Multitrack recorder unit?

I was wondering if its possibly to make the 6-track recorder function as an actual unit, so that it could be controlled to start and stop with an external trigger?.

I have a portable rig for my 301 and often make field recordings (mics/ accelerometers, 4ch ambisonics etc) - it would be amazing to remotely trigger a recording event like this. Even better if the channels could all be stored within just the one wav file.

Is this something we could program in lua, or is it more system level programming/ lot of work?

Thanks!

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Hi Brian - just wanted to give this a little nudge :-). Would this be a lot of work/ at all realistic with the current framework?

The 6 track recorder is brilliant and whilst allows sound capture, external/ internal end of chains - it seems if this could be cv controlled in some way or made into a unit itself then this expands the units functionality greatly, from a field recording / data logger/ IR capture point of view.

Thanks,
Jon

Have you thought about using the Dub Looper to do this instead? If so, what was the Dub Looper lacking?

I’m going under the assumption that if you are turning recording on and off then you probably do not need the (hands-off) benefit of recording directly to the card.

Why is this beneficial?

I was wondering this too, 5.1 perhaps?

Or maybe just a matter of convenience, it’s just 1 file instead of 6.

I guess convenience, yes. Im recording 4 channels from an ambisonic microphone (that need to be kept in sync) plus a couple of other channels (accelerometers/ triggers) sometimes - If the files are all in a folder as they are ultimately its not a problem , just some post management.

Just looking at the dub looper now (for the first time). I guess i set up two stereo chains, each with a looper, common trigger. Then manually record them playing back later?

Had just been thinking if this was easy it would mean i can do away with multichannel sound card/ laptop.

That’s what I was thinking also.

This won’t be necessary. Just go to admin > Sample Pool, then for each buffer that you want to save to the card: select it with the encoder and press M5 (save as).

The necessary pieces are exposed in Lua so you wouldn’t need to do any system-level programming. However, it will be a complicated and possibly error-prone endeavor given the current state of the middle layer documentation.

Specifically, there are MonoFileSink and StereoFileSink objects which can be incorporated into a Unit (for example, if you were making a Card Recorder unit) just like how other units are created by connecting objects. However, you will also need to instantiate and arrange to add the FileSink objects that you create to a FileSinkThread object which is the background thread responsible for periodically flushing audio to the card. The 6-track recorder (a.k.a. the FileRecorder module) uses these same FileSink and FileSinkThread objects if you want to look at an example.

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Thanks for this - i guess i was thinking initially that predefining sample buffers was only for working on files realtime as in creating loops/ grains etc. Thats why naturally i leant towards the card recorder

I see now its Its fine to go down this buffer route but it does make me want to get into (or rather have a bit more of a look) at lua. I will search out the fileRecorder exampe!

Thanks for your help!