We've been having a heated discussion for the past week or so on the beta forum. There is a lot of baggage there and I haven't been able to get my point across, so I thought I'd start with a clean slate here, to see what you guys think. It was something that was suggested on one of the KVR threads that got locked and addresses an issue that pops up now and then with new users.
Currently we have 64 patterns per instrument. It is a decent system but if you want to use a pattern with another instrument, it is not immediately obvious how you do that.
The suggestion is that instead o patterns per instrument, that all instruments share the same patterns. Obviously that would mean a lot more than 64 patterns but it would make it much easier to experiment with different instruments and parts. The biggest change would be to swap the A-H, 1-8 grid for some other kind of selector. An idea I had was this -
You would be able to go back/forward 1 pattern at a time, or 10 patterns with the FF/REW buttons (just like those buttons jump you back/forward 10 bars with the Transport controls). Clicking on the display would bring up a menu like you get for presets and double-clicking would bring up a window where you could enter an exact number. No pattern would be more than two or three clicks away.
Apart from that, the way you work would be pretty much the same. You'd find an empty pattern, set a length and put some notes and automation into it. The main difference would be that it wouldn't matter which instrument you used to create a pattern, it would be visible to every instrument, as they would all be accessing the same patterns. It would save you having to copy/paste patterns between instruments.
One issue that we have now is that when you copy a pattern and paste it into a different instrument, you lose all the automation on it. This happens because parameters don't match across instruments. e.g. Cutoff on Screamer is the 13th parameter but on Wasp it is the 23rd. If you can use any pattern with any instrument, there might need to be a better way to handle this than just erasing it. Here is one idea I had -
I've added one new drop-down menu so that instead of the automation being directly assigned to a parameter, it is assigned to a track (or lane or whatever you want to call it) and that track can be assigned to any parameter. So in the example of Screamer and Wasp, the automation would not be applied to cutoff, it would be applied to Track 1 and Track 1 would be assigned to Cutoff in each instrument. This could have real benefits. Imagine if Screamer and Wasp are playing the same pattern, which has automation in Track 1. You could easily assign Track 1 to Cutoff on both instruments, regardless the fact that Cutoff is the 13th parameter on one instrument and the 23rd on the other. Or you could assign it to two completely different parameters. e.g. Rage on Screamer and Cutoff on Wasp. It would make it very easy to experiment with all kinds of things you might not think of otherwise. Even if we keep the current patterns-per-generator system, adding this is a good idea that would allow you to paste patterns between instruments with automation intact.
Another advantage that Rich thought of is that Orion could ship with some pre-made patterns already created so that if you want to check out a new synth or something, you have some patterns you can use straight away. You could even create your own Default song pre-loaded with patterns for basic drum beats and stuff that will help you when you are trying out new ideas and you wouldn't be tied to Pro9 or DrumRack, you could use whichever you think is right for each session.
So, what are the downsides? The obvious one is that if you have one big set of patterns, it might get messy. There are plenty of ways to fix this. e.g. When you insert a new instrument, it automatically jumps to the first empty pattern or the next batch of 10 patterns or something, or maybe a pattern automatically gets named after the instrument you were using when you created it? A new shortcut to create a new pattern might help here, like CTRL+SHIFT+N, because a lot of the time you might want to use a pattern that already exists. There might be a way of organising patterns into folders that show up as sub-menus, like presets and plugins do. There might be a better design for the pattern selector that would make it easier. It would just be a matter of finding the solution that made it easiest for everyone.
So, have I missed anything? Are there problems I've not seen? More importantly, do you think it is a worthwhile idea?