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After many frustrating months trying to get Custom Rules to work reliably with various VSTi, I present here a different method that is guaranteed to work every time.

Some of you may already be using something like this but I have not seen any posts explaining to nubies how to set it up. I had many successes with using my own prules but many more failures. Still cannot seem to get a repeatability on 'note-before-note' and ''note after-note'' etc. Every VSTi is different in how they respond to CC, keyswitch control information. The built in Notion instruments are optimised for best response to articulation changes but its very hard to get external VSTi's to do the same.

Anyway, I hope this info is of use to those who have tried all they can with Custom Rules and just want it to work.

STEP by STEP

1. For simplicity, open a String Quartet Template.
2. Four staffs setup for Notion instruments will be shown. We will ignore the Notion instruments.
3. In Tools/Change Instrument, select ''new instrument'', for this example we are using Kontakt. (make sure Kontakt is enabled in File/Plug-in-Manager).
4. Set the midi channel to 1 and press OK.
5. Drag the new instrument to the first bar of staff 1 and edit the name to Violins I (1) where the MIDI channel is in brackets.
6. Repeat process for remaining staffs
7. In Tools/Plug-in-Interface, open Kontakt and open the four Instruments Violin I, Violin II, Viola and Cello. These instruments must be multi's so that all articulations are available.
8. Open Score Setup and from the ''Basic'' menu, select Treble Clef Staff and when the staff appears at the bottom of the page, select it and move to beneath the Violin I staff.
9. Rename this new staff, Keyswitch (1)
10. Exit Score Setup
11. Now here's the magic, if the time signature is for example 3/4 then enter 3 quarter rests in the Keyswitch staff. From the floating palette select ''grace eight note'' and drag it to just before the first rest. Then drag it down till its way off the note range and into keyswitch territory. Choose the articulation you want for the note in the Violin staff.
12. Open Score Setup
13. Now select the eye icon to the left of the Keyswitch staff for violin and make it grey.
14. Exit Score Setup
15. The score will play with all the articulations and the keyswitches will be hidden.

Just repeat for all remaining staffs and articulations. You may need to play with the Grace note lengths and the rest durations to get the trigger to occur in exactly the right spot.

Thats it, it now becomes similar to adding keyswitches in normal sequencers or Cubase Articulation tracks. Now you can still write the score in notation, which Notion is fantastic at, and the beauty is, it will work EVERY time.
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by petergardner1 on Sat Feb 11, 2017 5:45 pm
Rereading my post I noticed steps 9 and 10 should be swapped and I forgot to mention that the Midi channel of the Keyswitch staff must be the same as for its associated instrument. So for example, violin 1 staff is midi ch 1 and its keyswitch track is also midi ch 1. Violin 2 is midi ch 2 and its keyswitch track is midi ch 2, etc.

It is also possible to use this method at the same time as using Custom Rules. So a prules script that is generally working, but has a problem with particular articulations not responding properly, can have a keyswitch track setup to fix just that articulation alone.
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by johnbedggood on Sun Nov 19, 2017 10:41 am
Brilliant!!!!!!

Will give this a go with PreSonus Symphonic Orchestra!!

Thanks Peter.

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Audiobox 1818VSL, DigiMax D8, Central Station Plus, Faderport, Sceptre S8, Avantone Pro Mixcubes, Eureka Preamp (5 of),
Studio One Pro 3.5.4, Notion 6, PreSonus Symphonic Orchestra, Superior Drummer 2, CTC-1, Channel Strip Collection, Melodyne Studio 4.1, Waves Plugins
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by ivandanko on Sat Apr 22, 2023 4:51 pm
Hello,
unfortunately it doesn't work for me. at point 3 should i choose vst? Thanks very much. at no. 4 - where should I turn on the midi channel?
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by acequantum on Sun Apr 23, 2023 3:35 pm
What virtual instrument are you using?
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by ivandanko on Wed Apr 26, 2023 4:53 pm
I use Miro Phil 2.
I try to add the Library into Kontakt Player 6, but it doesn´t work. I need serial 20-digit serial number and I got a 16-digit one when I bought the MP2.
I cannot activate my Miro Library in Kontakt any other way. Use MacBook Pro


I'm trying to work on the artukulation directly in notion 6 and MP2 with rules and keyswitch, but it's too tedious... I was hoping that it would be easier and better with Kontakt

thank You
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by acequantum on Thu Apr 27, 2023 2:55 pm
Hi,

MP2 is not a Kontakt sample library I think. I don't think even if you could get it into Kontakt it would be better in terms of setting up the keyswitches. The keyswitches still have to be controlled by Notion through the rules for the specific VSTi. I'm really not sure how the method the OP suggests would work for anything but Kontakt libraries. What I would guess is the OP is using a hidden staff to trigger keyswitches instead of using rules - which in theory should work for any VSTi.

The principals for Rulesets are the same from VSTi to VSTi. One thing to note, you can build a ruleset without having to build a preset and save it independently and just load it when you need it.

For example, let's say we want the staccato articulation marking in notion to trigger the keyswitch D2 (or whatever that articulation might be in MP2). Any other time it should just be on regular sustain or Keyswitch C2. The rule set looks like this:


notion keyswitch d2.JPG


notion staccato articulation.JPG



You add the other keyswitches similarly then export the ruleset to be loaded when you want or save the entire notion file and use it as a template.

You don't have to use Kontakt, you can just load you MP2 multi instrument. I don't have MP2 but reviewed its functionality before responding here, you don't have to have a separate staff and MIDI channel for each keyswitch. When you select the keyswitch in Notion, if you are using a multi in MP2 the keyswitch will change the articulation.

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