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Old 05-05-2007, 11:00 PM   #1
Thrak
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Default Session mode?

Just noticed this on the jam farm page, anybody know what session mode is?


test.ninjam.com:2600
Empty server
BPM: 120, BPI: 16
Topic: 'Experiment with Session Mode here'

test.ninjam.com:2601
Empty server
BPM: 120, BPI: 16
Topic: 'Experiment with Session Mode here'
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Old 05-06-2007, 04:26 PM   #2
synthany
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Default copied from Jed in the Reaper Forum

copied from Jed in the Reaper Forum:

Hi all,

Recently I have been using the new reaNINJAM plugin in Session mode from within Reaper with a few other Reaper-ites. It's fantastic what Justin is doing with this, so I though I'd share.

- Whats it for?

Imagine a facility made of virtual studios where artists could meet online and collaborate on their Reaper projects, without technology getting in the way.

So two words - online collaboration.

The concept behind it is that a group of Reaper users can congregate in a virtual room (within a NINJAM host server), and record tracks together using Reaper, ultimately building up a complete song. Or you could just have a wild jam where everybody can hear each others tracks in sync with their own project.

- Sounds like regular NINJAM - whats the difference?

The best way to describe it is to detail a typical session between 2 people, 'A' and 'B'

'A' pops the included ReaNINJAM plugin into the master track within Reaper, opens it, and connects to say the 'test.ninjam.com:2600' server. When connected he then sets his local channel to 'Session' mode, as opposed to 'Normal NINJAM' mode.

'B' does the same. Now they are both in the virtual room and can chat to each other via text or voice right inside the plugin.

Next they both set their projects to the same value (say 100bpm)

Now 'A' sets up a track of drum loops of say 3 minutes. He arranges this on a track inside his current Reaper project.

When complete he hits play for the duration of the project length. (This records the track into the Ninjam server software so that others can hear it)

Now when 'B' hits play he can hear the drum track that 'A' put down! (via the reaNINJAM plugin). He can adjust the balance to taste in the reaNINJAM plug too.

Next 'B' records a bassline into his project (with the Reaper Track record monitoring on) when he is ready

Now 'A' can hear the bassline alongside his drum track when he plays back the project.

And so on....get the idea?....We have had a few trial sessions of doing this and the potential is huge.

If I had a song done that just needed say a keyboard part , I could meet a keyboard player in there, get him to play his part in, record it to disk and the job is done. Maybe make a few pointers along the way via text or voice.

Fantastic stuff

Feel free to add to this and when complete we'll pop it into the wiki

Cheers
Jed
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Old 05-06-2007, 07:35 PM   #3
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Ahhh, I get it. Now that is very cool. I have dabbled around on sites like collaboration central where folks post their tracks, and this is kind of a merging of that and ninjam.

Thanks Synthany.
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Old 05-22-2007, 01:01 PM   #4
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Default Instructions

Had a quick session last night. Here's a step-by-step for using session mode. I assume you know a little about REAPER. If you have any questions, ask away.

1. Open REAPER and start a new project.

2. Insert a new track called "NINJAM" and add ReaNINJAM to the FX chain of this track. Arm this track for recording, set record monitoring to "ON", and set the recording mode to "Output (stereo, latency compensated)." Disarm the track.

3. Insert a new track for yourself. Call it whatever you want. In the I/O routing for this track, uncheck the "Master/Parent Send" box. Add a new Send from this track to the NINJAM track. Set up the FX chain and recording mode however you like; the output of this track will be sent to the server. You can set up multiple tracks too, as long as they all send to the NINJAM track exclusively.

4. Open the NINJAM console and join a server that supports session mode.

5. Agree on a project BPM, vote for it on the server, and set your REAPER BPM to the same value.

6. When you're ready to send audio to the server, select "Session Mode" on the appropriate NINJAM local channel. Make sure the XMIT box is checked.

7. Mute the NINJAM metronome and turn on the REAPER metronome.

8. Press record in REAPER and play some music. When you're finished, press stop.

9. The output of your channel was saved on the server and propagated to everyone else. Now when they press play, they will hear your track coming out of their NINJAM plugin. If they set up their tracks the same way you did, they can record it locally and save it.

10. Likewise, whenever you are in play or record mode in REAPER, you will hear tracks from everyone else. You can arm the NINJAM track for recording and record their tracks locally.

Notes:

- If you'd rather record something locally, edit it, and then send it to the server, just uncheck the XMIT box for your channel and record locally on your track. When you're ready, check the XMIT box and play back the recording. Make sure the audio you're playing is going through the ReaNINJAM plugin.

- There's no easy way to clear out your track on the server. It seems your options are to either XMIT silence for the length of your previously recorded material or leave the server and come back.

