We might be able to come up with something…
Semi-modular you say…
I don’t know though, my original idea was do make these so people could have a custom layout/design to fit their playing style. When modules get involved everything is already in a pseudo-fixed position, and that takes away the personal feel.
But, i may be wrong, people might not care about a personal feel, as long as the function is there???
yeah, cause totally modular would be 1 control/LCD per module and I can see no way this is gonna work. But what do I know 
. Looking forward to the other suggestions/designs/ideas
it doesn’t have to be modular, it can be set like that. I just liked how they had it so you can design your own controller. There are somethings that can be taken away and so on as I don’t need some of them. Obviously if you do start making it I have a few more idea’s I’d like to include and so.
rather than one knob/ lcd per channel you would want to make it in modular groups of controls.
eg a rack of four knobs and 5 buttons - FX
a line of 5 center detent pots - eq’s
even though in terms of over all layout and control focus every body wants something a little different to the next guy, the same paradigms (ouch i said that?) hold true when you look at the arrangment of functional groups of controls for the bread n butter of mixing controls.
To acheive a modular design the best approach is to use a central higher spec processor to handle the USB and act as a host to all the modules, the modules would be fitted with slower low spec (cheap ) micro controllers and be connected serially via either an SPI or I^2C bus. Each module would have a unique address so it knows which packets are meant for it, and an identifying code which lets the host controller identify its type.
To design a system like that is no small feat if you want it to work well, though in saying that it is by no means out of the reach of hobbyists with a reasonable skill set.
I lol’d when i read that.
It could be very interesting to try, steal a few ideas from Mawzer(uses dip switches to assign address), or make it out of lego’s like the http://www.stekgreif.com/stekgreif:main.
But i don’t think i’ll be tackling a modular system anytime soon. Maybe sometime in the future, but most likely not.
Oh my god I want one.
This sounds very interesting, I’m at work right now but I’ll post a picture of what has been buzzing in my mind the last months as soon as I get home.
Right on brother. (Hulk Hogan Style)
Here is: The Awesemo (rev0.1)
A brief explanation for you (gotta hit the bed):
All of the knobs shall be pushable (you can press them down to reset them).
Why are the pitch faders so long, the crossfader non-existing and the EQ knobs/transport buttons enormous?
I will explain all that later (tomorrow)
After reading some posts here: Isn’t MIDI a perfect way to work around the need to work around the need for expensive modular hardware? Just create one controller that has all the buttons you need and multiple settingfiles for the different (/changing) software you use..
@ the OP: Good luck on the builds!
I like the design - no need for a crossfader really and I’m sure the big transport controls could have multiple uses?
I am rather curious about those pitch faders??
@^
I’m curious about the pitch faders too???
I don’t know where to find any bigger that 120mm, but then again i haven’t really looked.
@Awesemo- Do you want the platters to be touch sensitive as well??? Even though you don’t really need it with all those cue points.
Before I start explaining my ideas keep in mind that I’m not a scratch/urban DJ, even though I often “has” to play that kind of music due to drunk obnoxious girls. I’ve been DJ’ing for almost 10 years and these ideas are the results of my own experiences out at the clubs/events. Totally whacky ideas and “could be”:s are not intended for this design - only what actually works and is important. When playing at home or at a friends party you can go crazy with all kinds of setups reaching the absolute limits of what traktor can achieve, but in reality when you are out at a club, playing for an unknown drunk crowd, atleast I for one, tend to see what is really needed from my controller. Most of the crazy bells and whistles tend to seem not as important.
Here is a first explanation of my ideas including how it’s supposed to be mapped with Traktor PRO:
The EQ knobs:
All of the EQ rotary knobs are going to be BIG sturdy pieces with that nice “slow” feel to them and lots of space between them so that you can turn two knobs next to each other simultaneously without getting your fingers tangled up/touching each other.
The small yellow buttons next to each knob is going to be a kill switch (and now i discover that the upmost knob shouldn’t have a kills switch since it’s the filter) - when shining the kill is active (easier to find out which frequency is cut out at the moment when looking at the controller).
At the bottom we have the gain button - not as big as the EQ knobs since you really only use it during the first seconds of a mix to adjust the levels.
The effect section isn’t quite worked out yet, but here is the first draft at least.
The Dry/Wet knob is a big push-endless-rotary. When pushed down it emits a light somehow and this enables the effect with the choosen settings (And turns the effect ON inside traktor). The three smaller knobs are the parameters and the two buttons at the far right are for selecting effects (advanced mode).
The A-H buttons at the bottom are for enabeling quick selection of FX or perhaps loading different settings for the choosen effect - take your pick.
The two Advanced effect buttons inside traktor will be added, I just haven’t figured out where the best place to put them should be.
This is the JOG and tempo section, the jog wheel is by default functioning as a pitch bend (CDJ-style). The IN and OUT buttons are for setting loops, and is lit up in some color when active (the same color as the PLAY button will emit but not the same as the effect LED’s, hotuce LED’s and EQ LED’s.
