Ninjam Faq / Guides

DaMNeD · 02-28-2009, 01:29 PM

Hello,
we made some guides other there for everyone, covering various themes regarding ninjam.
Just wanted to share the link for everyone who is lost and wants some howtos with Ninjam.
Comments and improvements of the guides are more then welcome.

http://ninjamer.com/faq

Enjoy

pljones · 03-01-2009, 06:19 AM

Good stuff! Nice to see it organised and easy to follow.

Only had one suggested improvement (in the volumes setup):

Quote:

So how to do it?
Well, first, put your local transmit channel @ 0db.

That's local "monitor" not transmit!

It doesn't affect transmit level at all.

DaMNeD · 03-01-2009, 06:43 AM

Thx for the input, correction done

AndyMc · 03-01-2009, 03:46 PM

Hiya m8,
I wrote the previous sticky http://forum.cockos.com/showthread.php?t=12578 because of a few incorrectly or needlessly complicated guides and routing procedures.

For most users there is no need to put ReaNINJAM on its own track then route every other track to another track.

It sits in Master FX, pulls all in that are not Monitor Only and routing if needed can be achieved in a more workable organized manner.

I spent over a year correcting people's setups remotely and on MSN because they were completely lost, confused and followed a few similar guides.

It looks great and all but there's already a sticky with a working setup which can be contributed too, most is in there but a few bits are not. But a some additions of Screen Shots would be nice.

DaMNeD · 03-01-2009, 04:24 PM

Heya,
as stated in the first post of thread, it's a faq covering various & differents subjects.

And as stated in the guide you refer to in the Faq, it's written inside you could use directly masterfx instead of track fx.

And regarding the post you wrote a long time ago, it's great, but it needed imo more screens and clarity, as it's a bit confusing.
As you said, an update to it with some nice screensots here would be great. We're waiting for your update.

Anyway, as titled these guides are guides and not rules. Everyone as its own setup and own way.

Thx for your input anyway.

pljones · 03-02-2009, 01:21 PM

One FAQ that could do with being addressed is how to turn two mono line ins into a stereo pair, to save using up two stereo NINJAM channels (and making life difficult for everyone else jamming).

It's not something I've had to do: I'm certain it's possible in Reaper (pan the two monos left and right: done), not so sure in the standalone.

(Each stereo channel has to be distributed to all other jammers, so it's worth keeping your transmit channel count low just to maintain a reasonable bandwidth, without the hassle factor.)

DaMNeD · 03-02-2009, 04:28 PM

Like rerouting the two mono tracks into a stereo one, then reroute this one to reaNinjam fx track?

AndyMc · 03-02-2009, 06:01 PM

This would be just a case of adding 2 mono's with 2 mono inputs, panning slightly left and right, not fully but slightly. ReaNINJAM will just pick up both and put out to the 1 stereo channel.

I'm not sure if this is how you meant PlJones.

With the Stand alone I never bothered doing a guide for it as its not updated like the ReaNINJAM was so its better all move to ReaNINJAM if possible but would be nice to see the Standalone updated to ReaNINJAM spec but it would need some sort of mixing panel incorporated to achieve pre post mixing

pljones · 03-03-2009, 11:19 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by DaMNeD

Like rerouting the two mono tracks into a stereo one, then reroute this one to reaNinjam fx track?

Guess so, but I'm with Andy on using the Master as the ReaNinjam track - it means the only thing you should be hearing from Reaper is what's going out to the jam. And ideally, that's the only thing you should be hearing!

AndyMc · 03-04-2009, 09:40 PM

Another scenario would be as simple as this:

Other day someone wanted me to explain how to add a backing track liked they'd heard others do and your guide popped in my mind.

With ReaNINJAM on the MASTER FX someone can drag a audio file to REAPER, let go of the mouse and they have it in REAPER on its own track. Now they just play and its transmitted.

Your incorrect guide would mean they'd need to route every track they make, that's a lot of extra work for such a simple procedure, and if they have a lower end PC then that's a lot of cracks and pops they might get.

It wasn't too long ago you was asking me how to set things up, then a few months after your telling me how I should do it, now your making guides that are only going to really confuse the hell out of people now.

I think this thread should be deleted or locked, its just going to confuse people, its the same as the guides that were about before that had loads setup wrong. I'm always helping people setup and now we have a good amount who are setup perfect and this is going to introduce loads more bad setups into the community.

