Plans for 2021

It is that time again. I don’t believe in new year’s resolutions. But it is good time to check you plans and plan for the future. Covid-19 changed plans for 2020. I have planned to make my flat more like studio for couple years. Didn’t want people to get old stuff out and new stuff in during pandemic. If pandemic is over by summer I probably rearrange my flat during summer vacation. I didn’t plan to ride as much as I did. When pandemic hit Finland I started to ride daily. Did it until end of October. I rode 9670 kilometers 2020 and lost about 20 kilos. I plan to continue this until end of April. By then I should be close to my target weight.

Going into 2020 plan was to limit gear purchases. On music front it mostly went ok. On software side it was upgrades (or what could be considered as upgrade with little imagination) until yesterday when I got new synth. On hardware side I got two synths which I have wanted for a long time. There is still need for polyphonic analog synth. But otherwise hardware synth side should be ok for now. Next is to get guitar side to ok state. I got new amp last year and started to build pedal board. Building pedal board is plan for first half of 2021.

On second half of 2020 I started to rearrange plugins in Cubase to have small set of plugins I start to concentrate and learn to use them. That new synth I bought yesterday filled cap I had in those plugins. After having pedal board ready my music making set up should be ready and not to get major changes any more. Rearrangement of the flat would make using it easier. I will upgrade computers but music making software and hardware should stay the same for years to come.

On camera/video/photography side situation isn’t as good or plan as clear. There is gimbal which could be the gimbal for years to come. My current one doesn’t have all functionality I want but that has. There is camera which could be the camera for years to come but I would have to get lenses for it. I am waiting for upgrade to my current camera which would give all features I want. Then I would have camera setup I don’t need to think about upgrading. Current setup have some limitations. Mainly 8 bit video and rolling shutter. I could get rid of those problems by paying about 10 000 euros and waiting for stores to get cameras and lenses. I don’t want to pay that much at the moment because there could be camera for my current lenses which would fix those issues.

I got some lights from end of the year sales. Still need few stands and softboxes for them but bi-color lights setup is ok at the moment. Still need some RGB lights. After that it is waiting for rearranging the flat and I can start to shoot more cinematic videos in my flat.

To conclude everything above 2021 will continue same transition that started during 2020. I haven’t released music or videos for a while but I will do that in future. 2020/2021 has been/will be time to reinvent how I do things. In music I will add more playing into programming. On videos it will be better lighting and more cinematic footage. You could get from above I concentrate on gear but that is not the case. 2020 have been more about learning to use what I have and that will continue 2021.

Then when to expect new music or videos? I don’t know that yet. I had plan to do something during holiday season but Festive 500 was easier. There will be something this year. 2022 should start me already continuously making music and videos.

It has been weird week on software releases front

I don’t know what is so special about this week when four companies have decided to release updated version of their software. Joe Biden was announced winner of US presidential election but it can’t be that because software development takes much more time and launch can’t be organized in couple days. What ever was the case I got updates on three software I use on video production and making music. I was about to get the fourth one but more about that later.

It all started on Monday with new version of Davinci Resolve. Version 17 is still in beta. I have downloaded it but am not sure if I install it or wait for more stable version. It has few helpful improvements like audio is now available in fusion tab and easier keying and rotoscoping. There are other useful improvements but nothing I can’t wait for software to get more stable when I have other new software no longer in beta state.

Tuesday was Ableton’s turn to announce Live 11. Still in closed beta. Live is finally getting MPE and polyphonic aftertouch support and Push will get polyphonic aftertouch. If they had those one and half years ago I wouldn’t have moved from Live. I used Live for years until I learned about MPE. New release made me think about starting to use Live again. It lasted only one day. I might get Live 11 because it is still better for somethings than Cubase 11 which was released next day.

Cubase 11 and Scale Assistant stopped any considerations of updating to Live 11 right now. Scale Assistant is something I have wanted ever since I started to use Cubase. Ableton’s Push has similar functionality. Komplete Kontrol has it too and I was about to buy one last year. Scale Assistant gives same functionality to every controller and more. I didn’t have to think if I update or not. Of course I want to use Roli Seaboard with Scale Assistant. Everything else was bonus. Only problem was getting licence updated. I managed do that next day. I could use Cubase without updating licence for a day so it wasn’t big issue. But it was annoying. This was first software of these actually released this week. Not as beta but really released.