IN sets an in-point and OUT sets the out-point and enables the loop. Pressing OUT again disables the loop and the button LED’s.
There is no “Reloop” button as you probably can see, but I can’t really say that I’ve ever needed it as an “want to be 100% EDM DJ”, especially not when you’ve got all of the transport controls that will be explained in the next post.
The sync button does what it says - it syncs the BPM’s… however it won’t keep them locked in SYNC when you let go of the button. This is because I’ve found out that beat grids really can’t be set with 100.000% accuracy due to the fact that different base kicks fits differently together (this is for all of you who want rock fucking solid beat matching not the “it-will-suffice-in-my-bedroom” beat matching).
The only disadvantage this has is that you can’t ride the pitch on an other deck and have the other song follow it’s tempo - UNLESS you keep the SYNC pressed down on the deck that is supposed to follow. How many times per gig do you really need to do that, when playing out in clubs or at real events?
(I do about 2-3 tempo switches during a regular gig and sometimes none at all)
Now for the long pitch fader…
You see… unless you are axwell, dj tiesto or pete tong you are not going to get all of those “play whatever you want and the crowd will love you no matter what”-gigs. Eventually you will find yourself having to play some old stupid pop song from the early 90’s or perhaps some old stuff Guns N Roses did - or something else that you relly didn’t count on. Stuff that doesn’t have a straight BPM throughout the song. And you didn’t have any time to time warp it in Ableton. Or the new song that you bought from beatport has a break that changes in BPM. Then you will need a decent pitch fader with accuracy unless you want to do a horse run with your kick drums or keep on constantly pitch bending to keep it aligned.
The VCI’s pitch fader is really not that good - if everything is in sync you don’t need it - if it isn’t the fader is not accurate enough (yes, I find the pitch fader on the VCI a complete waste of time).
Bigger controls gives you better control (hence the argument two posts
above about the EQ knobs).
Oh, and there is one last thing that isn’t visible in my sketch-up: the jogFX button. It will either be placed at the opposite side of the OUT button (in the lower right corner of the jogwheel) or it will be placed in the effect section.
Anyhow… when pressed down it will let you scroll through jogadjusted effects by scrolling the jog and then activating them by just hitting the jog. (this will of course inactivate the pitch bend functions of the jog).
This part isn’t 100% thought through yet, therefore I didn’t include it in my sketch up.
And finally the transport controls.
The enormous CUE - PLAY - PREVCUE - NEXTCUE buttons are that big because… well… because there is no other buttons that are nicer to hit than the CDJ-1000’s in my opinion (no I’m not a fanboy that owns a pair myself, and yes I’ve tried basically all of Denons products too).
And with the PREVCUE and NEXTCUE buttons I hope that it will raise stuff to a new level. (This is the mapping I’ve got on my VCI and I love it)
The 1-8 buttons are just for activating the hotcues - plain and simple.
The Volume fader is pretty short since I don’t really use it that much… keep at 80% when starting mix and slamming it down when you are done (after you’ve filtered out the other song or just hit a massive break/buildup).
Whoa… this just went from a really simple build to something a little more complex.
Figure out how you want the layout to be in the final model, and what you want each Knob/Button to do. I don’t really need the function in traktor, as the mapping will be up to you, but if you want push knobs for the eq cuts, toggle/locking buttons for anything, which buttons to be lighted, size and spacing of everything, what you would like the enclosure made out of, and pretty much all the specifics that you are looking for???
When we’ve got that done, i’ll be able to get a parts list and a beginning estimate on the cost, minus the enclosure, as i’ll have to get quotes from several different people.
But once you know exactly what you want i’ll be able to get the ball rolling.
I’ve already got one really complex one i’m designing right now for nephew on here. Plus the 3 i’m currently building, 2 for me and 1 for a friend. So it’s going to be a little while before actual construction can begin on this, but that doesn’t mean we can’t get it all planned out. So there is less to do later on.
Well, it sounds more complex than it is really…
Regarding the jog, it would be nice if it were touch sensitive but it’s not a must. The EQ knobs should not be push-rotarys, however all of the effect knobs must be. There is no need for any kind of toggle functionality midi-wise, just plain midi signals sent for each push/turn of a button/knob. (And the ability to send MIDI-out data from traktor to toggle the LED’s of some buttons).
Something like this was what i had in mind for the big transport buttons with a size of about 3cm in diameter (sending one MIDI-note per click):
The houtcues, and all of the other rectangular buttons should just be plain square buttons (some with LED possibilities) that sends one MIDI-note per click.
The EQ rotarys should be big knobs that “clicks” at 12o clock sending a different midi note there, (with at least 1cm in diameter).
The effect rotarys works exactly the same besides the fact that they also can send a midi note when pushed down. And the dry/wet also needs to have some kind of LED (or perhaps just a standalone LED on the side).
The enclosure needs to be of some kind of sturdy material, either a hardened plastic composition or in a best case scenario: aluminum.
If you’re not a scratch/urban dj I don’t really see why anyone would want one…
Yes of course you could assign a cue drop function to either button if that’s what you wanted…
