First free release of autoloop

Hi all,

I've added another item to the software page on my website. Autoloop is an application I've literally thrown together after developing an algorithm designed to find multiple loops for pipe organ samples. Documentation is not as detailed as for my other software at this stage, nor is the application as "clean" internally as I would like it to be - but so far the testing looks promising. It hasn't complained with any of the test samples I have given it as of yet and I haven't found a loop that which it has generated that produces clicks or significant changes in the signal tone at the loop point.

I normally would wait a bit longer to release some software but would really appreciate some feedback on how it works on samples from other sample set creaters.

You WILL need to edit the autoloop.conf file that is included in the zip package to suite your samples. My samples are generally about 12 seconds long and the .conf file has been configured to run autoloop suited for samples of that length.

To use it, extract the zip file to a directory containing a set of samples and run the appropriate .bat file (which will work on "standardly named" hauptwerk wave files: 036-c.wav, 037-c#, etc...) a subdirectory named "new" will be created and the looped samples will be copied into it. A better alternative to extracting it to every directory with samples is to add the directory that you extract the files to into your systems PATH environment variable... then the bat files and the autoloop executable will run in any directory you are working in. The autoloop.conf file MUST be in the same directory as the autoloop.exe executable file.

The batch files are included only for convenience in processing large numbers of samples.

Feedback appreciated and ideas for features which you find important (excluding GUI's at this stage) are welcomed.

Get it here: http://www.appletonit.com.au/nickspage/software_autoloop_download.html

Nick Appleton.

Hi all,

I've added another item to the software page on my website. Autoloop is an application I've literally thrown together after developing an algorithm designed to find multiple loops for pipe organ samples. Documentation is not as detailed as for my other software at this stage, nor is the application as "clean" internally as I would like it to be - but so far the testing looks promising. It hasn't complained with any of the test samples I have given it as of yet and I haven't found a loop that which it has generated that produces clicks or significant changes in the signal tone at the loop point.

I normally would wait a bit longer to release some software but would really appreciate some feedback on how it works on samples from other sample set creaters.

You WILL need to edit the autoloop.conf file that is included in the zip package to suite your samples. My samples are generally about 12 seconds long and the .conf file has been configured to run autoloop suited for samples of that length.

To use it, extract the zip file to a directory containing a set of samples and run the appropriate .bat file (which will work on "standardly named" hauptwerk wave files: 036-c.wav, 037-c#, etc...) a subdirectory named "new" will be created and the looped samples will be copied into it. A better alternative to extracting it to every directory with samples is to add the directory that you extract the files to into your systems PATH environment variable... then the bat files and the autoloop executable will run in any directory you are working in. The autoloop.conf file MUST be in the same directory as the autoloop.exe executable file.

The batch files are included only for convenience in processing large numbers of samples.

Feedback appreciated and ideas for features which you find important (excluding GUI's at this stage) are welcomed.

Get it here: http://www.appletonit.com.au/nickspage/software_autoloop_download.html

Nick Appleton.

Thanks Nick.

I'm about to record some samples, so I'll give your software a try to see how I get on with it.
It won't be especially speedy, but I'll get back to you soonest.

I'm about to record some samples, so I'll give your software a try to see how I get on with it.
It won't be especially speedy, but I'll get back to you soonest.

Dear Alan

Are you coming up next Saturday? Would you like to come earlier and see if you could take some samples of the foot-blown pipe organ here and demonstrate? From what a pop-group did here, I know that the result is seriously exciting . . .

Best wishes

David P

Dear Alan

Are you coming up next Saturday? Would you like to come earlier and see if you could take some samples of the foot-blown pipe organ here and demonstrate? From what a pop-group did here, I know that the result is seriously exciting . . .

Best wishes

David P

Hello David.

I will certainly be visiting you, thank you.

If I can hang on to the DAT recorder that I have currently borrowed, I'll bring it with me. I must remember to get the microphones, which I don't have right now.

I'm not sure about demonstrating the looping software as I haven't tried it yet, but we can all investigate on the day.

I am bringing my laptop and license key, so I can run the Paramount 320 and possibly a part finished version of the Paramount 330+.

I might have to ask for the use of a chaise, as my left leg is not so good at present.

If I can hang on to the DAT recorder that I have currently borrowed, I'll bring it with me. I must remember to get the microphones, which I don't have right now.

I'm not sure about demonstrating the looping software as I haven't tried it yet, but we can all investigate on the day.

Dear Alan

Brilliant - I've got a Zoom H2 which might be good enough just to demo a rank.

If you'd like to come earlier possibly to set things up it might be a good idea so that we know what we are doing. My amps have phono inputs - we'll need leads - we can demonstrate stereo in the Library and multichannel in the Elgin Room

Best wishes

David P

Dear Alan

Brilliant - I've got a Zoom H2 which might be good enough just to demo a rank.

