Questions on the Idea Tool

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I'm confused on a number of issues on the Idea Tool and I often think it would be great to use it but then I try and I go away confused. In this video I try to explain some of my confusions and the discrepancies between I expect will happen and what actually happens when I use it.

https://youtu.be/Np8Zd9C09S8
(i don't know if it's just me but the audio volume is very low, i know i tried to get rid of some background noise but this is too much. If it's not just an issue with Youtube just uploading it hopefully you can put your headphones/speakers so you can hear it... sooory! i tried to compensate for a noisy mic but this is worse i guess).

I see in there a lot of promise, and I have in fact used it a couple of times to some success... but recently I've been having trouble.

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yes volume was too low but fixable easily :)
..

OK.

watching carefully and taking my notes on the fly .. i might be repeat myself .. sorry in advance!

-Idea Tool uses only the "First" Line in the selected "Part(s)"
so in your case only the Part 1/ Line 1 get re generated via the Track Randomizers..

"would be great if we can use the track randomizers freely in the timeline just make loop selection and press to randomize to
fill selected space with the phrases :pray: "

about .. why you get only 1 phrase?
because Line and the Phrase has same lengths 16 beats (4 bars) means just one phrase "A"
this will fills the Line already so there is no room for "B" ...

- about AB... (hard coded formulas) thing !
what i would do:
first select the highest number for "Phrases: / Use:" so keep it always at max "8"
then switch to "Custom Order" (bottom of the Formulas Menu/Window)
then i would ignore/forget that hard coded formulas!
then i would type my manual orders/formulas freely as i need !
so AB AB AB AC AC AD .. etc.

with also defining their lengths !
like: (4 means 1 bar)
A8A4A4B8B4C4D8 go crazy!
but remember in this case Phrase Lengths are important for using in this case "A8" phrase length must be 8beats or more ..

the Bar number you entered (top of the IT window) will be used only
when you use the Main Randomize function to create
with the "Replace Composition" or "Add New Part " functions
so .. when you use Main Randomize to create an Arrangement from scratch!
....

around at 5:05
you can add more generators of course if you want different settings in them
IT will randomly pick them as i know

around at 5:55
Vivaldi Phrases are 3/4 (maybe 6/8) time signature and they are 6 beats long .. so actually not compatible with the 4/4 time
signature that's why track filled with just 3 of them..

around 9:05
you are trying
"Select scale and generate progression based on rule" in the IT
this means you also need to select the "Chord Rules:" relevant to the "Scale:" you pick
if you click to ""Default Major Scale Rules (54...""
you will see the new rules like Mozart Harmonic Minor , Bach Harmonic Minor etc.

around 14:50
again phrase length is long (16 beats / 4 bars) : same as Line length!
there is no room for 2nd phrase ..
also for the Melody Generators because of Line length and Generator length you can get only 2 Melody Generators..


if i try to summarize all..

--it would be great if the Idea Tool / Track Randomizers
would work for selected/looped timeline .. not only for the first Line of the selected Part..
short of ability to generate anywhere we need in the time line via timeline selection?

--currently you should be aware of the Line length and Phrase/Generator lengths when you randomize on "Track based!"
the Main Randomize can creates the Line lengths also as you need from scratch!

--i would use always the "Custom Order" to enter my formulas as i want!
it allows you define also Regular Phrase/Generator lengths ..
plus you can add "Rest" anywhere in the manual/custom formula you enter!

all i catch so far! .. please let me know if i miss anything obvious!

"Custom Order"
somehow Gif link didn't work from my drive...
.....
here is the zipped version if you still want to see it
https://drive.google.com/open?id=1hiP8C ... 8tD6uOhcfY

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Hello,

Please how is the Idea Tool assigning the Rhythms? For example if I select 3 rhythms, are they always ABCABCABC, are they random, etc? Or maybe they use the same sequence setting as the phrase?

About the variations, are they pseudo random based on the phrase average variation or do you have some setting for the sequence? Or maybe they use the same sequence setting as the phrase?

Thanks and best regards!

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The rhythms are randomly selected. For example if you have 5 rhythm patterns in the list, and you use 3 of them, then the idea tool will choose 3 items from 5 randomly and assigns A, B, C to the rhythms, which will be used in that order ABCABCABC...

Variations work similarly but independently of the phrases. They are not assigned randomly, there is a counter that is incremented with the 'average variation' count, and if that becomes bigger than 1.0, the necessary number of variations are added to the phrase, and the counter decreased with the variation count. So if you set 0.25 as the average variations/phrase, you can make sure every 4th phrase will include a variation. Or when using 2.5, phrase#1 will get 2 variations, phrase#2 will have 3, then 2, then 3, etc. Once the variations were initially selected randomly, always the same order is used. If we name the variations A, B, and C, when 1 variation is added, it is always A, when 2: AB, when 3: ABC always in this order. I am not sure I could explain this understandably...

Maybe it would make sense to allow the user to lock the order of variations in the order you have added them to the list.

Thanks,
Attila

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As I have not used the idea tool for quite a while and I am sure if I do I will stumble into the same problems (and other ones....) like iXaari:
- is there a good, understandable, easy to use tutorial/workflow description like "how to make your first song with the idea tool in RC in half an hour"

As I am kind of old-fashioned I would prefer text with pictures but of course a video would do, just something to get started.....

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+1

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I can recommend yellukhan's videos. No-one can explain the idea tool better.
Page 25 in the "A few custom phrases" topic is full of videos about the idea tool, but there are many more in that topic, if you look further:
viewtopic.php?f=168&t=401024&start=360

This is the documentation for the idea tool:
http://www.musicdevelopments.com/wiki/d ... w:ideatool

Thanks,
Attila

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musicdevelopments wrote: Thu Apr 04, 2019 8:23 am The rhythms are randomly selected. For example if you have 5 rhythm patterns in the list, and you use 3 of them, then the idea tool will choose 3 items from 5 randomly and assigns A, B, C to the rhythms, which will be used in that order ABCABCABC...

Variations work similarly but independently of the phrases. They are not assigned randomly, there is a counter that is incremented with the 'average variation' [...]
Hello, Attila.

Thank you very much for your explanation, it makes me understand a lot better the Idea Tool. Thanks! :-)

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You are welcome, David!
I like good questions ;)
Attila

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