Screencasts about using GO

[L.Palo]

Hi!

I've created some screencasts covering some basic usage of GrandOrgue and uploaded them to YouTube. My intention is to create a collection of screencasts showing GrandOrgue usage/features that ideally will have at least some kind of instructional value for beginners.

The first one covers very basic stuff like downloading, installing, audio output settings etc. and is viewable on http://youtu.be/JoF1DxtoS3g. The second shows different load options, their memory usage and load speeds and can be viewed at http://youtu.be/qLRTZcFM6Ks.

If you have ideas for topics that I should cover in the screencasts, do feel free to suggest it to me!

Kind regards

Lars P

 

[Dorsetmike]

Lars, I find the sound on these, very poor, even with Youtube and speaker volumes set to max, I can not make out any of the words, just a very faint sound, I immediately checked another youtube item with the same volume settings and nearly deafened myself!

 

[L.Palo]

Hi!

I'm sorry to hear that. Strange, I admit that the levels were set quite low to avoid unneccessary noise, and I of course listened to them through headphones so it seemed ok to me on my system... But I'll keep that in mind and try to increase the mic level for future recordings.

P.S. It could of course also be my poor skills of speaking english that shines through...

Kind regards

Lars P

 

[scush]

As Mike says

The narration is inaudible,you need to do it again really.

All the best

john

 

[Dorsetmike]

P.S. It could of course also be my poor skills of speaking english that shines through...

Volume level was insufficient to determine this, I did try headphones, only a very slight improvement, I had to ensure no other sound in the room then could just make out some of the words.

 

[L.Palo]

Hi!

Now I've created new versions and uploaded them. I will edit my first post to have the new videos there instead as I'm going to remove the old ones.

This time I used a headset mic with higher volume levels, so the audio do contain lots of noise also but hopefully the words will be audible.

For the curious I might add that the audio device I use in GO for screencasting is not the one I normally use when playing. I had to use this to get multiple audio sources recorded without the screencasting program to crash. Unfortunately, the perceived latency goes up quite a bit with this device/driver... so I never use it normally. (I usually use one that directly access the hardware instead, most often RtAudio)

Kind regards

Lars P

 

[scush]

What a difference this is great

 

[Ghekorg7 (Ret)]

Hi Lars

GREAT WORK.

No issues with sound. It's all clear (except the background noise.... LOL from un-earthed device?).

Super tutorial for anyone wishing to mess up with GO.
More or less similar here, anyway I'm consuming more time than you because I'm loading sets at 24/48000... :-D

It's so helpful to have videos like these.
Humble suggestion, do the next one explaining how to use the panels <rolleyes>

I much enjoyed your playing and watching your fingers' and feet's paths on screen and also felt good for using our set !

Best
Panos

 

[L.Palo]

Hi!

Thanks for the suggestion. I'll have a go at it later. For now I've created another one as a follow-up to GO cache and this will show how to get lightning fast loadtimes! It's viewable at http://youtu.be/i2dOTm_vkgg.

P.S. The noise is due to that I use a poor quality (but very cheap!) headset for this recording directly into built-in soundcard. When I record samples I use completely different equipment, but I didn't care to hook it up for this work.

Kind regards

Lars P

 

[scush]

Hi Lars

I have just watched your latest video.
You seem to have a very good computer.
Your cache at least must be on a solid state drive.
I Hope veiwer's are not expecting this kind of performance from a standard hdd.


john

ps You had me there for a while ,Fast load = Samples still in memory from the previous load

 

[L.Palo]

Hi!

Good computer? Well, it's decent, but nothing near top of the line. It's put together by myself on a Gigabyte GA-H55N-USB3 Mini-ITX motherbord, a Core i3-540 LGA1156 3.06 GHz processor, 8 GB RAM Corsair 1333 MHz (with a pae kernel on 32 bit, full usage on 64 bit OS) and 1TB Hitachi Deskstar 7K1000.C SATA-II, 32MB as harddrive divided in two partions (one for 32 bit Ubuntu and one for 64 bit).

Anyway, here comes the next screencast about using the Panel menu http://youtu.be/CLm9DdwO7Ns.

Kind regards

Lars P

 

[Ghekorg7 (Ret)]

Hey ! Not just fast computer (i3 at 3.06GHz and 8GB ram Corsair do the difference = it's not just decent... LOL LOL) but also FAST VIDEO TUTORIALS !!

