Create a clip with GrandVJ and Tenori-ON

Author: Gorgull

About: Software engineer at ArKaos
Web: http://www.arkaos.net/

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Blindskunk, an ArKaos GrandVJ user from Australia we found on Twitter has made an interesting experience about creating an audio/visual clip using GrandVJ and Yamaha’s Tenori-ON.

The interest of this experience is that Blindskunk uses the musical instrument capabilities from the Tenori-ON to produce the music and at the same time its MIDI controller capabilities to trigger GrandVJ visuals in sync. To do so, he has linked every channel and button from the Tenori-ON to a visual in GrandVJ, and got that visual to play in time to the changes.

He has kindly shared with us a detailed log of his experimentation further below, including a MIDI template to use the Tenori-ON with GrandVJ.

But before you read any further, for those of you who don’t know about the Tenori-ON, here’s another clip from Blindskunk where you can see him using it as controller for GrandVJ:

1. Record Audio and Midi

Yamaha Tenori-On

Blindskunk composed the piece entirely on the Tenori-ON and recorded it internally using the original sounds.

Steinberg Cubase Studio 4

Then, he exported the whole piece using Steinberg Cubase Studio 4 to record the output as MIDI then splited the MIDI into its 10 individual MIDI channels (with Cubase MIDI dissolve option)

Propellerhead Reason 4

Blindskunk remixed the audio output in Propellerhead Reason 4 to produce a better sounding and mixed track which he saved as a WAV.

That WAV was introduced as a track of Audio in Cubase and aligned to the MIDI, in order to get a proper synchronization while previewing in GrandVJ.

2. Produce a midi-synchronized Video track using ArKaos GrandVJ:

ArKaos GrandVJ

In GrandVJ every MIDI channel and all 16 buttons were linked to a 16×16 matrix.

Various visuals including some presets and various sources from around the web were attached to the 16×16 grid (however, not all of the cells were filled with visuals). The spinning Tenori in the background was recorded playing the actual piece and the video mapped to a cube inside  GrandVJ.

Playing the piece in Cubase produced the Video output, by sending MIDI notes to GrandVJ through Rewire.

Here’s a link to download Blindskunk’s GrandVJ MIDI template file: Download VJT file Zipped

3. Create the final sequence

ACA Capture Pro & Morgan MJPEG Codec

Blindskunk then recorded a 640×480 resolution video (30fps) straight from the GrandVJ Master window using the screen capture program ACA Capture Pro (with Morgan M-JPEG codec). The resulting file size was 1000Mb

VirtualDUB & DivX

He converted the file using VirtualDUB to a high quality DivX (smaller in size than Morgan M-JPEG Codec) – The reason for this process is that while the DivX is fast, it cant keep up on high quality in real-time. The resulting file was then 70 Mb

Sony Vegas Pro

Blindskunk finally synchronized the DivX and the WAV file from earlier with Sony Vegas Pro, added his intro and extro Graphics.

4. Upload to YouTube

The final result is the video below:

About Blindskunk:

Home of Light Hearted Electronic Music

• Home page
• About Blindskunk
• YouTube Channel
• Twitter

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