where the beat aligns, (The timing that counts for when songs are exported)

[SuperSega]

Hi I need some help. I'm having a hard time figuring out how to diagnosis where the "beat" aligns in a song for modplug tracker or how exactly it works. Because I use some effects that time themselves by the tick for modplug for example like a cutoff filter lfo starting at a different position depending on which row you played the song from. Basically I don't know how to figure out where the official song timing falls at a given tick/row speed, but there must be some way of counting the ticks to figure where is the best place to hit play from right??
like I notice that the timing gets changed when I use speed change effects and what not.
And I use a lot of pattern breaks and pattern loops and stuff, are there any general rules about what row to play the song from to hear the official timing (where sound processing effects and envelopes are concerned)

An explanation would really be appreciated thanks!

[Saga Musix]

I don't think I understood this topic. Are you talking about effect plugins which don't reset their LFO offset when restarting the song, as in the other topic you started some time ago? In that case, there is no way to find out "when" you should render your song to WAV. My advice would be to always close and re-open the module before exporting it to WAV to always get the same timing with plugins (unless they are completely randomized, which case you can of course do nothing about the timing, neither in OpenMPT, nor in any other VST host).

[SuperSega]

no actually, this is related but in this case this is dealing with lfo plugins that DO reset their offset at the start of the song.
I don't know how to describe my issue because to be honest it's quite confusing, but I know for sure for example that the timing with some plugins is reliable say for example playing the pattern from row 5 will always have the same offset. My question is how do I calculate from which row to play a pattern from to hear the song with the effects' offset at a point that accurately represents what offset it will be at at that point when I hear the final exported wav.

[Saga Musix]

I don't think you are asking here for something OpenMPT-specific, but something that is very specific to the nature of some plugins. When starting playback e.g. on row 5 of the first pattern, OpenMPT counts how many samples would have been rendered until that row, so the same amount of samples should be passed to the instrument as if the module was started from row 0 (with a minor difference of 1 sample, maybe). If the plugin can deal correctly with this sample-exact information is however not part of what I can control within OpenMPT's code. If a plugin only resets its LFO when jumping around but does not sync it to OpenMPT's sample counter, then this is nothing we could fix.

[SuperSega]

man now i'm really confused, see I have this whole song and the timing with this plugin keeps changing when I try to play it from a logical part of the pattern, but when I paste that pattern into a new project and play it with the same settings the plugin is reliable.
I was going to send a sample but a sample works now, for some reason in the middle of this long song the plugin is being inconsistent. I don't really get what's happening. maybe I need a better lfo plugin. I would switch to IT mode but I already did this whole song in xm... :/ and I don't wanna mess up the timbre of the instruments.
Sorry for troubling you at least modplug on its own seems to be very reliable.

[Saga Musix]

You're probably using the plugin with different settings in both songs; try removing it in both and then re-add it... Should result in identical behaviour then if that is how the plugin is supposed to work. Really, I don't think OpenMPT could do anything here to improve the situation.

[SuperSega]

yeah I don't even know anymore I'm still diagnosing things. what i just typed might even be off because of how i'm hearing things i'm getting the most subtle re-timing. .. :/ next time i'll just use the it mode envelopes, I just got 5 minutes into this song so I don't wanna go and re-do all the sounds.

[Saga Musix]

I think you should look out for an LFO plugin that can be triggered through MIDI notes as a source for the modulation, and a plugin that can be controlled through MIDI CCs as a target plugin. That way, you could retrigger the LFO sync on every occasion as you like. You'd then set the target plugin as the output plugin of the LFO plugin and define some MIDI CC to be controlled through the LFO.

[SuperSega]

that would be a dream plugin :/

[Saga Musix]

I don't think it should be too hard to find plugins of any sort which are controllable through CC messages. And there are plenty of LFO plugins which can send CC messages.