Melodyne expiration

[Gary Shore]

Just found out that,unlike what I had been mistakenly assuming,when the 30-day trial version of Melodyne Player expires,it doesn't become the Essentials version...see it's there when I went to Region FX and tried to use it to convert a bass audio clip to MIDI but,as I'm new to both using Melodyne as well as doing this,wasn't sure if the fact that the resulting straight line on the MIDI track instead of MIDI data when I dragged/copied the Melodyne audio clip there was due to the version having expired or my own unfamiliarity with how to do things...

Was able to play the clip through the TTS-1 but using SI Bass only got a "sine wave"....

Saw the audio waveform in the Melodyne Editor but wasn't able to lasso select or get things to work...having spent the day familiarizing myself with how to use the Essentials version by studying some YouTube tutorials,I wasn't sure how to go about things....

Have a bunch of tracks I was planning on using the various MIDI/VST options available in Cakewalk to replace the audio bass track with(TTS-1/SI Bass/SI Strings Bass)but not sure what's up with all this and could use some feedback here...

I posted this thread a while back about this same subject and was operating  under the impression that using the info I received then would be how I'd go about doing things...guess things have changed since then w/various updates versions of CbBL having happened......

.As I'm completely new to this stuff,I'd welcome any info about other (preferably free)plug-in options for doing the audio-midi conversion as well as something that would be able to do pitch correction if possible (as I had been thinking Essentials would....)

As always,much thanks to everyone here who's taken the time to reply to my previous threads and get me on the right track with the DAW....

[Kurre]

I bought waves "Tune" on sale for 29.95 and am satisfied with the result converting audio to midi.

Though their plugin manager is a bit irritating installing tons of vst's where 1 would be enough.

The price varies, so right now it's a bit high but probably would decrease in a month or two.

[Gary Shore]

To what extent are you able to use it within the DAW itself like Region FX /Melodyne set-up?

After checking out a bunch of options,I realized many would possibly not be compatible w/CbBL and might require getting into having to export the audio wav,convert it to MIDI then re-import it etc..not sure how all this would work and what other factors might be involved such as bit depth and other various technical stuff I'm still getting a handle on...

My focus here is having a set-up in place that allows for the DAW audio-MIDI/pitch adjustment approach to be as instantaneous/low-stress as possible(as I had been expecting the Melodyne/Region FX  techniques I'd be studying in the tutorials to be...)

I've been working on the bass parts for these tracks for a while,tried various ways of processing the audio track to get the results I was after and ultimately decided to go the way of bass replacement...took  a look at the options,liked many of the different settings and was looking forward to getting into trying out different bass sounds in the context of the track,so yesterday's' experiences threw me...where I'd been ready to get started checking this stuff out and figuring out an empowered approach to things I'm new to,instead I found myself spending hours trying to figure out what was going on,emailing Celemony support,finding out the version had expired,then posting this thread here and on the FB Cakewalk groups as well...

After a while of continuing to react to this stuff,my decision was to go online and look around for a version of Melodyne to replace the expired one..think I've found one(Studio 4 VST delivered through the Cloud at a very affordable price),and so I think my focus will be on being able to uninstall the expired version and set this new one up in its place to work seamlessly as part of the standard Region FX  processes.....

 

[msmcleod]

Dragging the audio clip to a MIDI track *should* still work, even if your trial has ended.

[Gary Shore]

Mark-

Really appreciate your taking the time to post here..have been learning a lot from all your thread posts here in Cakewalk Discuss...

This was what I assumed as well,however,here's the email reply I got yesterday from Celemony support after checking with them to see if after the trial period expiration the Player version still operates within the DAW with limited functionality.....,

From: "Celemony support / J&ouml;rg H&uuml;ttner" <support@celemony.com>
Date: 3/18/20 6:30 pm
To: "gary@garyshorecomposermusician.com" <gary@garyshorecomposermusician.com>
 

Dear Gary,

Indeed only a 30 days trial can be used for the period of the trial - so 30 days. Once the trial expires it can be used to play back any edits done previously with the trial, but no edits can be done anymore whatsoever (hence the product shows up as “Melodyne player”). Also audio-to-midi is not operational anymore.

 

Best wishes,

Jörg Hüttner

 

Finding out it doesn't,although I was able to use it to set up a MIDI track, I think the results as described above in my initial thread posting-

-no MIDI data on track

-SI Bass producing sine wave instead of pitches/rhythmic pattern

-as well as something else I didn't understand that happened when I duplicated the bass track to set up a Region FX clip-the other 3 bass tracks,although not selected,still were affected by the selected clip and had Region FX applied..

