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Sorry, I didn't phrase it clearly. More work, as in a lot more coding to implement dynamic bus creation/management. Not that it will be a lot more work for the user. Probably is a better experience for the user to have a dynamic number of buses, i.e. if you are using only 2 buses, the module will only show them and you will know the preset only uses 2 buses.
What do you use the buses for? Can you describe a rough patch that would require 16 buses? The reason I'm asking is because it's not very obvious to me those use cases. And it would be useful to know. In Mela, most of the signal processing is done linearly on lanes. Buses are used for signal routing from one lane to another. And maybe it's how I design presets, but I don't find myself needing to have more than 4.
btw I'm not saying I'm not going to add support for more buses. I'm asking to have a better understanding of how it's used by users.
Is there any other way to multiple split audio signals and then summarize them up on different groupings before the master channel (dedicated signal output lane)?
How are you splitting signals and from what source?
And do you find you need to have more than 4 summer groups?
Here is the simple one sine OSC with the two splits. I needed time to make this screenshot. What about the zoom-out feature, haha? 🤦♂️
Thanks for the screenshot, this is exactly the kind of stuff I like seeing. Gives me a better idea of how people are using Mela.
The first thing I would say is that Bus 2 is redundant as it's doing the same thing as Bus 1. So lane 3 can be set to have Bus 1 as input instead of 2. And I guess there's no need for Bus 4 because you could put everything that's on Lane 5 at the end of Lane 4. I mean, that's how I would have done it. But I get it, it could be a matter of taste and how you want to lay out stuff.
I think the future Stack module might help with some of that splitting and summing, but maybe not all, especially if you prefer using multiple lanes to break stuff up.
I'll look into making buses dynamic sooner.
So, there is no secret, only a developer-known method to overcome this limitation. 😅
I don’t want to disappoint you, but Bus1 and Bus2 have completely different sounds, and they are used to split the left and right channels. This is just a basic example to help you and others understand the limitation I’m referring to.
Mela doesn’t have cables or mixers of any kind, buses and lanes are all we have. The main reason I’m still not using Mela is its lack of those fundamental features that make a modular system truly modular. 😌
Haha, you can't disappoint me. Bus 1 and Bus 2 contain the exact same signal. I understand that you have Lane 2 and Lane 3 panned in opposite directions, but that doesn't change the fact that using Bus 2 is redundant. You can just delete the "Audio Out 2" module and set the "Audio In 2" module's Input to Bus 1 and your preset will sound the same.
But yes, I get the types of presets you like to create.
What would a cable let you do, how is it different from a bus?
Mela takes a slightly different approach from other modular systems. Like, you say, there's no mixer, but to create a mixer all you have to do is set the output of your lanes to Bus X and then have a lane that takes input from Bus X, and that's your mixer. It will sum the lanes. Or the future Stack module will just do all that.
On the input, yes, but you can’t just ignore the completely different FX chain setup of Phaser->Flanger->Chorus->panning for Bus1 and Bus2 before it goes to the Bus3.
I think you're confusing Bus with Lane in this case, I interpret Bus 2 as a connection between the end of Lane 1 to the beginning of Lane 2, and Bus 3 from end of Lane 1 to the beginning of Lane 3, so you could just remove Bus 3 from the end of Lane 1 and make Bus 2 the input of Lane 3.
Did I get that right, @Nikolozi? I do think that there are things that trip me up related to not being able to make connections explicitly (either with wires or Drambo's somewhat "wireless" approach), but I want to spend more time building complex stuff before I provide specific feedback.
I believe those are Lane 2 and Lane 3, not Bus 1 and Bus 2. You can route Bus 1 to both Lanes, implement different processing, mix them and send on to Lane 4. Each Lane is like an Audio Channel in AUM. The Busses just make the links between the Lanes, same as in AUM.
Not quite. I deliberately route it that way just for the sake of the argument. Without the signal router module, the lane is just a blank paper.
So functionally, Lane 2 is Bus 1, and Lane 3 is Bus 2, as you can see from the example screenshot.
Also, if I continue to add modules to the OSC Lane 1 after the two bus sends and finish this lane with Audio out ‘out 1’ everything will work as intended.
These are lanes that function like a classic bus in this case. I just wanted to illustrate with an example how easily I can use all available connections in Mela.
Ah, if this an intermediate state and you add modules in between the two Audio Out modules in Lane 1 then I do see your point, it's just right now, since they're together, both busses ("buses"? not a native speaker) carry the same signal.
