Re: foot (cont) roller

[Travis Hartnett <travishartnett@gmail.com>]

I certainly prefer the Boomerang's roller control to a volume pedal
type controller, but in a programmable situation I think that you'd
need some LED's or some readout to show you what the software value
you were controlling with the roller was currently set to.  make the
roller an alpha controller (spins forever in either direction), and
you'd be set, but now you need bidirectional communcation with your
rack gear, a second MIDI cable (how it pains me that MIDI requires one
cable for send and one to receive), and some way to get your rack box
to send that information.

TravisH

On 1/9/06, numbernine@gmx.net <numbernine@gmx.net> wrote:
>
> I have got an idea for a MIDI foot controller, that I I've never seen
> somewhere. If it exists please tell me.
>
> I think about a roll (or roller, or barrel, don't know the precise
> english term). I put a (very simple) sketch at
> http://matthias.loibner.net/files/contRoller.jpg
>
> It should have an endless rotary encoder and send relative continuos
> controller data.
> I think it has some advanteges compared to a pedal.
>
> When you switch the function of the pedal at your hardware or in
> your software, the parameter you wish to control can have a different
> value from the position of the pedal, so you need either to adapt the
> pedal to the needed position, or as relative movement you might not
> have enough way to control what you want.
> The roller could be more subtle to change a value, when you touch it.
> With a pedal I always fear to touch it too hard or accidentely.
>
> I guess a pedal is much better for controls where your movement is
> part of the music like a whawha, but for mixing or fine-control your
> effects I can imagine a roller or a set of four coud do a better job.
>
> 1st of all: what do you think?
>