As a Prime 4+ owner, I jumped at the opportunity to use stems in whatever form it would come from day one. While having to pre-render is a time and storage consuming work around, it’s acceptable to get to the end result, all be it not the one we expected or were promised over a year ago. We’re here now though. It’s been released into the wild and field tested. 8 gigs later, here are my thoughts.
Coming from Serato and the Rane Four which was designed with stems in mind, the work flow could benefit from some obvious tweaks. Only two weeks in however, this is par for the course. From my experience thus far, first piece of feedback would be a desire to stems accessable without the sacrifice of the cue points. Toggling back and forth between the two is less than ideal when moving quickly between tracks. If the Arrow keys, as small as they are, could be dedicated to instrumental in acapella while the pads were still in cue mode, that would be a welcomed option. What I’d really like to suggest is a Shift + Filter button option to change the filter nob into a balance between acapella and instrumental which would be extremely intuitive to use. Admittedly, I don’t know how realistic a request this is considering that the equipment is not processing the stems itself but instead accessing them as separate audio files. Idk, I’m not a developer. Lol.
Separating stems onto the EQ nobs as we’ve seen some in other software would be a big hit with most of us fast moving open format DJs as well. This is probably a more doable task than my suggestion of using the filter knob and I’m sure we’d all love to see it in the next update. Making on the fly mashups is now a standard transitioning method expected by our crowds and this is one of the most seamless methods to do so smoothly.
One of the main selling points of the Prime 4+ and Mixstream Pro Go for me were the convenience of an all-in-one controller and small form factor respectively. Not having to leave the house with my laptop has given me added peace of mind as you never know what’s going to happen on the road. To expect not to sacrifice some measure of functionality as a trade-off for these conveniences would be foolish. It’s a catch 22. It’s great not having to carry your laptop around, but the bad thing about not bringing your laptop is that you don’t have your laptop. Lol. I hope the company hasn’t abandoned a future where Prime 4+ users can render stems on the go. While some might say that’s overdue, for now, a few small tweaks to what we have now would go a long way in keeping engine user’s head’s high both during their performances and in conversations about our state of the art tools we DJs often engage in with one another.
To the engine software development team, keep up the good work and don’t think it goes unnoticed by those of us using these products in our day-to-day lives and as the primary tools for our businesses. To the rest of the engine community, keep killing it on your gigs and happy mixing!
I wouldn’t really comment on the other points but here’s what I can tell you about this one
It all depends on how the EQ is currently managed on the units, if it is managed directly by the hardware, by the DSP for example then it won’t be possible.
On the other hand if the EQ is directly generated by the software, I think in this case that it could actually have a choice between two modes in the parameters, either the Classic EQ mode or the Stems EQ mode. But in this case you couldn’t have both at the same time.
Another solution if the EQ is managed by software would be to switch to Stems EQ mode when shift is held.
Since you only have a 3-band EQ, this could be assigned as follows:
Shift + filter = Drums
Shift + low EQ = bass
Shift + mid EQ = Melody
Shift + High EQ = Vocal
But using such a mode with shift could make things confusing for many users because as soon as you release shift the relative position of the knob could be different from the real value of the EQ.
So a system of smooth control recovery would also have to be implemented on the filter and the EQ knobs.
The fact that you can use software like Virtual DJ in Stems EQ mode without the action on the knobs also affecting the frequency bands makes me think that the EQ is well managed in software by Engine OS and not in hardware by the DSP.
(reading diagonally, so maybe didn’t catch everything)
Played around with stems a bit last weekend. You have to be careful not to overdo it. But, it’s a very handy “anti-Rihanna who doesn’t stop singing” button. Or if you need an intro loop without an “upbeat” vocal cut in half. That said, switching a layer on or off is too aggressive sometimes, and a fader per layer could be handy.
But then, where are you going to put those faders? Sorry @Gaian, but I really get shivers, just by thinking about shift-button combos … Maybe let’s resurrect the A&H Xone 4D, with its 4 midi mappable faders?
The best way to avoid a sudden stop of the stems would still be to put assignable FX stems on pads 5 to 8.
A FX Echo Out on 1 bt is particularly effective on the vocal, and a FX reverb can also be effective on the melody. Concerning the bass, a fairly short FX brake can really give a nice effect.
Only the drums remain and these can simply be attenuated gently using the volume fader.
Agreed with that, which is why I pointed out that this could really make things confusing.
Denon could add a page with four sliders, one for each stem. The existing EQ is not affected and you have full control of stems levels. Maybe even add StemFX to the same screen.
Would be great if the display was skinnable and you could use a desktop app to select the components you want and resize the elements. Also give the option of different waveforms. The custom views could then be uploaded to the players as part of the profile.
Yep, I agree it would be great - and it’s been discussed around these parts on several occasions. I’d certainly go back to some of the earlier GUI views.
We once had a view where the decks were full width, one below the other. Plenty of room for long artist name and titles, genre, year, comments and more.
… Maybe let’s resurrect the A&H Xone 4D, with its 4 midi mappable faders?