-along with both a long wait period for a very short clip to convert to MIDI while the blue spinning line continued and it appeared as if the conversion process was affecting all the tracks to some extent,looked like the FX bins were going on and off etcetc..new to this and was unsure about what I was seeing... but having gotten used to what goes on when bouncing to clips my sense was that things weren't working correctly...

 

-suggest that,even if it is usable to some extent ,it still isn't doing what it's supposed to(thus the Celemony info) and being new to all this,rather than messing around with stuff I don't understand instead of getting to work on figuring out which of the available bass replacement options sound best for these tracks,I've decided to get a replacement version of Melodyne and focus on uninstalling the expired version and setting up the new one to work seamlessly within Region FX...

However,if I'm incorrect and the support email is also misleading(in other words,it works to some extent but doesn't create the midi data on the track the Region FX Melodyne clip is dragged to),I'd appreciate your continued feedback here along with anyone else who's inclined to weigh in...

Again as I stated in the previous post,my focus is  on the bass replacement processes themselves and not continuing to have to deal with any DAW-specific technical stuff past the point of setting things up to work as they're supposed to....

Edited March 19, 2020 by Gary Shore

[Kurre]

You seem to have decided to buy Melodyne but for other readers not so sure:

Waves Tune:

You drag your wav-file to a track. You drag Waves Tune from audio fx to the track and its fx-bin. You play your wav-file and WT scans it and converts it to midi. It's done 5-10 sec after the wav-file finish play.

If for some reason it doesn't sync with the play line there is a Rewire plugin that comes with it and you drag that to an empty track2 and the sync should work. I've never had to do that.

[Gary Shore]

No decision yet,and this info is exactly what I'm looking for man thx for posting it and continuing to reply..BTW does this plug-in do any of the other Melodyne stuff or is it solely for audio-MIDI conversion?

[Kurre]

(Obs. It's the scan that takes 5-10 sec to be done after playing.)

I have to confess that i've only used Melodyne once so...i know the theory.

That's just who i am. I'll be interrested in something and test it once. Then i'll move on to the next thing and when i come back after some months...if it's a trial/demo it don't work any longer. I tend to stay away from trials/demos.

Aside from that, WT has two different versions. Waves Tune and Waves Tune real time. Real time is to pitch correct live performance. Waves Tune is an editor and you can edit the audio scan, note by note, in different ways before converting it to midi or save it as a new wav with the corrections you made.

Ok, i'll shut up now. I'm hearing myself as a salesman for Waves and that's no fun. I don't like salesmen.

It's just that i was so happy to see that it worked ok with that affordable price. I don't have the money to buy extremely priced software as Melodyne. (I don't pay for stripped down software. That's just developers way to milking it and get away with it.) (And the technology of it is over 10 years old so it is like selling a 10 year old car for the same price as it was launched.)

I've read up on tuning software and it seems all of them have the flaw that the resulting midi has to be cleaned up a bit. Notes with very short duration often have to be deleted afterwards.

Edited March 20, 2020 by Kurre
Correction.

[Kurre]

It just hit me what the biggest difference is.

Waves Tune has a rather tiny not scalable window.

[Gary Shore]

Appreciate the continued info...

When you say you can edit the auto scan note by note,does this allow for the type of pitch center adjustment(not by semitones but by cents)that Melodyne does?

[msmcleod]

@Gary Shore - did you install Melodyne via BandLab assistant? 

CbB uses ARA directly to perform the audio to MIDI conversion outside of the Melodyne interface, so while you can't use it as a Region FX or plugin when the trial is over, you should still be able to drag clips from an audio track to an empty MIDI track to do conversion from audio to MIDI.

If this has stopped working, I'd advise uninstalling Melodyne and re-install it via BandLab assistant.

As far as alternatives, I find MAutoPitch ( https://www.meldaproduction.com/MAutoPitch ) fantastic for just doing vocal tuning, and best of all it's free. Although you can't edit it in the same way as Melodyne, you can automate it in & out as necessary.  When I've used this method, I'll usually "bounce to clip(s)" afterwards to make it permanent.
 

[Gary Shore]

Hey Mark!!

Thanks again for continuing to reply here...

Yes I installed it along w/the SI Instruments/Drum Replacer from BL Assistant...

Based on what you're telling me above as well as what I described as the results of my initial processes,I'm thinking my mistake was in setting up the Region-FX on the clip as an intermediate step between dragging it to the MIDI track...

