Sub Phatty: local MIDI control and arpeggiators

[dswo]

This started with a conversation about arpeggiating the Sub Phatty:
http://forum.moogmusic.com/viewtopic.ph ... 78#p115304. I suggested an iPad app, StepPolyArp, that I'd used before with my Miniak and a Slim Phatty. It's elegant and powerful. Mico tried it, but ran into some trouble controlling it from the Sub Phatty keyboard. I got my Sub Phatty a few days ago, and tried using it with StepPolyArp (SPA) tonight.

First, if you control it from the app keyboard it works great, no problems. The trick is controlling it from the Sub Phatty keyboard. For this to work properly, the Sub Phatty needs to send MIDI notes to SPA and play the notes that SPA sends back. That's easy enough. Here's the tricky part: you want the Sub Phatty to ignore its own keyboard. It should transmit keyboard notes, but not play them. Now, some of you are thinking, there's a setting for that. Yes, there is, on p. 34 of the manual. If you turn Local Control off, the Sub Phatty will send notes from the keyboard but not play them. It will play the notes that it receives from SPA, which is what we want.

There are two problems.

1. On my setup, it works through the MIDI DIN plugs, but not through USB. The first time time I tried it, I connected a MIDI cable from the Phatty to my iPad, using the iPad's camera connection kit (CCK). SPA could see the Sub Phatty for MIDI in and out, but when I hit a key on the Sub Phatty, the Phatty was still trying to play it. That's not right! I tested this a couple times to make sure. Inbetween USB tests, I ran old-school MIDI cables to and from my MidiSport 2x2, which can serve as a MIDI merge box OR a MIDI-to-USB interface. For this test, I chose the latter function and plugged it into my iPad (again using the Camera Connection Kit). This time everything worked perfectly: when I hit a note on the Phatty keyboard, it played back only the MIDI signals from SPA.

Is it possible there's a bug in the USB implementation of Local Control? On my setup, it worked fine with the DIN connection but not with USB.

2. Local Control turns off the panel as well as the keyboard. I can see the logic in this, but the whole fun of the Sub Phatty is twisting knobs! Mind you, those knobs are still sending MIDI signals (which SPA will interpret in its own, special way). But they're no longer controlling the Phatty. You can play arpeggio patterns (using the iPad and SPA), but you can't tweak the sound. Also, you can't change the keyboard octave.

May I suggest that a future version of the firmware might have three options: local control on (the default that we're all familiar with), local control off for keyboard (the option we'd want in this intance), and local control off for keyboard and panel (though you'd still be stuck with no octave control).

Meanwhile, here are a couple of workarounds if you want to use StepPolyArp with the Sub Phatty:

1. Play notes on the iPad touchscreen. SPA has an intelligent and flexible keyboard. Or, if you have Animoog and have purchased the MIDI out option, you could use Animoog's keyboard and send it to SPA via Virtual MIDI. (This is in theory; I haven't tried it yet.)

2. Play notes on a second keyboard controller and leave the Phatty's Local Control on so that you can twirl knobs. The tricky thing here is going to be hooking three MIDI devices together. Here's where a device like the MidiSport 2x2 or the iConnectMIDI comes in handy. When you plug the MidiSport into an iPad, the iPad will see two MIDI devices, A and B. Let's assume that A is your non-Phatty keyboard (in my case, an Akai Miniak). Make that your MIDI input in SPA and make B your MIDI output; that will be your Sub Phatty. Play keys on A, and you should hear arpeggiations on B. From what I've read, iConnectMIDI is even cooler but I got the MidiSport on eBay for about $35.

[mico]

Thanks for posting your results with SPA after having received your Sub Phatty. I'm fairly relieved that it wasn't purely an error on my end, but this of course is replaced with a new concern.

My MIDI interface just so would happen to be the iConnectMIDI. It connects to my 4th gen. iPad by their specially made miniUSB cable for which I have mounted a 30pin-to-lightning adapter onto.

I have recently updated the firmware to the finalized version, moved to the updated iPad app for routing management for the unit, and have restored the unit to factory default. I have yet to try using SPA after doing this; I did this because I was having major problems with sending firmware updates over it to my Sub Phatty. Now, it solved that problem and I can only hope that it will also remedy the single-note actuation via MIDI that you too have experienced.

I feel it is also important to note that when I did try using SPA with the iConnectMIDI, I was using DIN cables both 'in' and 'out' of the Sub Phatty. So honestly, the issue for me has nothing to do with Sub Phatty's USB port.

I do concur with David that it would be awesome to still be awesome to implement a Local Control split option. That would be incredible.

On another note, David, did you happen to notice when controlling the SPA from the Sub Phatty the mod wheel reset with each new note or arpeggiation? This is something I came across myself and was wondering if I was the only one.