AudioMedia - January 2009 - (Page 54)

If you’re looking for a portable or semi-portable controller for your DAW, RICHARD WENTK offers a selection of the current suspects. B udget third-party controllers have sprouted where high-end designs have feared to tread, and the explosion of interest in loop players like Ableton Live and studio-in-a-box packages like Reason has spawned an entire support industry of small, inexpensive, and often unexpectedly interesting support hardware. While cheaper hardware struggles with the one-control-per-feature design ideal that is implicit on professional consoles, this is as much a problem created by the proliferation of complicated plug-ins as it is by the limitations of what’s possible in a small affordable box. Eventually assignable multi-touch interfaces with smart labelling will take over the industry. In the meantime, some controllers are starting to offer simpler auto-labelling, but for now most are still limited by how much you can remember and how much page switching you can be bothered to do. This isn’t a huge limitation – having eight faders and a few switches in a small box can move you beyond mouse mixing hell. Going further into dynamic assignability and plug-in control is very much an optional complication, not an essential feature. What makes these budget products appealing is their flexibility – you can build a -fader mini-console to your own specification for less than the cost of your DAW software. Alternatively, most of these boxes are small enough to travel with, so you can pack them up and take them with you to sessions, or even work with them in a hotel room. C ontrol Mini third-party controllers in THE REVIEWER RICHARD WENTK is the owner of Skydancer Media, a digital production company providing sound, image, design, and consultancy services to various clients in London and the West Country. From GB including contract www.store.apple.com/uk The iPhone has started to make unexpected inroads into the pro-audio market by offering a selection of more or less affordable DAW and audio control applications that use its WiFi support and multi-touch interface. While the screen isn’t large, the tactile and configurable nature of the interface means that it can switch quickly between displaying faders, buttons, transport controls, switches, XY pads, and MIDI keyboards. With multi-touch, these function exactly as their hardware equivalents do – if you have enough fingers, you can press all of the keys on a MIDI keyboard at the same time, and they’ll all send out note messages in the usual way. The collection of applications started with an up-market Mackie HUI emulator for use with ProTools, but has since spawned a collection of more open-ended interfaces that cost a few pounds or are free. The one wrinkle is that these open interfaces tend to send information over the OSC protocol rather than MIDI. Because most DAWs can’t yet understand OSC, an extra application like Reaktor or Max/MSP is essential to do the translation. This makes assembly more complicated than it really should be. But for those with the patience and perseverance, practical multi-touch has a very direct hands-on appeal. Apple iPhone assignable control in a small but expandable space. The BCF fader box includes a bank of eight mm motorised faders, with two assignable switches and a single rotary for each. The display is a very minimal numeric LED, so don’t expect much help with plug-in parameter assignments. But it’s difficult to argue with eight motorised faders that can be synced to most DAWs, especially when they come in a box this small and portable. The BCR rotary offers an alternative approach with a bank of x digital rotaries, with another couple of switches and an extra separate rotary with a different LED indicator system. The visual display is another numeric LED, so once again, assignments aren’t easy to read. But both the fader and rotary boxes include small scribble strips, and if your handwriting is small enough you can write on these in the traditional way to remind yourself what each control does. Ak ai MPD32 B ehringer BCF2000 Fader/ BCR2000 R otar y GB /GB www.behringer.com Behringer’s expandable control surface one-two punch is almost ridiculously affordable, but offers some powerful GB www.akaipro.com The MPD is an obvious spin-off from Akai’s historical sample triggering boxes and sequenced drum machines, so the emphasis is less on mixing and more on sample triggering and performance. Most of the control area is taken up with supersized pads, which are both velocity and pressure sensitive, and further bank switching extends the total pad count to . There are also eight assignable rotaries, eight faders, eight switches, and extra inputs for two-foot switches and a continuous > 54 AUDIO MEDIA JANUARY 2009 http://www.store.apple.com/uk http://www.akaipro.com http://www.behringer.com

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AudioMedia - January 2009 Contents Recording News Post News Broadcast News Geo Focus: India What's Up UK? Special Report: Pimp My Ride AKG C214 Sony Acid Pro 7.0 Final Cut: Mirror's Edge Opportunities in the Reality World She's Got the Look The X-Factor Sadie LRX2 Source Elements Source-Connect 3.1 Buying a Recorder In Control Product Sampler: Trade Shows Video Guide AMSR News Digico SD8 The Last Picture Show File Server

AudioMedia - January 2009

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