What you're saying if I understand you correctly is that,although the trial version has expired and the info from Celemony is correct in that the Region-FX process is similarly unavailable,the ARA function is still operating within the DAW based on the special license you're referring to...

I appreciate the info as well about the MAutoPitch plug-in,however I've been looking at the V-Vocal Region-FX option and thinking this would work just a well....

Not entirely sure yet about the workflow involved as it seems from my initial looking over the Reference Guide info that the V-Vocal processes have to be done on the audio waveform itself prior to MIDI conversion...

Still studying this as I got some info  over on one of the FB groups about using  the  ASP Audio>MIDI processes and prior to your reply had been considering doing this,then using the PRV to set up the actual bass line pitches....

Since it's a fairly simple repeated pattern with some variations that could easily be  done this way,along with the V-Vocal pitch correction, I was thinking I'd be able to have an effective workaround in place to effectuate what I had initially been trying to get going with Melodyne the other day as described in the initial thread....

However if easily producing the MIDI track off the audio can be done as you describe,this would be a much better option and I'm going to look into this later on today along with continuing to study the V-Vocal info....

Any continued feedback about this would be something I'd be very interested in...

[Gary Shore]

Here's an update on what happened yesterday when I got into working with these processes -

First off let me preface this by including that the track itself is a long one (7 + min)...

Wanting to make sure that I kept the original project intact,I set up a couple of copies,one to experiment with the ASP processes described in the previous post above and one to see if msmcleods' approach would work,dragging the clip to a MIDI track...

Although I was able to create a MIDI clip using the ASP approach,adjusting both the velocity settings in the ASP dialogue box as well as using Process-Length as indicated in the Reference Guide,since the ASP works on transients and the process of converting audio>MIDI using ASP is described as being for percussion tracks,I found the resulting MIDI track would require a lot of PRV processes to sound anything like the bass line audio did,especially in terms of note lengths..Having done a lot of work on the bass line already,I decided to rule this option out ....

Moving to the second option,I bounced the duplicated track,set up the MIDI track,and drag/copied (as well as drag/moved to see if that would work)the audio to the MIDI track...

Each time I tried this,the result was-

Initially the "Initializing Regions/Analyzing Audio/Mixing Down Audio"succession of events (paralleling the "Bounce to Clips" processes I'm familiar with and have done without any problem,something that takes either a second or a little longer depending the clips' length)started off as I'd expect,but after a couple of minutes started "hanging up",usually on "Analyzing Audio"...the line would go about halfway in the box on the Now Time display then stop,and the blue spinning line would continue without any further processes...

More importantly,I had to go into the taskbar Cakewalk icon right-click menu to close the program each time,and got the "Not Responding"/"Wait while Windows reports the problem to Microsoft" dialogue..the kind of thing I don't want to mess with using the DAW....

As well,some of these attempts led to crash dumps being created.....

A short segment of the full-length clip worked however,although the ensuing process suggested to me things weren't working as they were supposed to....Took a long time,saw the clip selection show Melodyne in the name for an instant,and things were blinking on and off on the other tracks like the Mute button,the FX bin...Unlike the usual way things work in the DAW,I had the impression I was watching a Twilight Zone episode where  one of those huge old early 60's computers suddenly malfunctions,sending out a long paper data sheet and emitting smoke while everything goes haywire....

I worked with the resulting short clip for a while,then decided to try another short clip from a different section which had a more developed bass line melodically to see what the results using the MIDI options would be...

However,although I set up a new copy of the project to do this,the only result now was "Track not responding"followed by a repeat of the above described closing down the DAW processes using the taskbar... 

So as someone who is still getting used to doing things "in the box",musically focused instead of being a tech wizard,and easily rattled by the sense of things not working as they're supposed to....you can imagine where I'm at,with tracks that are just about ready for the mixing/mastering stage except for this situation with the bass tracks.....

Spent some time investigating all the various locations on both my laptop itself as well in the Plug-In manager where Melodyne is installed...and made sure to delete both the copied project version that had led to the unwanted phenomena described here as well as the Melodyne folders connected to it from my  C-drive Downloads each time,thinking this might lead to some better results...however....????

Wondering about uninstalling then reinstalling the expired trial version using BL assistant for the ARA function re-msmcleods' thread above...

[scook]

On 3/19/2020 at 3:50 PM, msmcleod said:

Dragging the audio clip to a MIDI track *should* still work, even if your trial has ended.