If you'd like to come earlier possibly to set things up it might be a good idea so that we know what we are doing. My amps have phono inputs - we'll need leads - we can demonstrate stereo in the Library and multichannel in the Elgin Room

Best wishes

David P

Hello David.

I have a pair of Behringer TRUTH 2031As I can bring if that would be useful. I also have a small Alesis reverb unit. I may have enough leads, but my laptop is not ASIO so quality may be an issue. I can probably borrow or find enough connectors and I will bring a soldering iron, although I'm sure you will have one.

Do you have a Hauptwerk enabled multi-channel PC in the Elgin room?

I'm rather hoping that we can persuade Percy Vickery to play the Paramount.

Has anyone tried this software who can give me some feedback? Sorry about being so "dead" on the forums, I have been exceptionally busy with final year uni subjects! I just finished exams for the semester and am on holidays at the moment - I'm hoping to do some more sampling in the upcoming month.

I have also just moved my website to http://www.appletonaudio.com/ hopefully this will become a much better place for me to host my software and sample sets...

Best regards,

Nick

Hi Nick,

I'm surprised that no one has answered your request for feedback. I haven't actually tried your software even though I installed it quite some time ago. I am interested in it and I do intend to try it sometime, It just hasn't made it to the top of my "todo" list yet. But I'll tell you why it stays off the top of my list, even though that isn't the quite the kind of feedback you request.

I guess I'm one of the few Hauptwerk enthusiasts that actually loops samples instead of just always using sample sets "as is". I have looped many thousands of samples for my own use, and I always use Seamless Looper. The thing that discourages me from trying your software is that there doesn't appear to be any easy way to check the loops as they are made. I assume that if your software puts hundreds of loops in a rank there will be some defective loops that should be deleted. I know that Seamless Looper certainly finds a lot of bum loops, but it is easy to test each one before the loop is finalized and the sample saved. I think that it would be very tedious to check all the loops that your software inserts in a rank. The samples would have to be loaded into Seamless Looper and checked or, even more tedious, loaded into Adobe Audition and played one at a time. The thought of doing that is really what has discouraged me from even trying your program.

I suspect that your software may actually be better than Seamless Looper at finding good loops in organ samples. But it can't be perfect, especially with difficult ranks such as mixtures. If you have some easy way to check and remove undesirable loops, that would be of great interest.

Hi Al,

I actually wrote the software after getting fed up with the results of seamless looper - not that I think it's a bad program, it just isn't designed for pipe organ samples nor is it designed to find loops without a crossfade. More than 80% of the loops which it found when I was looping St. Stephen's had noticeable clicks at the loop points - usually if you raise the volume enough, you can tell that the loop, although a decent guess, isn't really "seamless".

My application will not result in clicks in the looping process (provided it has been set up correctly). There are some settings in it's config file (which I set experimentally while looping St. Augustine's) which will report to the user when it thinks it stuffed up (you can control these settings). You can also prevent it saving loops which it isn't very certain are valid. I have never heard a loop my application has found to "click" - however I have found the spectrum to change ever so slightly, but one would never hear this effect while playing. The application
Also saves text markers for each loop point (which can be viewed in cool edit and probably audition) specifying the confidence that the loop is accurate. It also saves the loops from the highest confidence to the least - I.e. If any loop is going to have a problem, it'll most likely be the final loop.

I look forward to hearing what you  think.

Nick

Hi Nick,

It's a holiday in America where we celebrate 234 years of independance from the British oppressors. I took this opportunity to try out your looping program and I am very impressed. It is MUCH better at finding loops than Seamless Looper. It only lacks one feature that I would like very much, and has one minor bug, which is easily worked around.

I wish you would add a configuration variable which selects less than 8 loops. I know some sample set producers like to brag about how many loops they include, but I'm pretty sure that after about 3 loops there is no practical improvement in realism, only a waste of RAM.

I retract my statement about not being able to check the loops easily. It is easy to load a whole rank into Adobe Audition and quickly check each loop. Actually, I looped a Harmonic Flute rank and found no bad loops at all. The program did have some trouble with a rank of short mixtures, but was still much better than Seamless Looper.

The one minor glitch is that the files it writes are non-standard in some way. A program which some people use to manipulate samples refuses to read them, giving the following error message:

********
05/07/10 10:55:51: : Starting to trim start and ends of sample H:\TempWork\StopPrepareTemp\01\036-C.wav
05/07/10 10:55:51: : Message: The WAV file header has an invalid size.

Attempted action: Loading a WAV file.
05/07/10 10:55:51: : Message: Error loading WAV file H:\TempWork\StopPrepareTemp\01\036-C.wav.
*******
However, if the file is simply opened in Adobe Audition and re-saved, the problem goes away. So this glitch is easily worked around, but should probably be fixed anyway.

