MaxLooper

Why another Looper?

MaxLooper is a plugin created to deal with inadequacies in Live's own Looper plugin, and integrate the parts of two other plugins that I've used on a regular basis for several years (SooperLooper and AugustusLoop). Its intention is to provide a wider range of feedback than Ableton's looper is capable of, and to make a looper that is capable of Tape-based Looper style looping in a software looper.

One of the main aims I've had for the patch is to have very precise timing that is accessible without a great deal of forethought. I was intrigued by the technique that Musolomo had of allowing the user to hit the "Loop" button after a passage had started and still have it lock to the correct quantization amount. That was the basis of my model, and has caused all sorts of problems. It seems like no one else uses this 'backwards quantization' method, and perhaps for good reasons. Anwyay, getting it worked out.

If you're trying out the Looper, chances are you've noticed that it's not terribly intuitive. Granted. I've been using it for months though, and it works great. You can look forward to a new version of it soon, since I've figured out how to redesign it and make it do what I planned on it doing in the first place.

010212 rev13

So the cat's out of the bag. The new revision uses a fairly different synchronization scheme to keep everything in the right place. So I guess its time to start talking about how the plugin works.

First of all, the intention of MaxLooper is not as a standalone device, although it may be used as such (presumably....I've quite honestly never tried it except for during the writing stages). Its designed to be in a rack with 4 instances and controlled by the LoopMaster Mod. This gives the capability of using a footpedal for controlling all of the Loopers at once, as well as control via the grid for changing state, timing, retriggering, etc. This is how it should look:

Currently the LoopMaster Mod will only see the MaxLoopers if they are grouped like this. This will change in a future version, but since this is how I use it, that's how you get to use it.

The controls are fairly standard, and you should be able to assign all of them in Live's own MIDI mapping scheme if you'd like to use it in your own way.

Quantization

This is how the looper knows when to start and stop. If quantize is turned on, and the quantize amount is set to 1n, that means that it will only start at the beginning of each note that Live is synced to. If you hit the button right before or right after that note, it will sync to it. The looper is ALWAYS recording, so it can interpolate the position that you wished to begin at. It will end in the same way. However, this means that if you end the loop after the quantization period, your loop will start playback after the beginning of its start-point, since its already passed. Best to always end early. You can view the quantization period next to the assignment, it flashes at the beginning of each beat.

Also note that after the Mod's instantiation, you will have to restart Live's transport to get it to sync properly.

Relative

This control only has an effect if Quantization is turned ON. It merely causes the loop start point to be grabbed immediately upon hitting loop. It will still quantize the end to the current quant amount, so everything should stay perfectly in sync.

Loop

This button starts recording a loop, or stops the current recording and starts loop playback.

Overdub

Overdub mode turns the looper into a tape-machine. You can continue to record while changing the speed and new material is recorded in real time.

Mute

Mute turns the output of the plugin down to zero. It may be used with overdub (be careful, as even though the plugins outputs are muted, its inputs are not and continue to record while the looper is in overdub).

Hitting Overdub does not currently change mute status...however this may change in the future.

Hitting Mute while in Loop Record will automatically end the loop and go straight to Mute.

Hitting Loop while Muted will automatically unMute when you finish the new loop.

Inertia

Inertia affects how long speed changes take. It is a constant amount in ms, so if the inertia is set to 600 (default), it will take the looper 600 ms. to change to the new assigned speed. This also will probably change in future versions to take into account the amount of speed change.

Undo

Undo stores the last buffer that was recorded before a new record action (hitting loop, clear, or overdub). It only has one level of undo.

Latency Compensation

Manually adjust for latency in your project. This was one of the main reasons I built this plugin. This manually offsets the new loop playback by the amount (in ms) that compensation is set for. It is crucial to get this number right for your setup if you expect to have correct syncronization. Its easiest to play a percussive track into the loopers input and record a loop, then line it up with the original by moving the latency setting. Once set, it should remain fairly stable.

Resync

Resync merely retriggers the original sync process that was used when the loop was first played back. Still working on this one....it will currently only work correctly if a sample is playing forward at 1x speed.

Input

The dial on the right is the input volume, very useful when in Tape Mode.

Feedback

The dial on the left is the feedback amount for Tape Mode.

Fade In

The amount of time (in ms) it takes for the volume to go from 0 to full when a loop is first triggered after recording. This is not a loop crossfade, it only works once when the loop is first triggered to deal with late loop catches.