Thanks Lars

PS. The panels tutorial was a great fun, really ! > I missed for soo long that "ignore ptich"....... tsk tsk Thanks again for that.

 

[L.Palo]

And here comes two more screencasts. The first covers some possible pitfalls when doing sampleset MIDI configuration: http://youtu.be/3g7H1W4x2cg. The second talks about some of the voicing/tuning features that a user can use in GrandOrgue: http://youtu.be/xc80uw_mz-w.

Kind regards

Lars P

 

[Larioant]

Hi!

I've created some screencasts covering some basic usage of GrandOrgue and uploaded them to YouTube. My intention is to create a collection of screencasts showing GrandOrgue usage/features that ideally will have at least some kind of instructional value for beginners.

......

Kind regards

Lars P

Not only for beginners! Lars what you're doing is very useful. Thank you!
Antonio.

 

[e9925248]

So GO will likely get a video manual, before it gets a real manual.

Let me add some comments/suggestions:

* I don't guess, that Lars manged to create the screen casts in the first take directly after booting the computer - he had probably loaded sampleset already. Pitea is about 1-2 GB + 1-2 GB Runtime + 1-2 GB for the Cache. As everything fits into his 8 GB, Linux reuses the data from the OS cache => nothing is read from the disk.

The cache need to be dropped, if the behaviour after booting should be shown:

sudo echo 3 > /proc/sys/vm/drop_caches

* Regaring compressed/uncompressed cache: What should be default?
I'm missing results on Windows to take a decision (Panos?)

* Lossless Compression and Compress Cache are independend options.
Compress Cache only affects the load time of the cache.
Lossless compression affects the in-memory format of the samples.
=> eg. Lossless compression without compress cache can be used.

* The scoped mode of all combinations (inkl. divisionals) could be shown in a new video.
Full could be also included (overwrites the don't store settings from the ODF).

* Regarding naming: I got the impression, the "Crescendo Swell" and "Setter" are not the optimal english names for these functions. Are the better labels for these panels?

* Just one tip: All elements on the panels are MIDI controlable. The redundant tuning elements on the master panel are just there to allow controlling these settings via MIDI.

* To the tuning video: The organ dialogs list the ranks, not the stops. On most ODFs, a stop corresponds to a rank - but not for organs like Barton.

* The volume is controlable as amplitue (linear scale) and gain (in dB) via the tuning dialog.

* To the MIDI problem video: The configuration problems are caused by the fact, that GO still include the "Initial MIDI configuration" and out of the ODF and these settings an initial MIDI configuration is built. Disabling various things in the initial MIDI configuration will mean, that the elements will not react to any elements by default => no surprises.

* MIDI offsets: GO is able to differentiate between MIDI interfaces: So channel 1 on device A can trigger a different action than channel 1 on device B. Offsets are not necessary any more.

 

[L.Palo]

Thanks Martin for your comments! The development of GO has been so rapid that even I don't have a full grasp of every aspect of the software! These screencasts are also a way for me to make sure I learn all the beauties of "ourorgan"!

* The scoped mode of all combinations (inkl. divisionals) could be shown in a new video.
Full could be also included (overwrites the don't store settings from the ODF).

I must admit that I'm not entirely sure what the scoped and full are supposed to do to the divisionals and generals... But if I know, I'll sure make another video about it.

* Regarding naming: I got the impression, the "Crescendo Swell" and "Setter" are not the optimal english names for these functions. Are the better labels for these panels?

Crescendo Swell = Crescendo Pedal (in swedish this is called Registersvällare which approximately would be rank swell and ironically the expression pedal is in swedish called crescendosvällare or just svällare), but others might have better ideas. The setter I think should just be named "Combinations", or possibly "Combination setter".

* Just one tip: All elements on the panels are MIDI controlable. The redundant tuning elements on the master panel are just there to allow controlling these settings via MIDI.

Yes, it's great that the possibility exist.

* The volume is controlable as amplitue (linear scale) and gain (in dB) via the tuning dialog.

I just forgot to mention that. But I usually (out of tratition!) use the amplitude instead both in odf and in gui.

* To the MIDI problem video: The configuration problems are caused by the fact, that GO still include the "Initial MIDI configuration" and out of the ODF and these settings an initial MIDI configuration is built. Disabling various things in the initial MIDI configuration will mean, that the elements will not react to any elements by default => no surprises.