And Damned please stop copying me, in the servers your copying how I do my music, in the forum and your site your copying whats in the sticky but trying to reinvent it and now your trying to copy Ninjamers. :S Get some originality dude, I feel like someones trying to clone me. :P

DaMNeD · 03-05-2009, 04:16 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by AndyMc

Another scenario would be as simple as this:

Other day someone wanted me to explain how to add a backing track liked they'd heard others do and your guide popped in my mind.

With ReaNINJAM on the MASTER FX someone can drag a audio file to REAPER, let go of the mouse and they have it in REAPER on its own track. Now they just play and its transmitted.

Your incorrect guide would mean they'd need to route every track they make, that's a lot of extra work for such a simple procedure, and if they have a lower end PC then that's a lot of cracks and pops they might get.

Which is written in the guides here, every track has to be rerouted. And for the extra work, clicking on io is very difficult.

Quote:

Originally Posted by AndyMc

It wasn't too long ago you was asking me how to set things up, then a few months after your telling me how I should do it, now your making guides that are only going to really confuse the hell out of people now.

I asked you how you were doing, and actually, I'm doing quite differently of the way you're doing. How do I know that? Because you didn't help me so much regarding what I wanted to do at this year ago period now.
Anyway, this is your own opinion, thx for sharing.

Quote:

Originally Posted by AndyMc

I think this thread should be deleted or locked, its just going to confuse people, its the same as the guides that were about before that had loads setup wrong. I'm always helping people setup and now we have a good amount who are setup perfect and this is going to introduce loads more bad setups into the community.

And Damned please stop copying me, in the servers your copying how I do my music, in the forum and your site your copying whats in the sticky but trying to reinvent it and now your trying to copy Ninjamers. :S Get some originality dude, I feel like someones trying to clone me. :P

Wow, thanks for the nice inputs, and the god all-knowledge like attitude, really appreciated. And it is great to start flaming on cockos forum, very clever and smart attitude. Especially for the community.
And I won't take time to answer to the last point, as it is futile and totally stupid.
Already waste some of my time to write this.

AndyMc · 03-05-2009, 08:53 AM

You just did and its pretty rude to repost info (incorrectly, you should have read deeper the sticky) lots have put a lot into just so you can have your name by others work.
It's called originality, its where you come up with your own idea's and stop trying to label your name next to others.
It was made a sticky a long time ago then others added extra info on setup and its become a good handy thread but in your arrogance and ignorance you see fit to dismiss its contents and tell all you'd know better. I'd say that's a godly attitude, and mine is more a scathing at what your true agenda is.

Now please be done with this community and go bother the next one you troll. :|

PS: I did help, you just took the bits you wanted, relabeled them then tried to do the rest yourself.

Brennan pls pls pls lock or delete this thread, this is exactly what he wants, he knew the other setup thread was there because he wanted me to rewrite it for his site with images. I haven't rewrote it anywhere else because I like the fact people have to come to Cockos forums to get the help which gives NINJAM support.
I want to be part of NINJAM, not pretend NINJAM is mine and try relabel others content as my own.

I do think this can all be sorted with Damned but only when his willing to sit back, think about things and listen to other opinions. He can still have a big part in NINJAM and make his stamp on it, as I tried to get him to do on Ninjamers but he was too competitive like we was in competition with others.
Its not about that, its about adding to the community and not taking from it, if people add to it then eventually they might get what they want from it rather than trying to take it.
With out big backing NINJAM can't overnight become a massive money earner that loads can then dive in and take a big chunk off but it could be made into something that later people could help pay the way of their hobby.

Ninjamers is a window only, I made it with the intent that many NINJAM collectives, groups and events would find there way there and many would build from there. When it grows and becomes a lot bigger then it will start to gain its fans and this will give people extra exposure to help the little guy have a shot or at least get his work and efforts appreciated.
But some control is needed at the start to keep it on track.

Ninjamers to some might seem cheesy, or cheap but its easy for users, has most things that's needed for its purpose and currently is doing a good job, it a puppy so is learning.

GGcc · 03-09-2009, 07:05 AM

Great job, Damned !

And don't spend your time with AndyMC. He is so sad.

AndyMc · 03-11-2009, 12:28 AM

Making new acounts to support yourself?
Maybe next time you make more effort in the name creation. :S

GGcc · 03-16-2009, 09:19 AM

Uhm.. I will pray for you man.

AndyMc · 03-16-2009, 09:12 PM

Cool, become a monk for 50 years, cya then

DaMNeD · 03-17-2009, 05:12 AM

Thx GGcc.
Andy, turn off the paranoid mode. And please behave.

