Melodyne Stand-alone & Plugin: My Results & Observations

[MikeDee]

Happy New Year, All!

I have tested Melodyne Stand-alone and Melodyne Plugin in SAWStudio on a Fujitsu LifeBook N6420 laptop. (Both are v1.0.11, the latest at the time of this writing.) Here are my results and observations.......

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Melodyne Editor Stand-alone

The program appears to work fine.

Also, just for fun, I was able to open a stereo .wav file containing a full mix and transpose it up and down. While not perfect -- there were a few artifacts here and there -- I was amazed that the file was able to be analyzed as polyphonic. I didn't try moving single blobs around here...I'll give that a try next chance I get...should be interesting and fun. Additionally, although I'm sure this would work in the Plugin, I have not yet tried it (subject to the constraints outlined below).

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Melodyne Editor Plugin in SAWStudio

1. Playback must continue after having stopped Transfer of audio into the Plugin, especially with polyphonic material, to give Melodyne the time it needs to analyze the audio. If playback stops too soon after the Transfer has completed (or after clicking the Transfer button to end the process), Melodyne stops analyzing the audio, which eventually crashes SAWStudio.
***8729;***8729; WORKAROUND: Add a blank Region farther down the timeline. (Although I discovered this on my own, I later found this tip in another thread.)

2. Selecting the Note Assignment Tool immediately crashes SAWStudio.

3. A. Upon completion of editing of audio Transferred into the Plugin, the following should be done immediately (in order):
***8729;***8729;***8729;***8729;***8729;***8729; i. Mix (render) this audio to a new file/Region on the current Track (or Layer).
***8729;***8729;***8729;***8729;***8729; ii. Remove the Plugin from the FX Patch.
***8729;***8729;***8729;***8729;***8729; iii. Replace the original Region with the newly created one.
***8729;***8729;***8729;***8729;***8729; iv. Save the Session.
***8729;***8729; B. Not heeding the advice in '3·A' (above) and attempting to save the Session with the Plugin still patched results in the following upon reopening of the Session:
***8729;***8729;***8729;***8729;***8729; i. The Plugin's GUI does not open.
***8729;***8729;***8729;***8729;***8729; ii. Double-clicking the Plugin in the FX Patch to open the GUI results in a MessageBox indicating corrupt parameter settings.
***8729;***8729;***8729;***8729;***8729;***8729;***8729;***8729; a. Attempting to play, rather than open the GUI, causes the Plugin (in its presently "corrupted" state) to crash SAWStudio immediately; subsequently, the machine, now unstable, should be rebooted immediately.
***8729;***8729;***8729;***8729;***8729; iii. Clicking OK (in the MessageBox) clears the Plugin's settings; thus, Melodyne's Transferred audio file is no longer accessible within the Plugin. At this point, the following should be done (in order):
***8729;***8729;***8729;***8729;***8729;***8729;***8729;***8729;***8729; a. Close SAWStudio (no need to save the Session unless additional editing has been done).
***8729;***8729;***8729;***8729;***8729;***8729;***8729;***8729;***8729; b. Open Melodyne Stand-alone.
***8729;***8729;***8729;***8729;***8729;***8729;***8729;***8729;***8729; c. Open the desired Transferred audio file (likely the most recent one).
***8729;***8729;***8729;***8729;***8729;***8729;***8729;***8729;***8729; d. Save to a new .wav file. (This file will have the correct header info so that it can be read by SAWStudio [and other audio apps].)
***8729;***8729;***8729;***8729;***8729;***8729;***8729;***8729;***8729; e. Close Melodyne Stand-alone.
***8729;***8729;***8729;***8729;***8729;***8729;***8729;***8729;***8729; f. Reopen SAWStudio.
***8729;***8729;***8729;***8729;***8729;***8729;***8729;***8729;***8729; g. Open the same Session.
***8729;***8729;***8729;***8729;***8729;***8729;***8729;***8729;***8729; h. Remove Melodyne Plugin from the FX Patch.
***8729;***8729;***8729;***8729;***8729;***8729;***8729;***8729;***8729; i. Open the new .wav file saved in Melodyne Stand-alone, and add it to the MT, replacing the original Region (as in 3·A·iii [above]).
***8729;***8729;***8729;***8729;***8729;***8729;***8729;***8729;***8729; j. Save the Session.

