Using ACT to control Vol/Pan of whatever track is in focus

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James P
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2014/02/05 06:46:10 (permalink)

Using ACT to control Vol/Pan of whatever track is in focus

First off, I'm completely new to using ACT so apologies if this is a stupid question...

Just got myself an Alesis QX61 controller keyboard today, which I'm really pleased to find does seem like a great little controller so far (despite some of the bad things I'd read about it).

I've managed to use ACT to assign the Transport buttons and that's all working fine. It also has 8 sliders and 8 rotaries which seem easy enough to control the Vol/Pan of tracks 1-8 but seeing as I almost always have more than 8 tracks in a project, it seems a bit redundant to just use it that way.

What I was hoping to do is to use Slider 1 & Rotary 1 to control the volume/pan of whatever track currently has the focus, primarily so that I can ride the fader and record the resulting automation. Is this possible?

I'm trying to read up on ACT so I can get a better understanding so any pointers would be appreciated.
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    James P
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    Re: Using ACT to control Vol/Pan of whatever track is in focus 2014/02/05 12:29:08 (permalink)
    I've made a little progress in that if I select "Channel strip" under "Rotaries mode" in the ACT settings, I can now use the first rotary knob to control panning on whatever track I have focus on. But I don't seem to be able to do this with volume and sliders, i.e. use 1 keyboard slider to control volume of whatever track I have focus on. Is this possible or am I wasting my time trying to find a way to do it?
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    markyzno
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    Re: Using ACT to control Vol/Pan of whatever track is in focus 2014/02/05 12:32:00 (permalink)
    I have setup a template with the remote settings rather than ACT which works for me (non focused tho)....If you have any joy with the focus ACT settings please let us know!

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    #3
    James P
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    Re: Using ACT to control Vol/Pan of whatever track is in focus 2014/02/05 13:20:20 (permalink)
    markyzno
    I have setup a template with the remote settings rather than ACT which works for me (non focused tho)....If you have any joy with the focus ACT settings please let us know!



    Is there any difference/benefit of using Remote vs ACT?
     
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    DRanck
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    Re: Using ACT to control Vol/Pan of whatever track is in focus 2014/02/05 22:18:52 (permalink)
    Not sure if this helps but you can change which set of tracks are being controlled by the ACT controller. On my Akai MPK 88 I set up 2 of the buttons to select the next and previous track, 2 more to move the ACT controller's 8 controlled tracks between track banks and 2 more to move between groups. If I need to control track 10, I just select the next track bank and use slider and knob 2. I can also switch to the buses easily.
     
    I know it isn't the same as automagically controlling the track in focus with slider 1, but it works well for me and it was easy to set up.
     
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    James P
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    Re: Using ACT to control Vol/Pan of whatever track is in focus 2014/02/06 06:08:48 (permalink)
    DRanck
    Not sure if this helps but you can change which set of tracks are being controlled by the ACT controller. On my Akai MPK 88 I set up 2 of the buttons to select the next and previous track, 2 more to move the ACT controller's 8 controlled tracks between track banks and 2 more to move between groups. If I need to control track 10, I just select the next track bank and use slider and knob 2. I can also switch to the buses easily.
     
    I know it isn't the same as automagically controlling the track in focus with slider 1, but it works well for me and it was easy to set up.
     
    - Dave


     
    Thanks Dave, that's a kind of workaround I could get used to. I've got four spare drum pads on the controller that I probably won't use so I can always assign a couple of those to previous/next banks.

    I didn't realise you can also just grab the WAI strip and drag it around to control different tracks manually so that's another way around it.

    I've also seen you can add a Cakewalk Generic Surface instead of an ACT controller but not sure what the difference is between the two or if it would be better for me to try that. Guess I've got some more reading and research to do!
    #6
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