AndyMc · 03-18-2009, 09:46 AM

You back again.

DaMNeD · 03-18-2009, 10:44 AM

Never went away

AndyMc · 03-18-2009, 01:24 PM

Your not a Monk yet then?

DaMNeD · 03-18-2009, 03:29 PM

Who should be a monk?

AndyMc · 03-18-2009, 07:17 PM

O Man, I just took ages scrolling down this.

I'm off to bed, I been in code all night, I'm starting to remember why I stopped.

DaMNeD · 03-19-2009, 06:09 AM

Uh Oh.
Seems now you start to have some clarifications coming up on what is the volume of 'work' to do to make things working correctly...

AndyMc · 03-19-2009, 03:05 PM

Yeah I spent hours now and all I want to do it make something show on the screen. I heard there was a print and show command but I couldn't get it to work so I've wrote an AI and am getting him to do it instead.

TBH Damned your right, you proved me wrong, I have learned from my mistakes and wish to kiss and make up, I'm not quite sure what I did but I'm happy to take the blame if it makes you feel happier, for the sake of all else I'm Sorry for whatever it was I did.

Now I have to work out what I have learned from this to increase my wisdom level so I don't do it again, so if you could pm me with any suggestions and help on the matter that would be great, but don't make a guide about it, just pm me.

sticks999 · 05-03-2009, 06:42 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by pljones

One FAQ that could do with being addressed is how to turn two mono line ins into a stereo pair, to save using up two stereo NINJAM channels (and making life difficult for everyone else jamming).

It's not something I've had to do: I'm certain it's possible in Reaper (pan the two monos left and right: done), not so sure in the standalone.

(Each stereo channel has to be distributed to all other jammers, so it's worth keeping your transmit channel count low just to maintain a reasonable bandwidth, without the hassle factor.)

I wondered about this as I like to play and record in stereo. For my two person jams on my server we each take two channels of the Ninjam standalone client. I then pan hard left and right. when I open the clipsort in Reaper I select each players pair and render as a stereo wav. I then drop these into Sound Forge for normalizing/noise reduction, etc. Then I drop each along with video that we each take into Sony Vegas 9 where I sync everything. This way all our panning effects remain intact. You guys all use Reaninjam in Reaper but I have not figured it out and am used to my other daws for editng. Perhaps I should look into Reaper closer. I am just so used to my old ways. I will be reading up on it and trying it out. Thanks for all you do.

sticks999 · 05-03-2009, 06:58 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by DaMNeD

Hello,
we made some guides other there for everyone, covering various themes regarding ninjam.
Just wanted to share the link for everyone who is lost and wants some howtos with Ninjam.
Comments and improvements of the guides are more then welcome.

http://ninjamer.com/faq

Enjoy

thanks for this Damned, I guess you did this one. the pictures are not very good though as I can't read them. I suppose they will help some or am i not viewing this correctly? I have only used the client for jamming so far and I get confused easily.

AndyMc · 05-03-2009, 05:06 PM

There is a sticky thread on this forum which has a quick setup for ReaNINJAM and REAPER.

http://forum.cockos.com/showthread.php?t=12578

DaMNeD · 05-06-2009, 03:17 AM

Hello sticks999,
thanks for the input.
Which pictures were hardly seeable?

3mph · 05-10-2009, 01:33 PM

Hail you, wise men of NINJAM!

You've got some pretty neat things giong on with those guides. Now, maybe you could do the one thing that haven't been done yet:

Make a REAPER/ASIO-installer, where the default project is a correct setup of NINJAM with 1 input, record/monitor enabled etc. etc. You guys could sure do this? I mean, a one-click solution, so that anyone could just click and play.

Before you go on about driver-problems, different audio-configs and so on, please remember that that is not the goal of this request. I'm only interested in the result, so that I can play with my friends without spending hours on the phone, ending up half drunk and scheduling meetings to get more drun.. err.. I mean, setting things up properly :-D

I think you guys could do this!

sticks999 · 05-10-2009, 07:54 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by DaMNeD

Hello sticks999,
thanks for the input.
Which pictures were hardly seeable?

http://ninjamer.com/pg/pages/view/613/
Actually the pics are good once I downloaded them for viewing in the proper res. I had just looked at them on the page and couldn't read them. I didn't realize they had been shrunk to fit! Sorry for the misunderstanding ..Damnit Damned I apologize! I just had to say that. Good job. Although I still haven't found the time and inclination to dive in on Reaper.