It may help if I provide links to the same file before and after fixing it by a re-save.

http://almorse.home.comcast.net/036-Cfault.wav
http://almorse.home.comcast.net/036-Cfixed.wav

To sum up, I think your program is fabulous! I probably won't use Seamless Looper again, even if you don't fix the things I requested above.

Oh, I almost forgot, I haven't been able to get Seamless Looper to work in Win7-64bit, but there is no problem with your program.

Thanks for an excellent piece of programming, and FREE!

I haven't been able to get Seamless Looper to work in Win7-64bit,

You are aware of "XP Mode", are you? Essentially it's Virtual PC with a free licenced copy of XP, and the ability to display the application as a window in Windows 7. I use it to run Surcode DTS in Windows 7 x64, because that has an installer that won't run in 64-bit Windows (I simply couldn't make Minnetonka's tech support understand why this was a problem! - they told me to download the latest version, which turned out to be the same 2006 file I already have).

Paul

Thanks for the tip Paul. However, I opted for the cheaper Home Premium version of Win7 and when I try to download XP Mode I get the following message:

You are not eligible to download Windows XP Mode. You must have Windows 7 Professional, Enterprise, or Ultimate to run Windows XP Mode. To upgrade visit Windows 7 Anytime Upgrade.

I have yet to see any really compelling reason to pay for the upgrade.

Ah, Ok - sorry. I'm using Enterprise under my university's licence, and hadn't taken that restriction on board.

Paul

I wish you would add a configuration variable which selects less than 8 loops. I know some sample set producers like to brag about how many loops they include, but I'm pretty sure that after about 3 loops there is no practical improvement in realism, only a waste of RAM.

I will implement this and upload a new release in the next couple of weeks... you are correct in stating that 8 loops is overkill. I hard coded the 8 loop search for testing purposes and figure I just never bothered to change it.

I retract my statement about not being able to check the loops easily. It is easy to load a whole rank into Adobe Audition and quickly check each loop. Actually, I looped a Harmonic Flute rank and found no bad loops at all. The program did have some trouble with a rank of short mixtures, but was still much better than Seamless Looper.

The one minor glitch is that the files it writes are non-standard in some way. A program which some people use to manipulate samples refuses to read them, giving the following error message:

********
05/07/10 10:55:51: : Starting to trim start and ends of sample H:\TempWork\StopPrepareTemp\01\036-C.wav
05/07/10 10:55:51: : Message: The WAV file header has an invalid size.

Attempted action: Loading a WAV file.
05/07/10 10:55:51: : Message: Error loading WAV file H:\TempWork\StopPrepareTemp\01\036-C.wav.
*******
However, if the file is simply opened in Adobe Audition and re-saved, the problem goes away. So this glitch is easily worked around, but should probably be fixed anyway.

Thanks for this report. It's funny how I miss little things like this. My routine for processing samples is to loop them and then manually set the release cue point using Cool Edit thus I was always doing a re-save before a sample would be loaded. This will be fixed in the next release and thanks for the sample data.

To sum up, I think your program is fabulous! I probably won't use Seamless Looper again, even if you don't fix the things I requested above.

...

Thanks for an excellent piece of programming, and FREE!

Thanks for the encouragement! It's what drives me to keep doing it. I'm hoping to wrap some of my programs in a GUI soon, it's starting to get tedious using the console all the time.

Nick

Hi Nick

I only discovered your Autoloop a couple of days ago and already I'm putting it to good use on a project.

Edit: I misread Morse's original post, and now see that he's referring to Zero-X not working under 7-64, not AutoLoop. Strange thing is, for me it *does* work...

So far, it seems to produce very good quality loops and unlike an alternative, it doesn't crash or wilfully ignore its own config files.

I have two "wishes" which may or may not be of use to others:

1) Due to the way I'm working, all my samples are exactly the same length, which means it would be very easy to auto-position release markers. Yes, they sometimes need hand-manipulation in Cool Edit, but having ballpark correct ones to begin with cuts out a lot of point-and-click in Cool Edit. Any chance a future version could optionally add release markers at a pre-defined timestamp set in the config file (rather than the output level location algorithm used by other software which often fails badly on wobbly samples)?

2) As AutoLoop is obviously very thorough, it is quite slow on my i7, which is not a problem other than my having to babysit it. Would it be possible to use it in batch-mode so I could set it running on a whole division for example, and go do something else? Regarding a GUI, the only need I can see for one is to allow something akin to the output queue window in Handbrake, which would solve the "problem" of large sample sets.

Many thanks for producing a very focused, stable and no-nonsense application

Kind regards

Neil