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Getting Started with Orb Composer S
V 1.5
Accompanying Video Series
INDEX
I. What is Orb Composer?
II. Installation on PC and Mac
III. MIDI drivers explained
IV. VST/Audio Units scan explained
V. DAW VS standalone workflow
VI. First opening : UX/UI overview, menu explained
VII. My First Music with Orb Composer
VIII. Refresh melody and chords with AI
IX. Build your own chord progression
X. Exporting MIDI/Audio
XI. Project Template to Store VSTs for future projects
XII. Midi Editor
XIII. Importing/Harmonizing Melodies
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XIV. Clip Editing Interface
XV. Drum Sequencer
XVI. Deformation
XVII. FAQ and Opening Tickets
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I. What is Orb Composer?
A. Orb is the name of the first Artificial Intelligence designed for music composers.
More than 5 years of research and development were necessary to create this
smart tool for composers, bands, orchestrators, to help them experiment new
musical ideas and enhance their creativity.
B. Orb Composer is not a replacement for a composer. Instead, it is a tool for ideas,
and to create full orchestrations, songs, etc. very quickly, which you can then
keep as they are, or edit further in your DAW of choice by exporting MIDI or
Audio. You are still the artist, and Orb Composer relies on intelligent decision
making from the composer to define what it will write.
II. Installation on PC and Mac
A. First for PC users, download the Orb Composers software from your
account at www.orb-composer.com/my-account/ and click the Windows
icon on the software you have purchased. Once downloaded, simply run
the .exe file, and install the software as you would any other. You will need
to then restart your PC.
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B. For MAC users, the installation is similar, but you also have to install Orb’s
MIDI drivers separately.
1. You can download them here:
https://www.orb-composer.com/midi-driver/
III. MIDI drivers explained
A. Currently, MIDI support for Orb Composer S is only basic transport control
(Play/Stop/Back). Extended support for midi will be included in future
versions, but those are the current limitations.
B. Orb also has a number of MIDI channels that are installed on your PC
when you install Orb Composer. Here is a complete list of all Orb
Composer’s MIDI ports for your reference.
IV. VST/Audio Units scan explained
A. VST (Audio Units on Mac OS) scanning enables you to use external VSTs
in Orb Composer S, such as Kontakt, Omnisphere, and many others,
including effects plugins.
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B. You can access the VSTs and scan for them in any of three ways. Press
ctrl+shift+p, click on an instrument name on the left side of the main
window, or click the Edit button at the top, and click on Instrument
Preferences.
C. Once here, you can then click on “Search Paths” next to the text “VST
Explorer”. Doing this opens a dialog box that will let you choose the paths
to scan for VSTs and plugins. You can define as many as you need to.
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D. Once you have defined your paths, you can then click OK, and then in the
Instrument Preferences window, click the “circle arrows” button to refresh
your VST list.
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E. VST folders are always scanned on startup of Orb Composer. To disable
this, go to Edit, then Show user settings, then uncheck the box that says
“Update plugin list at start”
F. It’s important to note that while Orb Composer S supports VST3, it is
recommended to use VST 2, as VST 3 support is only basic in this
version.
V. DAW VS standalone workflow
A. Previously in Orb Composer, you had to connect Orb Composer to a
DAW, which was quite tedious to setup, and much less reliable than Orb
Composer S. Orb Composer S is a standalone software that enables you
to have a much less intrusive and complicated workflow. You simply load
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all of your VST instruments directly into each articulation or instrument you
are using, and you can even add VST effects to each articulation as well.
B. However, Orb Composer has some limitations, and while you may be
satisfied with the results in Orb, you might want to edit MIDI or WAV files
separately. It is at this point that you would export all of your files, and
open them in the DAW of your choosing for further editing. We will go over
this more in detail later.
VI. First opening : UX/UI overview, menu explained
A. While the basic UI of Orb Composer hasn’t changed much in Orb
Composer S, there are some key features that should be noted, and we
will review the UI.
