Axe_FX II Rigs, or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love Digital Modelling.

Drew_TNBD

Si_ said:

Well, AxeFx is Shipped and will be here next Wednesday so starting to think about setup. 

Patches V Scenes.. what are the pros and cons?

It's your 4th unit. Surely you already know this by now??

Si_

Just asking.. I fabled with scenes last time but since I want to start from scratch just wondered what others were doing.

Clarky

Si_ said:

Well, AxeFx is Shipped and will be here next Wednesday so starting to think about setup. 

Patches V Scenes.. what are the pros and cons?

scenes give you the seamless tone transitions that preset changes cannot

especially as they preserve the reverb / delay tails..

Si_

Cool, thanks. a single patch with scenes it is

digitalkettle

Si_ said:

Cool, thanks. a single patch with scenes it is

It's not really patches *v* scenes...scenes are just a collection of the patch's bypass settings, X/Y settings, plus a couple of other relevant parameters. So patch is obviously your pedalboard/amp and scenes are like...erm...really clever feet(?)

Clarky

I can see why folk think in terms of presets vs scenes

do you build a riffing preset, a soloing preset, a clean preset etc and switch between them

or

do you build a single one with all three tones contained within it

which will perform better, but is a little more involved to set up

I do this…

a basic 3 scene preset

scenes 1 thru 3 contain my riff, solo and clean tones respectively

scenes 4 and 5 are 'misc' [where scene 4 is generally a 'ballad solo' tone and scene 5 is 'something else']

the basic preset will get me through most songs.. and scene 5 will handle a specific thing for a specific song..

if I have a song that my basic preset cannot fully handle and so it needs a new tone added..

I make a copy of the basic preset and create the specific required extra tone in scene 5

this keep my config, tone and performance behaviour consistent

Si_

I was thinking of a similar setup.. but only 4 scenes (I've only got 4 buttons per row on my controller)

Clean, Rhythm, Misc, Lead (I like my lead button always on the bottom right side). So a similar setup to yours.  was thinking of using 2 amp blocks, giving me 4 options (using the X/Y settings).

Any chance of a screen shot of one of your presets? just to see how you have it set up. 

I've just had a first practice with my new band so perfect timing to set this all up. 

Clarky

I use 2 amp blocks too

scene1: both are active and X side

scene2: only amp1 X side

scene3: only amp2 Y side

scenes 4 and 5 vary from preset to preset

Si_

cool. sounds like what I had in mind.. I'm planning on just having 1 preset, and not changing at all through a gig (limitation of my midi controller).. maybe 2 versions, one EQd for home, one for live, but both basically identical 

Clarky

I try to do something similar..

so the bulk of the set is on a single preset..

and maybe just 2 or 3 songs will each have a variant [of the basic preset]

the variants can be subtle or dramatic…

for example.. 

in my basic preset, XP1 will morph the dirty tone to a 'cleanish' tone..

this is fine for most applications..

but in one song I may need to to morph cleaner and introduce a delay and stronger reverb as it cleans up to address a very specific ambient moment..

there's another song where I play a duet with DC. The first half of it is soft pizzicato and the later part is a regular soloing tone, 

and so my solo tone in this case needs the delay very low overall, and out completely when morphed clean.. also, as it's a duet I mustn't step up over the band like my regular soloing tone.. so it have a few dB knocked off of it..

when building variant presets [and dialling them in], global blocks can seriously come to the rescue..

Si_

We've chatted about your morphing stuff before.. very interesting it is.. got any demos of you doing it? morphing from say clean to dirty or vice versa.

Again, limitation of my current controller is that i can only have 1 expression pedal and was planning on that being Wah (Will get another MFC at some point but not yet)

Clarky

I think this one has scenes

and I think these are multi-tone presets without scenes [earlier presets]

Si_

Great sounding stuff there..

Clarky

thanks matey….

when you get your AF2, if ever you get interested in the morphing stuff and want help with all that etc, just giz a ping...

Si_

Thanks.. Should be turning up on Wednesday

Si_

And so it begins.. AxeFx in Da house..... Again.

Clarky

awesome…. I hope you have a better experience with it this time around

Drew_TNBD

Clarky, quick question - can scene changes send out program changes to another midi device, or can only preset changes do that?

Clarky

scenes won't send MIDI, but the MFC will, and the MFC has to send MIDI to switch scene. Right now, I use an MFC IA switches to transmit two simultaneous MIDI commands, one command is the MIDI CC to select a specific scene, the other command is to send MIDI data via a different CC to trigger other 'things' in the Axe.

So the question is; can the MFC transmit a MIDI CC to switch scenes and simultaneoulsy transmit a MIDI PGM change value on the same or a different MIDI channel?. The manual says that an IA can support two MIDI CC commands and a PGM change. What the manual don't say is if you use PGM you can't use CC or the other way around, so it's not hinting that these things are mutually exclusive. So... it's looking like the answer is yes... The MFC can trigger a scene change and send a PGM change on another MIDI channel.

That said... I've never tried it..

Drew_TNBD

I was doing a bit of reading. According to the manual, you can use the program change midi mapping section to map program changes to a scene. This begs the question then, will that program change be reflected at the midi thru/output of the unit. If so... then it should work - you setup PC's and direct them to preset scenes in the midi mapping setup, and you setup your midi controllable amp or device to receive PC's on the same channel that the Axe spits them out as.

That is *if* the Axe will spit the received PC's out through the thru/out. Can't imagine why it wouldn't!