Playing in advance

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RPG
Posts: 13

Post by RPG »

There is some situatiosn when the player plays some notes a little in advance. In some cases Synthesia will consider that correct and go on, but in other cases Synthesia will consider the notes wrong if the come to early and discard them.

There should be a customizable parameter to modify the allowed inteval to play the notes in advance.
svergeylen
Posts: 3

Post by svergeylen »

+1
Totally agree

Especially for the left hand where lots of simultanate notes has to be played, there is sometimes problem in the midi file itself (not in synthesia) : the multiple notes don't begin at the same moment in the midi file.

So even if you play correctly (every notes at the same time), Synthesia is blocking because it waits for one of the left hand notes.... :-(
Nicholas
Posts: 13135

Post by Nicholas »

I have wanted to distinguish melody practice a little more from rhythm for a while now by allowing something like this. You should be able to play notes much further ahead of time (like a screen's worth ahead of time).

Doing something smart like watching how fast you're playing and adjusting the song to keep pace ("score following") would be awesome, but unfortunately it's been patented by the Home Concert Xtreme folks. The patent doesn't expire for another four years, but after that it's a possibility for Synthesia.
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jimhenry
Posts: 1899

Post by jimhenry »

Nicholas wrote:Doing something smart like watching how fast you're playing and adjusting the song to keep pace ("score following") would be awesome, but unfortunately it's been patented by the Home Concert Xtreme folks. The patent doesn't expire for another four years, but after that it's a possibility for Synthesia.
if that patent is actually holding you back, let me know. i can help you analyze the claim to determine if what you would do would be likely to infringe the claims.
Jim Henry
Author of the Miditzer, a free virtual theatre pipe organ
http://www.Miditzer.org/
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stephenhazel
Posts: 223

Post by stephenhazel »

They may have a patent on that, but their implementation sucks :)
I know one guy who has HCX and he says that mode doesn't work.

To be fair, it's a pretty tough nut to crack. But I doubt the logic in that patent cracks it if their implementation doesn't.

Also, their website has sure bounced around a lot. I'm wondering if their developer is getting frustrated with the company.
Whoever that guy may be.
Nicholas
Posts: 13135

Post by Nicholas »

stephenhazel wrote:Also, their website has sure bounced around a lot. I'm wondering if their developer is getting frustrated with the company.
Actually, Zenph looks like they were having some trouble and just reorganized the company. (And all of this just a year or so after they acquired HCX and its patent from TimeWarp Technologies.)

I was going to try to track down who got the patent from them to see if I might license it, but that second article mentions "Zenph Sound Innovations, Inc." sold all their assets to the new "Zenph, Inc." So it's still in their hands. (I suppose it couldn't hurt to contact them anyway and see if they were interested in licensing.)
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jimhenry
Posts: 1899

Post by jimhenry »

Nicholas wrote:I suppose it couldn't hurt to contact them anyway and see if they were interested in licensing.
that is a bad assumption. start by figuring out what they really have to license and decide if you want it before you contact them. once you contact them they are likely to look closely at everything you do from then on.
Jim Henry
Author of the Miditzer, a free virtual theatre pipe organ
http://www.Miditzer.org/
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stephenhazel
Posts: 223

Post by stephenhazel »

I haven't read over that patent very hard.

But they mention
> assigning importance attributes to notes:

That's not gonna work. You can't ignore ANY notes and still track where you are.
Every notedown time and key in the score is precious.

Caring about volume of the notes is wothless and so is whether it's in a chord or not.

That algorithm just won't work. It talks about tempo tracking, and that's an important
=part= of it. But other apps do tempo tracking to align recorded data back into bars
(a purer sort of quantizing). There's nothin new about that.

Once I'm laid off in November (is it weird to look forward to being laid off?) it'll be that,
sheet music spiffin, arranger logic (styles), and probably a performance engine.
I am =really= ==REALLLY== lookin' forward to being laid off.



SO BAD :mrgreen:
Nicholas
Posts: 13135

Post by Nicholas »

jimhenry wrote:Once you contact them they are likely to look closely at everything you do from then on.
I'm not so worried about this, assuming I'm already doing everything by the book.

Besides, I'm pretty sure the project is already being scrutinized. A few years ago (under bizarre circumstances) I've seen a private YouTube video of George Litterst (the first named inventor of that patent) discussing the details and limitations of the way I decided to issue device resets in Synthesia and how those decisions affected the behavior of certain Yamaha models. So at the very least, I am 100% certain the inventor knows about the project. :lol:

Still, your point is a valid one. If I can design around it, I wouldn't even need to bother with licensing.

Just glancing at it briefly, so long as I don't consolidate notes into chords during the analysis, I would be avoiding every single claim. Though, their subsequent patents based on that first one appear to have broadened the claims quite a bit.
613Skier
Posts: 49

Post by 613Skier »

...I was just going to start a thread about this, but I found this one :)


What about having a setting where if you hit the next series of note before the bar hits and your still holding the note as it comes "time" that it will recognize that you've played the note instead of pausing.

In recital mode it does this as it doesn't care whether or not you keep on tempo or make mistakes, but what about having an option in practice mode.
613Skier
Posts: 49

Post by 613Skier »

It's kind of like Synthesia has OCD when tone wise you're hitting the correct notes in the proper sequence just that your timing might be a little off which causes a "Hiccup".

If you were to make an option for the program to not being such a timing "Nazi" in practice mode it'd be appreciated! :D
Nicholas
Posts: 13135

Post by Nicholas »

613Skier wrote:... to not being such a timing "Nazi" in practice mode...
This is exactly my intent. Being more lenient there makes sense. It's already a mode that ignores lots of timing stuff; no reason it can't ignore timing even more.
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