Hands-free parameter tweaking while playing — anyone using external MIDI controllers/gear for this?

danielworks

danielworks

Inspired
I’m looking for ways to tweak parameters while playing, without taking my hands off the guitar or stopping the flow.

On Helix and Headrush, this was easier — I could adjust parameters in real time with foot controllers and immediately feel where the sound wanted to go, without menu diving.

Right now my workflow is:

  • map one parameter at a time to an expression pedal
  • e.g., Bass, then Mids, then Gain, then Treble
  • play while moving the pedal until I hit the sweet spot by feel
It works, but it’s slow and not very practical for real-world tweaking.

• Is anyone using something like an external MIDI controller for real-time tweaking?
• Can a standalone MIDI controller (hardware with knobs/faders/buttons) actually be used to adjust parameters live on a Fractal rig?
• If yes, what kind of controllers are people using — are they practical and musical, or just awkward DAW surfaces repurposed?
• Does anyone keep these controllers connected during performance, or only for sound design/rehearsal?
• Has anyone used things like Stream Decks or similar surfaces for parameter access in a meaningful way (beyond preset switching)?

Main goal:
Dial tones and tweak parameters while playing, by feel, without touching the unit, mouse or notebook's touchpad
 
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Why not put things to pitch or envelope followers?

When you say “live” im assuming mid gig.
 
danielworks said:
It doesn't need to be live. corrected. thanks.
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Is this just for getting tones or is the idea to shift while playing all the time?

If the former, looper block is your new best friend

If the latter, mc6 can do cc/pc as do other midi controllers, but mapping to pitch envelope and maybe volume would probably work out better. Dont forget you can use 2 sources for modifiers too.
 
You could setup external controllers to do that, but its not very common amongst users. There used to be a third-party knob interface (RAC-12) that worked via Sysex with older AXII units specifically linked to BMT and gain controllers, but the sysex assignments changed with the III and FM units, so I don't believe they work anymore. Similarly, FracPad connects an ios device to the III via sysex; you would need to manually save after tweaking regardless of the method.

A lot of people assign the performance controls for this purpose, so it still requires going to the unit itself, but doesn't add any midi bindings and is quicker to access than editing the blocks directly.

This thread is relative to the FM3 but it brings up the RAC-12 and tweaking via performance pages: https://forum.fractalaudio.com/threads/knob-controller-for-fm3-to-give-amp-front-panel-feel.175070/

None of these methods use expression to control it. If you want to go literally hands free, you would need to use midi controllers. In terms of midi control: any controllers end up eating up CPU, so I tend to avoid keeping many unused assignments.
 
jamongrande said:
You could setup external controllers to do that, but its not very common amongst users. There used to be a third-party knob interface (RAC-12) that worked via Sysex with older AXII units specifically linked to BMT and gain controllers, but the sysex assignments changed with the III and FM units, so I don't believe they work anymore. Similarly, FracPad connects an ios device to the III via sysex; you would need to manually save after tweaking regardless of the method.

A lot of people assign the performance controls for this purpose, so it still requires going to the unit itself, but doesn't add any midi bindings and is quicker to access than editing the blocks directly.

This thread is relative to the FM3 but it brings up the RAC-12 and tweaking via performance pages: https://forum.fractalaudio.com/threads/knob-controller-for-fm3-to-give-amp-front-panel-feel.175070/

None of these methods use expression to control it. If you want to go literally hands free, you would need to use midi controllers. In terms of midi control: any controllers end up eating up CPU, so I tend to avoid keeping many unused assignments.
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This is exactly what I wanted, something like RAC-12. But acording to @laxu 's reply, isn't so cool working with midi controllers in this scenario
 
I find a laptop setup on a music stand is easy to make some quick adjustments. Also, I usually prep a 2nd or 3rd preset with a different cab, or different EQ to A\B at rehearsal
 
danielworks said:
This is exactly what I wanted, something like RAC-12. But acording to @laxu 's reply, isn't so cool working with midi controllers in this scenario
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Yes unfortunately so.

You can use MIDI if you are ok with the caveats shown (not following stored params but MIDI controller knob positions) if you just want direct access to specific parameters and don't need too many of them. Might be good enough for just dialing in an amp or fx block for you since you don't need to switch mappings or bend over on the floor to adjust things etc.

Otherwise you need essentially MIDI -> MIDI Sysex translation software that can talk to and receive data from the Fractal. It's a significant development effort without having documentation so no such software exists to my knowledge.

I hope Fractal provides better MIDI control support on their next gen devices.
 
laxu said:
Yes unfortunately so.

You can use MIDI if you are ok with the caveats shown (not following stored params but MIDI controller knob positions) if you just want direct access to specific parameters and don't need too many of them. Might be good enough for just dialing in an amp or fx block for you since you don't need to switch mappings or bend over on the floor to adjust things etc.

Otherwise you need essentially MIDI -> MIDI Sysex translation software that can talk to and receive data from the Fractal. It's a significant development effort without having documentation so no such software exists to my knowledge.

I hope Fractal provides better MIDI control support on their next gen devices.
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Actually I quit for a reason : I wanted to play and edit deep parameters at same time or at least mapping it to some external knob or fader cause playing and stopping it's hard to achieve a sweet spot when for example dialing stuff in power amp section that can't be mapped to anywhere
 
laxu said:
It's a significant development effort without having documentation so no such software exists to my knowledge.
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Fractool has a sysex sniffer but you need to solve some riddle to get access to it. I couldn’t figure it out.

I spent some time trying to reverse engineer the sysex comms but I don’t have enough time for this.

The publicly available third party spec is only good for buttons, not for knobs, and the communication between Edit apps and devices uses something structurally different, so it’s of little use.

So the only way to do have hardware knobs controlling parameters is to assign them to CCs in settings, but that is a bad solution. It’s not bidirectional, there’s no way to sync the actual parameter with the hardware knob, and you lose the ability to change that parameter in the software or on the device, which is a complete showstopper for me personally.

MIDI implementation on current gen hardware is very limited, unfortunately. To put it mildly in a diplomatic manner.
 
vangrieg said:
Fractool has a sysex sniffer but you need to solve some riddle to get access to it. I couldn’t figure it out.

I spent some time trying to reverse engineer the sysex comms but I don’t have enough time for this.
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Yeah I did this sort of thing as well and ultimately abandoned the project because it would take so much time to map all the params, their value ranges and whatnot. I tried to figure out how to query all this stuff from the Axe-Fx 3 (like Axe-Edit does) but could never get it working. I'm just not well versed enough with bit manipulation since I never use it in my professional programming life.

vangrieg said:
So the only way to do have hardware knobs controlling parameters is to assign them to CCs in settings, but that is a bad solution. It’s not bidirectional, there’s no way to sync the actual parameter with the hardware knob, and you lose the ability to change that parameter in the software or on the device, which is a complete showstopper for me personally.
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Exactly. One direction would be actually fine, if Fractal supported relative values (CC value <64 for value down, >64 for value up). Then all you'd need is to send "I want to adjust this value in this direction" to the Fractal and how many times in a given timeframe that occurs is what determines how much the value changes.

vangrieg said:
MIDI implementation on current gen hardware is very limited, unfortunately. To put it mildly in a diplomatic manner.
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Woefully inadequate is how I'd describe it. 16 external parameter controllers is just not a lot, and everything else is footswitch related - and still not as good as the FC controllers because there's no bi-directional communication to report state back to your MIDI controller.
 
You said you are used to using foot controllers for this, why not do that with your Axe which supports multiple expression pedals?
 
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