Live looping / slice question

Hey guys,

Haven’t played with my er-301 for a while so pardon if this has already been asked.

I was wondering if it is possible to create a unit with a set of predefined slices that you can record loops in at will while playing the different slices arbitrarily?

cheers! :slight_smile:

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i was thinking about this just a couple of days ago…
i come from the octatrack too, and i used to live resample\slice stuff from the eurorack during performances.
i don’t know if @odevices knows how the octatrack works in this field…

it has a number of slots for “flex” samples and a number of slots for “static samples”
the difference between them is that flex are loaded in RAM while static are streamed direct from disk (compact flash). pretty similar to the difference between varispeed player and card player on the 301.
you are able to slice both types of samples.
fact is that the slicing information is tied to the SLOT and not to the sample!
so if the sample you have sliced is in a recorder track slot it can be overwritten whenever you call “REC” on that track. the sample is overwritten but the slicing information remains, allowing you to rearrange material you just recorded or that is filling the buffer in that moment! very clever (but i had some troubles with it on the octa, i think it isn’t perfect).
something very similar might happen if one slices the content of a buffer that’s shared between a looper and a player…i have to try it!

While copying another manufacturer’s design is definitely good for someone learning in this field, I don’t think it is considered professional behavior for me to engage in.

Bold added later for @madeinspace.

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well, i agree, but it’s also true that usually good conceptual ideas might become common practice (like synthesis techniques, think phase modulation…)

You are kind of missing my point. If you guys want to use the ER-301 as an emulator please do it on your own time(*). I have other fish to fry. :smiling_imp:

By the way, statements like “I basically want to replace the functionality of X.” are instant buzzkill for me. You’ll have better luck trying to trick me by not mentioning you got the idea from some specific product. :sweat_smile:

(*) I’m here to answer your questions though!

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@madeinspace damn you and your big mouth!!! :smiley: :smiley: just kidding :smiley:

Wow why do you even bother replying then

This response seems incongruous to me. Did I miss something? :thinking:

because

:smiley: :smiley: :smiley:

well, don’t be rude @madeinspace, Brian already stated many times that the er-301 is an original concept and doesn’t want to turn it into a substitute for module “x” or device “y”.
i deeply respect this choice even if , as i said the post above, i think borrowing good ideas from other devices and expanding them, twisting them, exploring the opportunities they give is good practice and is common in coding and engineering. but those are only my 2 cents.

“don’t be rude”? Jeez. What Brian wishes for his device to become is irrelevant with what I’d want to do with mine, feels like my question ruffled a bit, so, sorry if I mentioned the Octatrack! I’ll figure it out. ¯_(ツ)_/¯

I think I found the source of confusion and added to my initial post for clarification.

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man, don’t misunderstand me, i wasn’t pointing my finger, just wanted to remind you that this platform has its vision and we can just ask or suggest but it’s totally up to brian wether to implement something or not.
peace!

I didn’t request or suggest anything, merely asked if this was possible! Read again. :slightly_smiling_face:

I’m just surprised that it feels like my question didn’t deserve an answer because not elitist enough, see what I mean? I wish I had time to program really clever devices with Lua but unfortunately one ambition I have now with the 301 is to emulate a functionality of another hardware device. Booo, or maybe is it because I named the device? Will remove the offending bits :wink:

Anyway I’m 80% sure it is possible, just have some interrogations around keeping the loop in sync, appropriate buffer size and locked slices. I’ll figure it out and perhaps I’ll come up with a custom unit that will grant me some respect lol :smiley: peace out.

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sorry, i attributed my behaviour to you :slight_smile:

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I’m interested in this way of working with loops, too. So if you find a way how to build this functionality in for example a custom unit, please let me give it a ride…

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I came to the 301 from Octatrack as well. One piece of my workflow that I moved over from the OT was to take a channel w/ an empty buffer to record into and reference that same buffer on another channel that was used to manipulate the sound further. Playback speed, playback direction etc. the magic was that you could preslice that recording buffer so you could access the slices in your FSU channel as well.
All of that you can do w/ the 301. So good!

Thanks brian for making a wonderfully flexible machine that lets us make new and fantastic things (as well as emulate shit we already owned :rofl:)

:pray:t4::pray:t4::pray:t4:

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you mean you can actually slice a buffer and the slice information stays no matter what the content?

Yes, or at least you could last time I did it…not sure if anything’s changed in latest firmware

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thanks that’s really great news! so stupid to have never actually tried!!!

Great! That’s what I’m talking about, but say you create a custom unit based on that idea and change the tempo, do the slices kinda stretch with that tempo change( if that make sense)? Also what’s an appropriate buffer size to accommodate loop of different length, that’s one aspect of the 301 that I still don’t fully understand with buffer allocation, why can’t this be elastic?