- If there are multiple people on the server, I assume you can record them locally one at a time by making multiple passes and soloing their channels, then moving the recorded audio to another track for playback. This would allow you to send track "stems." For example, when transmitting a drum track, you could have one channel for kick, one channel for snare, one channel for everything else. This makes it a little easier to mix. If you coordinate, you can send an unlimited number of tracks in the time it takes to record them all back to back.

- To use multiple channels in ReaNINJAM, you need to do some routing. Open the I/O Routing menu for the NINJAM track and set the number of track channels to 8. Now you can set each Received track to a different input(s) (where it says Audio 1/2 => 1/2, set the second one to 3/4, 5/6, etc.). Finally, in the NINJAM console, set each local channel to receive from the appropriate input (1/2, 3/4, 5/6, etc.).

Summary:

Anything going into a "Session Mode" channel in the ReaNINJAM plugin is recorded on the server while REAPER is playing. Anything recorded on the server by other clients comes out of the ReaNINJAM plugin while REAPER is playing. If you strum your guitar at 0:10, everyone else will hear it at 0:10.
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Old 05-22-2007, 08:06 PM   #5
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Excellent, thanks Mvollrath. I was trying to get this working this weekend, but between not having willing participants on the server and not being able to figure it out, I never got too far.

Now I want to give this a try.
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Old 05-28-2007, 02:26 AM   #6
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Session mode is cool, heres it the final mix mvollrath and I recorded in session mode:

https://stash.reaper.fm/oldsb/21996/bassy.mp3

not the greatest stuff :P, but showing the session mode has potential for good recordings
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Old 05-28-2007, 08:02 PM   #7
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Nice man, that's cool stuff. I'm pscyhed to try some too.
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Old 05-30-2007, 06:48 PM   #8
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Wow, great move Justin, I have been envisioning something like this for a while but you go and blitz Ninjam and Reaper together to make it for us!

Looking forwards to giving this a try when I find a willing participant.

Oh and it was fun jamming with you just a moment before Mvollrath.
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Old 06-07-2007, 03:02 AM   #9
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Had a good long session with spuddle tonight. Here are some notes on how we ran the session.

I joined test.ninjam.com:2600 because I wanted to try a pickup session. While I was waiting for someone to join, I opened Ableton Live as a ReWire slave and recorded about 4:30 of very thick drum/percussion textures in Live's sequencer. After some tweaking, I recorded the drum mix to a track in Reaper.

Spuddle came along and had a neat melodic loop handy, a simple progression (D-C-A-C). He transmitted it to the server and I recorded it locally. Then I looped it alongside the drum track, and the foundation was set.

Next I recorded a synth track, following spuddle's progression, with a couple of lead sequences at the beginning and end of the drum track, but mostly as a background pad for everything in between. I recorded the synth track locally, then transmitted it to the server.

For spuddle's next trick, he recorded a rhythm guitar track on the last half of the song. We were now up to four tracks, but still had a lot of foreground "space" to fill in the middle of the song.

We'd built up quite a bit of material and still didn't have a bassline, so I took a shot at it and recorded the second take. I wish Reaper had a way to quickly warp audio clips to make up for my shoddy timing, but I digress..

Spuddle recorded the final track, an ambient piano lead part, and we both remixed our tracks to make things a bit more coherent.

The result was surprisingly listenable, considering we went in with next to no session mode experience (I'd had a short session with alex, but that's it). We both learned some valuable lessons about working with session mode concerning technical details and workflow considerations. Here are some things we learned (and I assume you've read my guide to session mode posted above).

- ReaNinjam should be in the FX chain of its own channel. Here's how my Reaper project looked after all the extra tracks were cleared out.




- Here's what the Ninjam track's I/O routing page should look like. Note that the number of track channels is set to 8, incoming tracks are on different track channels, and it DOES send to master/parent.




- And here's how an instrument track should look. Note that send to master/parent is disabled and it's going to a unique stereo pair of track channels on the Ninjam track. The local channel in the Ninjam console is also set to the appropriate pair of track channels.



When you have all the tracks set up, the Ninjam console should look something like this. Note that all the local channels are set to receive from different track channels on the Reaper side. Also, don't forget to set all your channels to session mode!




- Next to each user's name, you will see a box showing how much material they've transmitted to the server. It may be empty, meaning they haven't transmitted anything. Otherwise, the left hand number is their current position in the song and the right hand number is the maximum time they've transmitted to. Here's what it looks like. In this case, spuddle isn't currently transmitting anything, so the left hand number is shown as '---'

((linked because you can only have 4 image tags))
http://www.gvollrath.com/ninjam/remote_channels.png


- When someone connects to the server, they can't access any session tracks that might already be on the server. All tracks must be retransmitted every time someone joins (that means every time you get disconnected, everything needs to be transmitted again). I won't say it's graceful, but that's how it works right now.