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The following URL lists compatibility and peculiarities with different hosts:

http://www.celemony.com/cms/index.php?id=host_comp

Currently, SAWStudio is not supported by Celemony [Melodyne]. (I have requested that they do so.)

HTH,

[Harold Thompson]

And Celemony's response to this is "you're out of luck". They don't have any plans to develop or trouble shoot for SAW Studio.

On the bright side the Melodyne Bridge plugin with Melodyne Studio seems to work fine.

Harold Thompson

[MikeDee]

I sent pretty much the same text to Celemony. Perhaps they might reconsider, armed with this new "test data." (Uh...NOT.)

To his credit, Jörg Hüttner at Celemony was very attentive in helping me to determine my activation issues after updating from v1.08 (on the CD) to 1.0.11 (but that's another story).

[txshonk]

Good info - thanks for sharing.

I was thinking about spending $199 to upgrade my Celemony cre8 to Melodyne Studio. Guess I'll keep that money and continue using with the Melodyne Bridge to cre8 in SAW.

Who am I kidding Ill just end up spending it on something else.

Dave

[MikeDee]

Dave, if you're using the Melodyne Bridge with Cre8, then it should work just fine with Melodyne Studio.

Melodyne Studio is different from the Melodyne Editor Plugin and its stand-alone version. In fact, I figure that the Melodyne Bridge wouldn't work with the Plugin's stand-alone version (though I could be wrong). Of course, I don't need the Bridge, since I'm already using the Plugin itself.

If you like/need the added functionality of Melodyne Studio (vs. Cre8), then you might consider upgrading.

[sebastiandybing]

In the melodyne editor manual they clearly explain the problems they
got about how to handle all these different audio programs.
I think it is faily easy to place a region down the timeline.

My biggest problem is the audio quility of the polyfonic analyse,
I had a couple of recordings I hoped editor could fix, one with a singer+ piano, another with a simple choir.
Even when shifting the vocal like 15 cent couse the sound to get this
FFT kind of artifacs sound.

Maybe it is just me...

Sebastian

[Grekim]

This sounds like complete insanity to work with. I had some occasional crash issues with the plug-in version when trying to open it, but nothing like what you've been through.

[txshonk]

Dave, if you're using the Melodyne Bridge with Cre8, then it should work just fine with Melodyne Studio.

Melodyne Studio is different from the Melodyne Plugin and its stand-alone version. In fact, I figure that the Melodyne Bridge wouldn't work with the Plugin's stand-alone version (though I could be wrong). Of course, I don't need the Bridge, since I'm already using the Plugin itself.

If you like/need the added functionality of Melodyne Studio (vs. Cre8), then you might consider upgrading.

With the upgrade from cre8 I would get the Studio Bundle - which would include editor and studio. I really liked the idea of having the plug in my SAW session and not having to maintain a file linked to through the bridge. But I also like having the "paper trail" of edits. And it sounds like the "paper trail" with the plug in SAW isnt any option - so I guess I dont see the reason to dump the cash.

[Dave Labrecque]

Thanks for your thorough work on this, Mike!

[Grekim]

Fortunately, the Editor 1.0.11 (as a plug-in) seems to be working okay in SAW for me. So far I'm just testing with one mono track and no other plug-ins in the path. No other tracks yet. But, I'm able to edit pitches, close SAW, re-open SAW and continue working in the plug-in. Or, buildmix to hot track and continue. The real test will be in the next few days to a week as I mix a project.