AndyMc · 05-11-2009, 02:25 PM

Problem with a presetup is that when setting up in's on a track it resets when asio/driver changes so it would only be half complete.

For NINJAM use in REAPER it's simple, put reaninjam on Master Volumes FX then make some tracks and set the input of your instruments.
They could be you Line in or Mic in, rearoute (handy for routing other ASIO applications into REAPER that don't support rewire), ASIO Strip, Audio or Midi and/or VSTi's.

That's all that's needed, most people will use ASIO4ALL so that just needs setting as ASIO driver in REAPER.
All other problems tend to come down to Audio Hardware but for most using a line in or mic this is normally no problem.

This is why I wrote the long guide on here in the first place, because when I got first into NINJAM there was loads of confusing, incorrect, long winded guides that just led to more confusing and bad setups where people are so scared to touch anything in fear of breaking it.

The other reason I never rushed to post picture in the guide was because it can have a reverse effect and people just follow the pics and never really learn anything about what they have done, making them just passengers in the long run. But I myself do like pic's sometimes, but mainly if something wasn't explained or isn't how they explained it.

3mph · 05-11-2009, 03:54 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by AndyMc

it can have a reverse effect and people just follow the pics and never really learn anything about what they have done, making them just passengers in the long run.

I agree in everything you say, Andy, but the one-click-solution (download'n'play) could have the effect of some people wanting more, and then study guides to make them more.. errr.. flexible in the way they play.

AndyMc · 05-14-2009, 04:23 PM

Yeah would be nice, if there was a quick load template that setup a track on the default asio with first inputs setup in the audio setup on REAPER.

Atm if you saved a project then changed your asio and reloaded it then it would be busted and inputs etc on the track would need to be setup again.

If REAPER checked for connection like cubase does then if they wasn't there it popped up like cubase does and asked for connections then it shows what the old should have been then gives a list of available.

So the setup inputs could maybe be named MIC IN L and MIC IN R then same again for line and people would be most times able to select the correct inputs on there system.

Even if REAPER selected the first available inputs for most that would set it to the correct inputs as a lot of people use ASIO4ALL.

I'll setup an ASIO4ALL and attach it or give a download link then someone else with asio4all could test it.

It would work for most NINJAM Newbies with ASIO4ALL using there standard Built in Sound Card.

pljones · 05-15-2009, 09:46 AM

ASIO4ALL will work with any soundcard with WDM drivers, so once you have it set up, the Reaper/ReaNINJAM/ASIO4ALL project should "just work".

Of course, that just means getting ASIO4ALL set up is the problem!!

(I've used my Mia with ASIO4ALL and it's pretty much as reliable as the native ASIO driver. It would be useful if I wanted to use a mic as I've no pre amp, but the mic in on my onboard card is good enough. Do you really want me singing whilst drumming, though..?

)

So I'm happy to test when you've something to try out.

AndyMc · 05-15-2009, 10:40 AM

k I'll sort something out later when I get a chance, I'll setup on me onboard sound as me emu works pretty well in any situation so won't show up any problems like the onboard would.

But for all with a AC97 sound chip (in there machine they could try the nvidia audio drivers as the ASIO driver it installs it pretty good for onboard sound and has low latency.

3mph · 05-16-2009, 12:10 AM

I assume that people who bought a soundcard would know something about it, so maybe there should be different options like:

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The installer needs to set up ASIO-drivers for Reaper and NINJAM to work. Choose your audio-setup:

(1) Don't know (would set ASIO4ALL up as if you are using onboard soundchip)
(2) Soundcard connected to PCI/USB/Firewire
(2) Soundblaster-series (KS-drivers)
(3) I already have ASIO
(4) I will set up ASIO manually after the installer have finished
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Would that make things more fail-proof?

AndyMc · 05-17-2009, 04:27 PM

(5) HELP! initiate remote connection with 3Mmph. :P

(6) Select me if all other options failed and you now wish to expire.
(7) Electrocute a random individual online.
(8) We are the BORG!
(9) Info. for Opt. 8.
(0) Exit.

3mph · 05-17-2009, 04:37 PM

Hahaha! What a coincidence: This weekend I saw Star Trek 5-11 (I strongly recommend the last one!) and most of TNG season 6 and 7. My conclusion is that if you f*ck with Picard or Kirk you'll be whipped in an extremely cool way. Have you noticed how elegantly Picard breaks the spine of the über-borg without a glimpse and a bit of joy in his eyes?