Day after Cubase released new version which made Roli Seaboard my main keyboard Roli released Equator 2. I had Equator but it didn’t get as much use as it should have. It felt like it was made to have MPE capable synth for Roli’s MPE controllers. It was synth which took most out of MPE’s potential. But when other synths started to implement MPE I started to use them when wanted to use MPE. Other synths were synths first and MPE capable second. Equator 2 feels like it was made to be synth first, not just synth for Roli’s own controllers. After announcement I updated Equator. It is now better than I remembered. One reason being sound libraries are no longer limited to what controllers you own.

I didn’t realize how complex Equator was until I checked how much of its functionality was in Equator 2. Equator has six sound sources too but you can’t choose what those are and architecture is similar to Equator 2. I guess I should have used it more. Maybe I was too turned off by the limitations it had. Equator 2 loses some of those limitations. User interface isn’t the sexiest but I think I can endure.

I have wanted to find one synth I learn well. Zebra HZ has been good candidate but it doesn’t have MPE. Zebra 3 is coming in future. At least it has been promised. Zebra 2 and Zebra HZ has still got major updates while we wait for Zebra 3. Equator 2 could become that synth. It is quite complex and while it is not perfect yet it does many things well. It still takes most advantage of any synth I know out of MPE. Ability to use own samples and wavetables expands sounds from what you get out of box. After evening with Equator and second with Equator 2 it feels like this could be the synth for me. It is not perfect yet but with small improvements it could be close to it.

After Cubase 11 and Equator 2 was released I feel like I got what I was missing in making music. Now I just have start working on it which is a other matter.

Plans for 2020

I went quite experimental with this one. On both video and music side. It could be taste of things to come. Experimental videos are more fun to make. Next one will be experimental at least on music side. Don’t know how experimental I can go on video side. If it works it could start series of videos. But more about that next time.

Video tells my plans for 2020. I try to get rid of gear acquisition syndrome. There are still something like 360 camera I’d like to have but for what I have I am not going to get something only with minor improvements on what I already have. How that works remains to be seen.

Best thing at the moment: Ototoy Friday

CUTENESS WARNING. I have spend way too much time watching Ototoy Friday’s music videos last couple days. As far as I know they haven’t released full length album. Only singles and EPs. They had crowd funding campaign earlier this year for something. Not sure what it was about. Twitter’s translations are not too good. Translation for their tweet with studio pictures was “Today was a certain activity for Adult Friday”. I don’t even try to guess what crowdfunding was about when translations are this good.

Video above is their most ambitious. I wish there was behind the scenes video telling how they pulled it off. It needed crazy amount of planning and coordination . It looks so easy and effortless but it is not. That is probably why they haven’t tried anything as ambitious after this video. Video for song スプリングフィーバー has both girls on their own frames just like this one but there is no interaction between them. They do things same time but nothing like they do in this. I have to warn you that video can cause cuteness overdose.

Even their less ambitious videos have something interesting in them and songs and girls make them super cute. Their latest video for song Enigma is bit disappointing. It is closer to regular music videos than their other videos. Maybe because it is closer to electronic dance music than their other songs. I hope it is only one off and not change of style. I like their cute and interesting songs and videos more.

Upgrading from Sony A6300 to Sony A6600

I am one of those who dared to buy Sony A6600. This is what I have to say about the camera after having and testing it for a week. Whole video is shot outdoors with Sony A6600. You don't have to endure my talking face waiting for sample footage. I mainly shoot video so I talk from that perspective.

Making of Strange Times

New cycling video coming. Next one will probably not be cycling video. I broke DJI Osmo’s clean protective filter and no store seems to sell it. Osmo can survive without it but I will save it for a while. I have ND filters for summer usage. I have thought about other options but there aren’t anything like Osmo. GoPro Hero with Karma is closest but it is not the same. Last two videos have had cycling footage so it is time for other kind of videos anyway.

Another reason for less cycling footage is I am not too happy of DJI Osmo’s low light capabilities. Small cameras aren’t best possible low light. DaVinci Resolve has reasonably good noise reduction but my computer can’t run it on level which I like. I wish there was “I don’t care how long rendering takes as long as video looks good” option. I would use it on final renders all the time.

With Brexit and USA’s mid-term elections on news I decided to make video about social media. Social media is big reason why everything seems so weird. I have cut down Facebook usage because it tries to make me angry by showing angry posts. I am considering leaving couple groups because angry trolls spam their hate there. Groups were interesting before but lately it has been mostly hate or Facebook only show the hate posts. More about that in video.

I had really big problems with everything making music. It took almost hour before I could start making it. Then I learned I couldn’t find anything working with sample library I started with. It was sample library I got free when I bought something else so it is good it was useful in on video. I started to put effects after sample library until it started to good. Problems continued even when rendering. Despite all the problem I am pretty happy with the result.