Do you know which algorithms are used when the trial expires? IIRC, there are 3 monophonic algos: Universal, Percussive and Melodic. Is it set up to automatically switch between them based on the clip or is it set to use one of them?

[msmcleod]

1 minute ago, scook said:

Do you know which algorithms are used when the trial expires? IIRC, there are 3 monophonic algos: Universal, Percussive and Melodic. Is it set up to automatically switch between them based on the clip or is it set to use one of them?

When I last spoke to Noel about this, he said it used whatever one Melodyne was set to... so I guess that would be the last one you set it to within Melodyne's UI.

Now this has got me wondering... if you were using the trial, and it was previously set it to one of the polyphonic modes... that might explain it not working.

[scook]

May be able determine this from the com.celemony.melodyne.plist file in %appdata%\Celemony Software GmbH

I believe the default algo is stored in MUAnalyzerParameterDefaultSetPrefKey

 

[Gary Shore]

Much thx to you guys for posting above-

Haven't opened Melodyne itself at all since getting the email back from Celemony support(see above earlier thread from a couple days ago)as I've been assuming that it's' just the ARA aspect of having it installed that's still operative(re-Marks' take on things) and anything else relating to specific settings as Scook referred to aren't...interested in seeing what Noel has to say once he gets a chance to look things over.....

I'm focused on resolving things here ASAP instead of having to deal with the technical aspects of the audio-MIDI conversion in the DAW as the tracks are just about ready to mix/master and want to get into the bass replacement,to that end I've been checking out versions of Melodyne online to get and install if anything I try as suggested here ultimately continues producing the same dysfunctional results......

[msmcleod]

1 hour ago, scook said:

May be able determine this from the com.celemony.melodyne.plist file in %appdata%\Celemony Software GmbH

I believe the default algo is stored in MUAnalyzerParameterDefaultSetPrefKey

 

@scook is correct - this is where it's stored.

The values look like this for the various default modes:

Universal:        <string>com.celemony.analyzerParameterSet.polyphonicUnpitched</string>
Percussive:        <string>com.celemony.analyzerParameterSet.percussive</string>
Melodic:         <string>com.celemony.analyzerParameterSet.melodic</string>
Polyphonic Sustain:    <string>com.celemony.analyzerParameterSet.polyphonic</string>
Polyphonic Decay:    <string>com.celemony.analyzerParameterSet.polyphonicWithDistinctAttacks</string>

I've found best results for Audio->MIDI are from Melodic (or Polyphonic Sustain if you have Editor or Studio).

Be VERY careful when editing this file though. If you get one of them wrong, it'll crash Cakewalk.

[Gary Shore]

Appreciate this info,going to look into things again at some point today and will post the results once I do...

[Gary Shore]

 

Just opened Melodyne in the original project I used it in(another project from a month or 2 back when it was just installed)...

Saw the algorithm  is in fact set to Melodic from the default dropdown although the initial screen shows everything greyed out....

[Gary Shore]

I spent some time checking all the locations on my laptop where I had Melodyne installed and am wondering  if the type of things I've been experiencing might be due to my not having understood the initial installation processes and consequently having one version(4.1.11 /VST3/ 64 bit /In 2 Out 2)actually installed in the DAW while also having both the 32 and 64 bit versions of the suggested update(4.2.4.001)installed on my laptop as standalone apps independent from the DAW....

(I installed these according to the screen that came up when I used Melodyne initially after the BandLab Assistant add-on installation process under the impression that the version in the DAW would automatically be updated..)

Thinking this might be the case,and after checking out some online info about it and finding that having both 32 and 64-bit versions of the same plug-in installed could potentially lead to problems,I uninstalled the 32-bit version,however I hesitated to uninstall the 64-bit as info I saw  when the Control Panel screen came up showed both> 

-the version in the DAW instead of the update

-as well as the Melodyne Runtime,suggesting this was connected to the version in the DAW itself.

After uninstalling the 32-bit version of the update,I repeated the drag- to-MIDI track process to see if that had fixed things,but got the same result..

I'm thinking this might be due to the project being connected to the OS 's previous status and when the DAW goes to activate Melodyne it can't figure out which of the versions to go through or something like this..will try setting up  a new copy of the project to see if this might be the case a little later on...

Figured I'd review all the info I have about where things are on the laptop as I'm fairly new to using one as well as the DAW itself and still familiarizing myself with various locations where things are installed/stored..want to get a clear definite understanding of this so I could provide it if needed ...