- You can indeed record another user's individual channel to your local project. Solo the channel you want to record in the Ninjam console, set the Ninjam track in Reaper to record output (stereo, usually) and record at will. When you're finished, you can drag the recording down to a new track for storage/playback. It's very important to solo the channel you want to record; otherwise you might record your own tracks as they're on their way out of the Ninjam track, or someone might join the server and chug out a few chords to say hello.

- Be mindful of your levels. You might notice in the above screenshots of the Ninjam console that I have all my local channels and all of spuddle's remote channels set to the same level (0db). I think setting all channels to 0db is a good idea, since you will hear exactly what is leaving your box, but whatever you do, make sure your local channels are set to the same level as the remote channels. This will prevent you from sending tracks that are too loud or soft relative to your collaborators. It's also a very good idea to leave plenty of headroom; a rule of thumb is to not allow your tracks to peak above -12db. The volume can always be raised later in the mixing process, and there's no reason to run a session at full gain.

- Have fun! If you're doing a pickup session, be considerate to other collaborators by leaving plenty of room for them to add their part to the song, but don't be afraid to fill in the gaps when things are starting to fall into place. Establish the melodic structure early and take turns adding tracks. Point others to this thread to get them started in session mode. I'll be happy to answer questions or have a session with you whenever I'm online.

Oh, and spuddle will probably be posting the mix of our session soon. Can't wait to hear it!

Last edited by mvollrath; 06-07-2007 at 03:08 AM. Reason: correction
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Old 06-07-2007, 08:36 AM   #10
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Great write up mister mvoll!

I will post a render of the mix when I get back from work along with some contributions/observations concerning the session-mode 'workflow'.

Watch this space
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Old 06-07-2007, 06:22 PM   #11
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As promised, here's the no-frills mix-down of my session with mvollwrath.

http://music.debastion.com/mvoll-spuddle_070707.mp3

Two complete strangers anywhere in the world, working together in collaboration to complete a song together.

Ooh the mind boggles at the potential
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Old 06-08-2007, 08:21 AM   #12
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Not bad at all for about 6 hours of work!
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Old 06-11-2007, 11:57 AM   #13
keyElement
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The session mode work you all did sounds great! What an excellent tool. Thank you very much for the excellent info mvollrath. I was having a tough time trying to figure out session mode but your posts cleared it all up. Do you know if is possible to enable session mode on a private server?
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Old 06-11-2007, 05:25 PM   #14
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Ok, I see now. My bad. It appears that Ninjam Server does support session mode by default. I was looking for a setting in the config file. I didn't think to try to connect to it...duh. One more question for everybody, why does Ninjam Server only allow you to use 1 port on the server instead of 5 or 6 like on the jam farm?
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Old 06-18-2007, 07:58 AM   #15
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Quote:
Originally Posted by keyElement View Post
One more question for everybody, why does Ninjam Server only allow you to use 1 port on the server instead of 5 or 6 like on the jam farm?
You can use as many ports as you want. You just need to start up a new instance of the server using a different port.
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Old 06-21-2007, 08:02 AM   #16
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Shweet! Thanks Pruitt
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Old 07-04-2007, 09:48 AM   #17
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Any chance of splitting off Mvollraths posts into their own thread and stickying? I think it'd really help out a lot of people.

Maybe I'll see about doing some documentation as well to put up for download..
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Old 07-19-2007, 09:32 AM   #18
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Pruitt View Post
You can use as many ports as you want. You just need to start up a new instance of the server using a different port.
on MAC: to log into two servers simultaneously you must have a second iteration of NINJAM installed. also, there are no effects on the MAC version.

ha: more fuel for tbfx's "switch to Linux" fire.
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Old 10-30-2007, 11:51 AM   #19
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Default Bump!

Um, this thread should probably be stickied?
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...Playing fast around the drums is one thing. But to play with people for others, to listen to, that's something else. That's a whole other world.
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Old 04-19-2008, 02:53 AM   #20
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Bump
....
!!
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Originally Posted by Tony Williams
...Playing fast around the drums is one thing. But to play with people for others, to listen to, that's something else. That's a whole other world.
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Old 06-03-2008, 02:04 PM   #21
JP_Fdez_de_la_R
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VERY THANKS MAN!!

YEEEAH, YOU ARE GENEROUS

THANKS!
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Old 06-09-2008, 07:23 PM   #22
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I would love to try this with someone, if you're up for it come and find me and ask me I'm on Ninjam often or just post back and we can talk (Drummer Alex not Bass)
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Old 08-08-2010, 03:33 AM   #23
jayendra
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I can't change the bpm in Test ninjam 2600
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