Wah, pitch, and volume with one expression pedal?

sirus1987

Inspired
I feel like this is probably a dumb question that been asked several times, but is it possible to set both the pitch and wah to IA switches so that when I select an effect it is off, but ready for auto engage on the EV-1 and then when both are off it acts as a volume pedal? I feel like that would be the ultimate way to set it up
 
I feel like this is probably a dumb question that been asked several times, but is it possible to set both the pitch and wah to IA switches so that when I select an effect it is off, but ready for auto engage on the EV-1 and then when both are off it acts as a volume pedal? I feel like that would be the ultimate way to set it up
Hi!
This is quite complex, I tried to do it just yesterday, but failed. Why don't you try using scenes? It works pretty well.
P.S.: tried to do it few minutes ago once again. Failed once again.
 
You can but the routing and switching can be tricky if you want to use auto-engage with it. You'll need to assign the expression pedal to all the desired blocks at the same time and then use other blocks to control the signal flow in order to select which one you want to actually hear. You can use null filter blocks set to Mute Out bypass mode behind the pitch and wah blocks to work as a path selector. If the two can be placed in parallel, you can also use a mixer block instead to select between them. Auto Engage will turn the wah and pitch blocks on at the same time if enabled on those blocks and the pedal will still control the assigned parameter in each, but you'll only hear the one whose following filter block is enabled or is selected via the mixer block. For Wah, Pitch, and Volume, you'll also need two IA switches, one to select between either wah or pitch effects and the other to select between volume or effect. You could also use scenes in place of IAs to handle the switching too.
 
You can but the routing and switching can be tricky if you want to use auto-engage with it. You'll need to assign the expression pedal to all the desired blocks at the same time and then use other blocks to control the signal flow in order to select which one you want to actually hear. You can use null filter blocks set to Mute Out bypass mode behind the pitch and wah blocks to work as a path selector. If the two can be placed in parallel, you can also use a mixer block instead to select between them. Auto Engage will turn the wah and pitch blocks on at the same time if enabled on those blocks and the pedal will still control the assigned parameter in each, but you'll only hear the one whose following filter block is enabled or is selected via the mixer block. For Wah, Pitch, and Volume, you'll also need two IA switches, one to select between either wah or pitch effects and the other to select between volume or effect. You could also use scenes in place of IAs to handle the switching too.

That method where you use two IA switches sounds perfect. Could you elaborate on that a little more, or better yet, would you mind fixing my patch up for it?
 

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  • Bogner Rig Q 7.00.syx
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And I would set it up using scenes, but I have scenes 1-5 setup like amp channels (clean, pushed, crunch, heavy rhythm, lead) and I want to be able to do this on any scene.
 
If your expression pedal has a toe down switch then it's relatively easy to change between volume and wah. The switch turns the wah block on and the volume block off, and vice versa. If not then you have to dedicate an IA button to the job. Adding pitch as a third alternative gets you into the null filter routing which mr_fender described.

On a personal note: I prefer to auto engage the wah from a dedicated pedal so that I can nip in and out for single notes. I also get into trouble with wah/volume switching on the same pedal, and have been known to leave the wah turned on.
 
If your expression pedal has a toe down switch then it's relatively easy to change between volume and wah. The switch turns the wah block on and the volume block off, and vice versa. If not then you have to dedicate an IA button to the job. Adding pitch as a third alternative gets you into the null filter routing which mr_fender described.

On a personal note: I prefer to auto engage the wah from a dedicated pedal so that I can nip in and out for single notes. I also get into trouble with wah/volume switching on the same pedal, and have been known to leave the wah turned on.

It does not have the switch, Im using the EV-1. I would like the option where I can switch it over to wah or pitch with auto engage so I can set the volume and then have it ready for expression effects. I also like the idea of the volume being locked in place until I am ready to change it. Im still a bit unsure of how to route my patch for this. Could you go into more detail, or possibly even show me in the patch I posted up there ^
 
Give this a try. External Controller 3 is setup to select between volume and effect sweeps. External Controller 4 is setup to select between wah and whammy. You might also want to change the auto-engage off value for both the wah and whammy blocks to be at toe down (95%) instead of heel down (5%). That way when you switch over to the volume block, it will be at full volume instead of silence. Preset was edited with my XL running 7.0 Beta 2.
 

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  • Bogner Rig Q 7.00 expr.syx
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Here's an example of the same exp pedal controlling 3 different things:
scene 1 (row 1) uses exp 1 to control delay mix
scene 2 (row 2) uses exp 1 to control wah
scene 3 (row 3) uses exp 1 to control volume for swells

I set the volume block to on when I want that row/scene to function (bypass mode is set to mute in a 3 volume blocks). So when i mute the other 2 volume block it kills those rows.

scene 1.png scene 2.png scene 3.png
 
Give this a try. External Controller 3 is setup to select between volume and effect sweeps. External Controller 4 is setup to select between wah and whammy. You might also want to change the auto-engage off value for both the wah and whammy blocks to be at toe down (95%) instead of heel down (5%). That way when you switch over to the volume block, it will be at full volume instead of silence. Preset was edited with my XL running 7.0 Beta 2.
Thank you! So does this setup require a selector switch to switch from volume to the effects? I currently only own an expression pedal. I was hoping for a way to assign this to IA switches and Im a little confused on how to set that up. Im not very tech savvy on any level.
 
