MultitrackStudio User Forum

This is either a question or a request for a (relatively simple) new feature. I was looking over the features of another popular DAW, and noted that there was an ability to "humanize" MIDI data. It was then mentioned that this was a pretty standard option to have for MIDI data, but I was unaware of any equivalent feature in MTS.

I haven't tried it, but my impression was that it probably just added variation to velocity for various MIDI notes that you selected. I could imagine another version of this where you get very slight movement of notes off of the exact beats, so that something you program in the piano roll ends up sounding less robotic and more like someone actually played it.

So, can you "humanize" MIDI data in MTS, or is there any interest in adding that? I'm sure you call up the velocity control bars underneath progression and draw in variations pretty easily that way, alternatively.

The desktop versions do have it, but it's not in the iPad version. I'm not too impressed with the feature myself.... human musicians are great because they know how loud and when to play notes, not because they decide randomly


Giel Bremmers

Support wrote:The desktop versions do have it, but it's not in the iPad version. I'm not too impressed with the feature myself.... human musicians are great because they know how loud and when to play notes, not because they decide randomly

Giel Bremmers

Thanks for the response!

That's definitely true about human versus randomly generated variation. I think it's a problem of semantics - people don't like the concept of computers replacing humans for anything - this was a big element the initial pushback against electronic music of many forms. But if we called it "diversification" or "add volume dynamics" or something, the negativity would fade away.

I was more thinking along the lines of keeping MIDI data from sounding too robotic - if everything's at "100" or "127", you get sequences that sound jarring. Thanks for pointing out that the desktop versions have it - I'm happy with my iPad Pro version, and this is more of an ancillary feature.

It could be cool if MTS provided a RANDOMIZE function in the editor-- for attack velocity, quantize, and duration (quantize note off)

To keep it simple, the randomize would only need two values
to set the range (set low and high limits to the randomizing numbers)

The random generator would generate numbers within that range (say -10 to +3)
and add/subtract the values from from velocities or note-on/off positions (in ticks)

But that might involve making the MIDI edit window become something less
all-in-one