I use my MC8 for basic meat and potato interactions with my Strymon Pedals. I have factory and custom presets in toggle mode on my switches, I have one switch dedicated to bypass and, so far, that’s pretty much it. As with the other pedals on my board, I’m sure I’ll discover other “useful” midi applications for my Timeline and Big Sky pedals.
Strymon provides a long list of midi controllable “parameters” (the utilities accessed by pushing the VALUE knob) with their attendant cc#s and value ranges. There are 36 discrete parameters listed and each has a range of values.
It would not be uncharacteristic of me to be missing something, but since I have already used those parameters to adjust my my saved presets, what is the value of controlling the parameters with my foot switch?
The only application(s) I can imagine is to cherry pick those parameters that I might want to use on the fly, like adjusting the Timeline’s tremolo speed with an expression pedal or duck sensitivity. Am I on the right track with this one?
I doubt I’d personally do that because I’m pretty dependent on presets, and when I adjust one parameter, it usually affects another so the process is more extensive than programming one preset or pushing one switch. But for those more inclined to on-the-fly improvisation maybe they dedicate a bank for it?
Anyway, I’d appreciate learning if and how others have used their MCx’s to control “parameters” on their Strymon pedals.
A bump here as I’m also very interested in this. Just got my Morningstar and it’s hard to think of a use-case or scenario for managing individual controls on any pedal in such a granular way. Expression for a single parameter makes sense, but I can’t think of why I’d set up sending all individual parameter updates for a “preset” instead of just saving the preset to the pedal and recalling that preset via a single CC?
I’m also just learning the world of midi and pedals so I’m excited to learn more of what is possible.
I think you have it right. There are a dizzying number of parameters to adjust with the expression pedal on both the Timeline and Big Sky. (I use the MC8 and I have two banks devoted to each pedal, and that doesn’t incorporate all the expression-tweak-able parameters available—only those I want to play with.) I also have individual switches for favorite presets I want to use on the fly. I play primarily ambient music—highly improvisational—so presets “per song” don’t work for me. That said, I’m not sure what you mean by “sending individual parameter ‘updates’.” My apologies if I introduced that confusion in my original post.
Thanks for the reply! I’m sure my post wasn’t as clear as it could have been as I get all this stuff straight in my head.
I suppose when I first started looking into this I initially looked at (just an example) the BigSky user manual and noticed how all Parameters have CC# and Value ranges, and just started thinking of how I would “Build” my Preset in the Morningstar configuration (send this value to Boost, this value to Room, this value to Decay, this value to Tone, etc. etc.). But of course then it hit me that this would be a lot of unnecessary work; I should just dial in my Preset on the BigSky, save it to an actual Preset in the BigSky, and then recall that Preset with the Morningstar. Easy, and awesome.
But then I had to wonder what other use-cases might there be for having the ability to randomly tweak “Pre-Delay” (again just a random example) if I’ve already recalled my Preset. This is what I meant by “sending individual parameter ‘updates’.” Expression pedals make sense here; I call up my Preset and then I use my Expression Pedal to modify Mix or Decay or something. But I can’t think of reason for sending a whole bunch of Parameter Values at once.
Sorry to go on but I think another post I read on the CBA Preamp MKII also confused me. I read that if you send values for all 6 faders that one (or more?) fader could get “stuck” and so they recommended that you build in a delay between each fader value being sent. So I started thinking of how I’d have to build my Morningstar commands for all my presets. But in the end, I don’t know why anyone would actually need to send 6 values for the faders when they can instead just send one CC command to recall a preset and that preset already defines the fader values. More than one way to skin a cat I suppose? lol And perhaps if there aren’t enough banks in the Morningstar (???) then you’d need to send detailed Parameters from the Morningstar?
OMG, Wazatron! I just configured my El Cap V2 and logged on to see if I could do exactly what you described above. I programmed every function in to my MC8 with expression-pedal-definable parameters. But, like you observed, tweaking EVERYTHING is nuts. MOST of the time I’ll only want to use a couple/few settings. So why not save them as presets and, if desired/needed, “tweak” them with the expression pedal? You can always go back to your fav settings by pressing the switch for that preset and then go back to tweaking. It took me a while to realize this–INSERT “FOREST THROUGH THE TREES” METAPHOR, HERE–because there are a LOT of “trees” in MIDI.
Can’t wait to do the same for my other Strymon pedals.
I don’t have any Strymon pedals, but i do have a Pigtronix Echolution3. It has only 4 presets, so access to most of the parameters via CC, opens up a nearly infinite range of ‘virtual’ presets.
Select one of the 4, add ‘modifiers’ as messages from the MC6, for any parameters I want to change, et voila, new preset.
One use-case I have programmed into the MC6 is the “Hold” function and selecting between Infinite and Freeze on the BigSky. Instead of holding down the switch on the BigSky, you can hit a switch on your controller to turn Hold on and off. You can use another to switch between infinite and freeze.
Other examples might include Persist on/off, changing with param your exp pedal controls.
Just got my Morningstar and it’s hard to think of a use-case or scenario for managing individual controls on any pedal in such a granular way. Expression for a single parameter makes sense, but I can’t think of why I’d set up sending all individual parameter updates for a “preset” instead of just saving the preset to the pedal and recalling that preset via a single CC?