I started building this ages ago to play live with ableton, my other midi controller(UC33) is on it’s last legs, and i was never really happy with it anyway.
I had a big break from building but have decided to finish it off.
Basically it’s setup like a 6 channel mixer with 3 band eqs, 2 sends, 1 mute button, 1 launch button, and 1 encoder per channel. It also has 4 joysticks to control fx, and a rather dodgy monome ripoff, which i’m not 100% sure will work yet. If it doesn’t i’ll just add more encoders instead.
I am a student, so i’ve been trying to do this on the cheap. I’m pretty pleased with how it’s coming along. The only thing that i’ve screwed up so far is the drilling of the front panel isn’t as square as it could be.
some more pics, this is how i’m doing backlit buttons.
10mm leds with the top sanded flat, glued to the top of tact switches. It looks a bit dodgy but it’s actually really sturdy and looks like it will work fine.
Let me tell you, ableton 6 has lots and lots of new MIDI futures. You might wanna use them with your box, so stop building, get ableton 6, and continue building
It has support for multi-midi-commands (unlimited crossfaders for everything), group-params, etc.
I would really really really want to take a look at that, if I were you.
I will check it out, a friend has it. Even so I don’t think this controller will change much as i’m fairly set in the way i play live, and i’m not far off finishing it.
yea sounds like agood idea id like to see this box fineshed you can all ways build another for live6 but by the time you finish it live 7 will be available oh well thats life i suppose
I’m thinking of maybe having a small redesign. I was thinking of using the 4 buttons on top of the matrix to toggle between different setups, but i might add extra buttons for this
I have an encoder for each channel, these will be assigned to control insert fx parameters on specific to each channel.
I’m thinking of adding a multi colour led and a small button to switch between the parameters of the encoder. The led will show a specific colour for each parameter. So this brings me to a question:
Is it possible in the midibox 64e firmware to toggle through individual encoder assignments, or am i limited to toggling complete snapshots?
I’ve ditched the button matrix idea and will be replacing them with a 4x4 button encoder matrix with multicolour leds. But in the mean time I have been trying to get it working without the matrix.
I’ve uploaded mios and 64e firmware, but am having some troubles getting any midi output.
Anyway a couple of more pics including the new stronger case i found for it:
Patstormont, your controller looks cool. I like those big retro knobs, but seams there is no enough room between them for one finger and should be enough for two if you are turning neighbouring knobs.
That tool case is great, I used same kind of case to make pooreman`s laptop by integrating Dell bookshellf PC and 15" TFT.
…i was going to use atool case just like this one until i decided to completely build the case from scratch
Me too for my future proyect, after I saw how you did it. Great job Kris!
Tool case is great, but I need to put in it so meny things now so it is not big enough. Pooremans laptop havent got controller integrated. Really no space left.
yeah the main volume knobs are a bit big, but i don’t think it’ll be too much of a problem. The main reason i’ve used those knobs is they were really cheap, 30c each.(about USD25c)
i’m getting closer to getting it working, I think my ain boards are dodgy. Probably because i etched them myself. :
Great job Kris!
I alweys do my panels of cardboard first! Very usefull. Almost every time I hange somethinh afetr I see it in real.