at least once per month to re-fetch the current license key'.

Currently I'm just making room on my iPad Air 2 for tomorrows iPadOS13.1 installation...
(Yeah, It's app clean-up deluxe today and tomorrow).