Audio to midi conversion module....

rodos1979 · Post by **rodos1979** » Thu Feb 27, 2003 8:44 pm

Hello to all!

I was wondering if there is any SFP module/device out there that could render polyphonical audio to midi in real time. It would be great if I could plug in my guitar to my PC and use my Pulsars as a true polyphonical guitar synth(for example, route my guitar from Analog in to the "Audio to Midi Module" and then route its midi output to any SFP or VSTi synth!)
Is there such a module? Or should I add it to the wishlist?

Thank you!

rodos1979 · Post by **rodos1979** » Thu Feb 27, 2003 9:22 pm

Hello again!

I did a search in the Internet and found some software programs that render audio to midi. I am downloading them to try them and see if and how good they work.
However, I am sure that an SFP module doing the same thing would be much better when playing/recording live, since there will be no latency!!
Is there such a module? If not, Developers pleaze make one!!!

Thank you

rodos1979 · Post by **rodos1979** » Fri Feb 28, 2003 6:33 am

Hello again again!

Ok, the demos I have tried so far are:
1) Epinoisis Digital Ear 4, which although was 4.5MB, did not seem to be working properly (about 15-20% of the notes were tracked correctly, and monophonic)
2) AKoff Music Composer 2, which was quite good, but had a great latency when playing live (more than 1sec!!!)
3) TS-Audio ToMIDI Realtime Converter 2, a small program, which has a very good latency and is quite good (but still far away from the desirable)
I have downloaded another one, called Intelliscore but have not installed and tried it yet. I will let you know when I do.
Any news? Anybody knows if there is such a module for SFP?

Thank you

rodos1979 · Post by **rodos1979** » Fri Feb 28, 2003 8:35 pm

Hello!

I tried the last software too, which is quite good but it introduces a great latency for live playing.
...since nobody responds, should I take that there is not such a module in SFP? Would anybody else (except me) like such a module and/or find it useful?

Thank you

j9k · Post by **j9k** » Fri Feb 28, 2003 10:20 pm

try http://www.starrlabs.com

they make a specialized guitar midi controller. i have a mini-Z which i am very happy with.

roland also makes a special pickup and sound mdl.

j9k

spoimala · Post by **spoimala** » Sat Mar 01, 2003 12:16 am

Rodos, indeed, it would be very useful. Imagine, you could print score out of your fav music cds

But.. I don't want to bring you down, but I think it is far from reality. At least polyphonic module, that would extract all the instruments from audio.
But you are only speaking "guitar to midi". I'd suggest these midi guitars j9k talks about.

astroman · Post by **astroman** » Sat Mar 01, 2003 5:39 am

J9K, great link

they have taken the Casio DG20 as a start and put it in a professional shape at professional prices

Rodos, it's essential that you have a single coil on each string (that's what the hexacoils used with Roland DG10 etc) are about. The processor then does six mono pitchdetections / noteconversions.
With modern CPUs the pitch detection isn't really an issue anymore.
The detection 'how' the guitar was played (mutes, up/down movement, speed of the hand) demands much more software efforts.
A pitch to note conversion would be a nice module though, one could simply transfer 6 single coils on 6 mixer channels (adat), so at least the note / duration event would be present.

cheers, Tom

borg · Post by **borg** » Sat Mar 01, 2003 6:01 am

unfortunately for you, mac and cubase only, but i'll just add the link for others:

http://www.macmusic.org/softs/share.php ... jpAznOhM=1

here on Z:
http://www.planetz.com/forums/viewtopic ... 8&forum=16

rodos1979 · Post by **rodos1979** » Sat Mar 01, 2003 3:43 pm

Hello to all!

Thank you for replying!

J9k, if I had the money to buy such a controller I would not be asking for pulsar module. However, the roland midi pickup could be a good addition to my strat... Spoimala, when I say polyphonic I mean different notes but played on the same instrument (ie a guitar chord). I know that such an automatic 'transcriber' of audio to midi (and scores) is only possible in science fiction movies (....however, no one could imagine in the past that the man would reach the moon one day!) Astroman, I didnt know that it worked like that (ie six different single coils that were actually processing/transcribing six different mono signals). Well, the module I was asking was a module that could detect the pitch and the timing from "polyphonic" audio material (ie guitar chords) and that would give approriate note on/off events and pitch-bending.

Thank you

astroman · Post by **astroman** » Sat Mar 01, 2003 5:34 pm

hi Rodos,

to detect chords from polyphonic sounds is actually very simple, but it requires special hardware and processing.
Unfortunately it's even more expensive than the nice Starrlabs instruments, unless such a project results in real large scale sellings (due to the hardware).
It's a typical application for neural network processing which (simplyfied) just remembers the chord's structure from an extensive training process.
Opposed to that the common way on native CPUs with spectrum analysis is magnitudes slower and not very precise.
As a guitar player you know how many variations of the same chord exist.
I have one of the Casio predecessors of the Starrlabs stuff.
The microswitches under the frets work quite well, but the problem is the neck, which doesn't have enough resistance against a reasonable string tension due to the simple plastic construction and it doesn't transfer any bend information.
I left it as a project for some free time to improve the thingy, so it's at least usable for chords on gigging.
It just looks so gorgeously spacey

cheers, Tom