Here's an example of the same exp pedal controlling 3 different things:
scene 1 (row 1) uses exp 1 to control delay mix
scene 2 (row 2) uses exp 1 to control wah
scene 3 (row 3) uses exp 1 to control volume for swells

I set the volume block to on when I want that row/scene to function (bypass mode is set to mute in a 3 volume blocks). So when i mute the other 2 volume block it kills those rows.

View attachment 38193 View attachment 38194 View attachment 38195
Yeah I thought about setting it up using scenes, but I have scenes 1-5 set up like different amp channels for varying levels of gain and need the expression functions to work on every channel globally
 
One thing you can do is put your wah and whammy in parallel, then setup the controller curves so 0 to 50% of the pedal controls the wah from 0 to 100%, and 50% to 100% of the pedal moves the whammy from 0% to 100%. Then put a mixer after those two blocks and have the pedal control it to sharply switch from the wah to the whammy around 50%. That gives you an expression pedal that is a wah during the first half of its travel, and a whammy during the second half of its travel.
 
Thank you! So does this setup require a selector switch to switch from volume to the effects? I currently only own an expression pedal. I was hoping for a way to assign this to IA switches and Im a little confused on how to set that up. Im not very tech savvy on any level.

Yes, you'll need additional controllers to be able to select between volume and effects as well as between wah and pitch. Do you have a MIDI controller, or do you have your expression pedal plugged directly into the Axe?
 
Yes, you'll need additional controllers to be able to select between volume and effects as well as between wah and pitch. Do you have a MIDI controller, or do you have your expression pedal plugged directly into the Axe?
I have an EV-1 plugged into the MFC
 
You can setup two of the MFC's IA switches as general use IA's by setting their AxeFX functions to NONE in the MFC's MIDI menu. Then, set their MIDI CC numbers to those for external controllers 3 and 4 (CC#'s 18 and 19 respectively). I used external controllers 3 and 4 because I have two expression pedals and external controller 2 was already in use in my setup. You could change the controller numbers to whichever you wanted for your setup. General use IA's are described in the MFC manual on page 24. You could also plug a couple of external expression switches into the MFC and use those if you don't want to give up your regular IA's. That's the way I have my rig setup. I've got two Ernie Ball Jr. expression pedals on controllers 1 and 2 and a four switch extension for the MFC for controllers 3 through 6. For your preset, I used the bottom two switches on the extension, which were controllers 3 and 4. The extension is one from @Roadrunner from this thread here and it works great: https://forum.fractalaudio.com/threads/the-first-ever-extension-module-for-mfc-101.60819/
 
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Its doable, but its also confusing (at least it was for me)

There are some pretty good deals on EXP pedals these days. I personally like buying old Ernie Ball VP Jr's for about $25, changing the pot to a liner taper for $10, and having a couple of compact pedals with a great travel for minimal cash. Advantage of course is that you always know that a given pedal is wah, another is volume etc, for each patch/scene your playing.

I've set them up to do double duty before and yes it works, but I'll be playing for example scene 3, and think I have a wah active, but its actually a whammy, so then I need to switch to scene 2 to get the wah, and scene 2 might of have a different amp selected.

If your really methodical with your presets/scenes and know exactly what to select for a given part of a song it works, and works well, but I like to improv a bit more with what tone/preset I use for a given song, so having all my pedals do the same task across patches makes life simple.
 
You can setup two of the MFC's IA switches as general use IA's by setting their AxeFX functions to NONE in the MFC's MIDI menu. Then, set their MIDI CC numbers to those for external controllers 3 and 4 (CC#'s 18 and 19 respectively). I used external controllers 3 and 4 because I have two expression pedals and external controller 2 was already in use in my setup. You could change the controller numbers to whichever you wanted for your setup. General use IA's are described in the MFC manual on page 24. You could also plug a couple of external expression switches into the MFC and use those if you don't want to give up your regular IA's. That's the way I have my rig setup. I've got two Ernie Ball Jr. expression pedals on controllers 1 and 2 and a four switch extension for the MFC for controllers 3 through 6. For your preset, I used the bottom two switches on the extension, which were controllers 3 and 4. The extension is one from @Roadrunner from this thread here and it works great: https://forum.fractalaudio.com/threads/the-first-ever-extension-module-for-mfc-101.60819/

Thats an awesome start, thank you! Now the only other thing I wanna do with it is lokc the volume in place when I hit the IA switch that controls volume so I can set the volume where ever I need it and then use the wah and pitch. Also so I dont accidentally change the volume from where I set it. Right now when I hit the IA switch for volume off, it goes all the way back up to full volume
 
The only way to share the controller with a volume block an not hear the volume change is to bypass the block, which returns it to unity gain when on Thru bypass mode. There's no way to lock the value at fixed point when also using the controller for something else. You'd need to assign the volume control to a separate controller for that. In other words, you'd need a second expression pedal dedicated to volume.
 
...you'd need a second expression pedal dedicated to volume.
I think this is the best solution, both for simplicity and for flexibility. When you're painting with so many colors at once, it's so much better when you have more than one brush.
 
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