That would be yet another way, of course. But I think it's good to keep the old way of doing this also to not break too much with the old specification and sets. It's just to be aware of some of the peculiarities that may arise. Thanks to the Listen for Event button it's so easy to customize the organ to a console anyway.

* MIDI offsets: GO is able to differentiate between MIDI interfaces: So channel 1 on device A can trigger a different action than channel 1 on device B. Offsets are not necessary any more.

Of course! I used the feature a lot before... but not anymore. In the video I used it because I cannot in any easy way change the channel my MIDI keyboards work on and I wanted to demonstrate the stop activation/deactivation by MIDI signals and for that the offset served it's purpose. Of course any other event on any channel could be used for this as well.

Kind regards

Lars P

 

[e9925248]

I must admit that I'm not entirely sure what the scoped and full are supposed to do to the divisionals and generals... But if I know, I'll sure make another video about it.

Scoped can be used to create eg. a all reeds on/off (Turn only reeds on, select scope and store - then turn all reeds on/off, depending on the function, use scoped and store).
Also look at the GO Crescendo thread in this forum.

Full is eg. necessary, if the ODF says don't store invisible elements (eg. Barton). If full is on, all these don't store are overwritten.

Crescendo Swell = Crescendo Pedal (in swedish this is called Registersvällare which approximately would be rank swell and ironically the expression pedal is in swedish called crescendosvällare or just svällare), but others might have better ideas. The setter I think should just be named "Combinations", or possibly "Combination setter".

Maybe some US based, native speaker organist can help.

 

[L.Palo]

Scoped can be used to create eg. a all reeds on/off (Turn only reeds on, select scope and store - then turn all reeds on/off, depending on the function, use scoped and store).

I'm reading the other thread and I'll keep experimenting, but it seems to me that for reeds on/off functionality this is not working as one would expect it to do on a real organ. I would expect a reeds on/off to be a single button that when activated will add all the reeds and when de-activated remove the reeds but not touch any other stop that happens to be active (or not active) in either state.

Also the peculiar french system of jeux de combinasion, appel d'anches, jeux d'anches préparés (a separate windchest in real life with strong stops that could have the air either on or off and thus have the ranks prepared (stops pulled) in advance but not sounding until one stop or lever was activated) is not covered by this feature either if I'm not completely mistaken... Which of course can be the case.

It seems to me that if I first have a group of stops active and store them as scope (set + scope), then if I deactivate set and activate scoped the combination I next will set (set + button or step) will only store the state of the stops selected as scope eariler. As the feature works at the moment I have a hard time understanding when it will be useful instead of just using regular all the time. But I may be a bit dull this late so feel free to enlighten me if I won't have an epiphany all the sudden some time tomorrow (today).

Kind regards

Lars P

 

[L.Palo]

Ok, some sleeping seems to be good for the mind! I think I start to get the use of Scope and Scoped but feel free to correct me if I'm wrong.

It's possible to make two generals act as reeds on (one of them) and reeds off (the other). If I first have all the reed stops active and select (in generals panel) Scope and set both of the buttons (say 1 and 2). Then I switch to Scoped and with the active stops set 1 again, remove all the reeds and set 2. Uncheck set button. Now general 1 will work as a reeds on and not touch the state of any other stops, and general 2 will act as a reeds off and once again not touch any other stops that may be active at the time.

Of course it would be possible to use a single MIDI button with state on the organ console to on activating connect to general 1 and on deactivating the button it will connect to general 2.

If my understanding is correct, then it's possible to use two divisionals (on the panels) mimic a fixed appel d'anches system for every division (manual or pedal). One divisional would add the anches and the other remove them. It's not exactly as the french system works, but close.

Kind regards

Lars P

 

[Ghekorg7 (Ret)]

Hi Lars

Correct me if I'm wrong or misunderstood...

Let's say we got a prin8+0ct4+oct2+mix4 and play and we need to add anches (prepares...like Dulcian/trompete/clairon) for some passages then anches off.
In a CC real organ this is done with a foot pedal on/off.

In jOrgan we do this with another coupler in which we reference the elements needed = reed stops in this case. Then we assign the midi controller for this coupler, like a simple sustain switch for in and out. It works great as in real life.

Is this possible with GO and generals and/or divisionals?
Afaik if I have opened the above 8+4+2+mix and puch a general which will have the reeds stops, this move will close the former plenum leaving the anches alone...
In sample set's odf we need to create a specific keyboard with reed stops referenced then add a coupler for this keyboard to the division or whole organ we want.
This is how I'm doing it in GO so far....