Visual Bar Indicator

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Posts: 4
Joined: April 28, 2014 - 00:29
Visual Bar Indicator

Hi, this is most of all a question whether anyone here knows of such a this as this: I often have a couple of musicians playing along with a MIDI file - at present VanBasco Karaoke -> CoolSoft -> PA System.  It is very hard for them to keep time with the MIDI file. I dream of a light flashing the first beat of each bar for the players to keep time to. Does anyone know of such a setup?  If there is no such setup in existence, does anyone wish to join me in trying to bring it into existence?

Wayne McHugh

B.App.Sc.-Comp, B.Th.

"It's the job that's never started as takes longest to finish."

Posts: 1972
Joined: March 25, 2012 - 01:19
Re: Visual Bar Indicator
Wayne McHugh wrote:
Does anyone know of such a setup?

I don't, but I think the best way it is to intercept VanBasco MIDI OUT with some kind of MIDI splitter or MIDI processor (like MIDI-OX) and send it both to VirtualMIDISynth and to an hardware MIDI-OUT (maybe USB).
Then you can connect this MIDI-OUT to an external board that will "flash the light"; the first that comes to my mind is Arduino and its MIDI Shield.
Finally you have to wrote some Arduino code to detect interesting MIDI messages and power the light (or let MIDI-OX do the "hard filtering" work and flash the light on any MIDI message received...).

That's my 2 cents ;)

Posts: 1972
Joined: March 25, 2012 - 01:19
Re: Visual Bar Indicator

I also can suggest you to post the same question on MIDIKAR yahoo group.

It's a really good MIDI discussion group, with a lot of MIDI experts and passionates.
I'm sure that you'll find someone having a better idea than mine... ;)

Posts: 4
Joined: April 28, 2014 - 00:29
Re: Visual Bar Indicator

Thank you.  I will research what you have mentioned and post on the Yahoo group and see what comes.  By the way, I love your utility and it works a dream for what I need.

Wayne McHugh

B.App.Sc.-Comp, B.Th.

"It's the job that's never started as takes longest to finish."

Posts: 4
Joined: April 28, 2014 - 00:29
External call triggered by MIDI event

*** Joined here from a separate thread ***

Hi. What I am trying to achieve is to flash a USB light on the first beat of each bar as a MIDI file plays, in order to help a partial band keep time.  I can deal with placing the MIDI message at the bar start, but can I get VirtualMIDISynth to make an external call based on a MIDI event occurring?  I contacted Ian Luck @ un4seen who responded by writing ...

"It sounds like it should be possible to achieve what you want by using a free/undefined controller number for your LED events. You can then set a BASS_SYNC_MIDI_EVENT sync with param=MIDI_EVENT_CONTROL (via BASS_ChannelSetSync) to receive notification of when the event occurs during playback of the MIDI stream."

I understand the free/undefined controller number, but not the rest.  I'm figuring you probably do. It is one thing for un4seen to be able to handle it, but you are wrapping un4seen in a particular way, so I have to pass the question on to you.  Is this possible, or do you think it can be made possible?  Thanks.

Wayne McHugh

B.App.Sc.-Comp, B.Th.

"It's the job that's never started as takes longest to finish."

Posts: 1972
Joined: March 25, 2012 - 01:19
Re: Visual Bar Indicator

Hi Wayne, I joined your two similar threads here.

What you're asking is a mix of software+hardware solution, and there's no ready-to-use solution AFAIK.
The suggestion Ian gave you could be implemented into VirtualMIDISynth BUT I can't see no common usage for it except your specific need.

I don't know your software/hardware knowledge, but I can actually give you some suggestions:

  • If you have good software development knowledge, you could write a simple MIDI driver like Windows MIDIMapper.
    This driver (like VirtualMIDISynth) is installed into the OS as a virtual MIDI Out device, reads its MIDI Input, parse messages then resend the same MIDI stream to a configured MIDI Out (a real MIDI device or VirtualMIDISynth).
    When a configured MIDI event occurs, you can turn on your light through an interface of your choice (USB, Parallel, Serial).
  • If you have no software/hardware knowledge, you could use tools like LoopBE to split MIDI stream into two copies: one for VirtualMIDISynth and one for an USB MIDI Out (there's a lot of them or maybe you already have a MIDI Out on your system), then connect MIDI Out to an external interface like this: http://www.midisolutions.com/prodrel.htm
    This interface can be programmed to react on a specific MIDI event, so it should fit your need.
  • Same as before but using an external hardware MIDI Synth; the external interface I linked before is a pass-through device, so its output could be connected to an external MIDI Synth.
    This way there's no need of LoopBe and (bad for me...) VirtualMIDISynth.

Hope this helps.

Posts: 4
Joined: April 28, 2014 - 00:29
Re: Visual Bar Indicator

It is some 13 years since I hung up my boots as a professional VC++ programmer, so these days I crawl through tech challenges one mystery at a time. I think I've forgotten more than I knew.

However, I don't expect a custom software/hardware solution. What  was hoping for was some kind of generic software hook whereby I could register interest in a particular MIDI event and have some action taken when it occurs. I remember engineering a solution which involved loading dlls which exposed a particular function (eg WatchMIDIEvent()) and calling each of those functions to determine their function/ability, and calling the dlls action function when the watched event occurs. I imagine that such a flexible system could helpfully extend someone's software, and also provide a sufficient hook to allow action such as mine to occur.

This solution I am trying to create is not just for my personal benefit, but if successful will be of interest to underresourced churches all over the world. The idea of passing out to external hardware is impractical because it needs to be a very low cost solution. The idea of a pass-through MIDI solution would be beyond me unless there was an existing example in the public domain that I could model from.

Thanks for listening.

Wayne McHugh

B.App.Sc.-Comp, B.Th.

"It's the job that's never started as takes longest to finish."