@uncledave and @Grandbear explained correctly. This screenshot with labels Bus 1/2 on the Oscilloscope modules is wrong. You shouldn't think that at that point, lane is transmitting bus 1 or 2. I get that it might help you visualise signal flow, but it's an incorrect model and thinking like that will get in the way of designing presets in Mela.
Lane signal flow is completely independent of buses. A bus coming in via an "Audio In" module gets merged into Lane's Audio signal. Lane also always carries other signal types like MIDI and Pitch (and sometimes Poly). An Audio Out module that sends audio to a bus simply makes a copy of the Audio signal in the lane at that point.
I think now I understand your frustration a bit. You have a different model of how Mela's signal flow works.
The key is that buses simply let you copy Audio (or MIDI) signals from and merge to lanes. So you can easily create mixers and splitters with buses and lanes. I get it that you might need more buses for certain presets. But for example, if you are creating a splitter, you only need a single bus.
There is no option for renaming the lane, I used that labeling for you to see what’s happened with the signal from Bus1 and the signal from Bus2. For some reason, you jumped to the conclusion that this basic example needs to be optimized. 😌
Lane 1 on the example is a basic sine OSC with two sends, and there isn’t any module between those two audio out modules or anything after them. I should make a slightly more complicated example than you, and @Grandbear and @uncledave will never be caught in this confusion. Sorry for that! 🫣
Not at all. My understanding of 'lanes' and 'audio out' remains the same. You even reinforced that with unnecessary additional explanation.
Ok cool, no problem. I mean, it's great to hear if the signal flow is not confusing because I was worried it might be for some.
Just to clear up any miscommunication and make sure we are both on the same page:
1) In your example, you understand that there was no need for Bus 2 at all, and you could have used Bus 1 to send the same signal to Lane 3, and the resulting audio would have been the same.
2) And more generally, in Mela, you can create a splitter and a mixer, and in both cases, you just need a single bus.
Everything is answered already; please, there is no need to regurgitate this debate all over again. 🤦♂️😅
Here is Lane 1 with a possible usage example, as I mentioned before. Maybe visually it can be more understandable. There is no need to optimize those two sends because two FX lanes (I won't call them buses again 😅) need to be aligned visually to simulate the Mela Classic workflow, etc. It’s the artistic choice; this is a freaking instrument before anything else.
Ok, no worries : )
I've created a post to track the dynamic buses feature request https://mela-feedback.nikolozi.com/feature-requests/p/enhancing-buses
Created another tutorial, which is a follow-up to Build a Phaser from Scratch Using Mela's All Pass Module. In this tutorial, I show how to add feedback to the phaser:
Just let me know if you don't approve of me using your screenshot. I'll take it down.
@Nikolozi You can see I'm no GUI guru but I just took the opportunity to show some idea of the UI idea I had in mind. Color groups are for things like filter, adsr, effects, midi, audio, etc.
Thank you for this, I created a post detailing this; let me know if I missed something: https://mela-feedback.nikolozi.com/feature-requests/p/tinted-modules
Looks lovely and very readable🤘
Thanks very much for giving it some consideration. The post you created is perfect, thanks.
maybe make it a option. looks abit like candystore.
two diffrenent colors for midi/audio would be great indeed.
The candy thing occurred to me too, I quite like that though 😄
I had a feeling this would going to be controversial. I'm leaning towards colouring being optional. But even if it's optional, they will need to be saved in the preset, and when another user loads, they will get the colours. Unless there's an option to ignore colours saved in presets (which complicates UI).
Over the years, I've flipped-flopped on this sort of thing many times. If you check my Logic Pro projects over the years, you will find in some projects, channels and regions are colour-coded, while in others use just 2 colours.
Be my guest, 👍 especially because I have been promoting multicolored modules in Mela for years. Your concept is fantastic!
Another thing regarding visibility is the absence of desktop scroll and zoom out. So you need to scroll (left-right) lane by lane, and the experience while doing this is not good. If you change something on those pads, there is no undo to save the day.
This image shows what is actually visible in this demo setup.
If this 'tinting' gets implemented I vote for an option to completely disable it even if it's saved with a preset...
...I could accept element-tinting if they 'references the source' but since for example knobs can have multiple modulation source coloring based on source would not work in practice...
Even though some think for example Drambo's coloring is 'random' the coloring is highly logical and always references the source module and the colors are chosen with visibility in mind (some of the beta-testers are color-blind).
I'll just adapt but let's keep the option to keep all colors unified...
You could leave everything as is, but let users override the individual module theme. So, for example, if I select the ‘Audio Out’ module color theme ‘Mela 2,’ everything else will still be default except for other instances of this particular module.