B. There is a new menu in Orb Composer S for defining sound output
settings, and choosing the sample rate, and hz of your project. This is an
important thing to set right. Set your samples too high and your latency will
have a really long delay in listening, but set it too low and you’ll run into
issues with cutouts. We suggest somewhere between 1024 and 2048
samples for optimal latency and least amount of cutting out issues.
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VII. My First Music with Orb Composer
A. Video Explanation
1. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q8uyW9y1VRo&t=311s
B. First, you’ll want to select an existing template, or build your own, by
hitting “CANCEL” and then dragging any instruments you want into the
timeline.
C. For any instruments you add, open the instrument settings by clicking on
the instrument in the timeline, or hitting CTRL+SHIFT+P, and then drag in
any instruments you’d like from your VST list.
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D. Next, finalize your default track settings (BPM, Key, Time Signature)
E. Then, start picking your track structure by choosing your blocks. Intro,
Theme, Transition, and End blocks.
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F. Choose and experiment with different block structures.
G. Once you have finished building your track, you can then start to
experiment and listen to what Orb Composer has written. For instance,
you can double click on any clip and see detailed settings that will let you
customize everything Orb Composer does with that clip.
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VIII. Refresh melody and chords with AI
A. Video Explanation
1. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q8uyW9y1VRo&t=619s
2. Refreshing melody and chords is easy and there’s two ways to do
it.
3. One is to refresh everything using the main menu buttons:
4. You can also do this per block:
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IX. Build your own chord progression
A. Video Explanation
1. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q8uyW9y1VRo&t=698s
B. Building your own chord progressions can be done in two ways.
1. You can choose from a list of dozens of premade chord
progressions
a) Simply drag and drop the chord progression you want to use
into the chords section of your blocks
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2. You can also double click on any chord in the Chords section and
choose custom chords, and hear them in context.
X. Exporting MIDI/Audio
A. Exporting MIDI
1. Go to File > Export MIDI
2. Choose where you want to save the file, and give it a name
3. Click Save
B. Exporting Audio
1. Go to File > Export Audio
2. In the dialog box, select your Project Name, tail length, whether you
want to have individual tracks or the full song mixed together, and
the location to save the file
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XI. Project Template to Store VSTs for future projects
A. It is recommended that if you have instruments or templates you want to
use frequently that you start a new file from scratch, and then save the
project as a TEMPLATE file to use for future tracks.
B. This will prevent you needing to add instruments/VSTs/effects/etc.
C. You can create as many templates as you need to as many different
styles and projects as you require, and this is the recommended way to
use Orb Composer S to ensure faster workflows for ongoing composition
projects.
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XII. MIDI Editor
A. The MIDI Editor is a way for you to change the notes produced
automatically by Orb Composer.
B. By default the MIDI Editor shows all of the notes for every instrument in
your project. However, the instrument you have selected will show the
notes as green, and all others will be grayed out. This allows you to easily
see where other instruments are playing.
C. Orange shaded notes are the notes you have selected to edit, and allows
you to lengthen, shorten, or move them up and down along the piano roll.
D. Selecting an instrument on the left side will allow you to edit the notes for
that instrument.
E. By holding CTRL/CMD and scrolling up/down will resize the vertical size of
the MIDI Editor
F. The brightness slider allows you to change the
brightness of the notes in the MIDI Editor
G. You can detach the MIDI Editor from the
main window by pressing the double square
icon, and redock using the same button.
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H. You can zoom horizontally in or out by clicking the +/-
magnifier icons.
I. You can quickly change the Velocity/ModWheel of the
notes by clicking on a single line and raising it up or down, or by holding
CTRL/CMD and running your mouse across the Velocity/ModWheel Area
J. This same procedure can be used anywhere there are lines or alterable
parameters.
K. You can also add other CC controls for your instruments and adjust them
in the same way using the “+Add CC” button, which will allow you to have
more control over your VSTs/AUs.
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XIII. Importing/Harmonizing Melodies
A. To import and harmonize a melody, simply import your melody into your
block and Orb Composer will instantly analyze and create chords and
supporting elements around the melody you import.
B. By default, any imported melody will always produce the same chords
based on the analysis of the melody if the same melody is imported again.
In other words, you may get different orchestrations, but your chord
selections will remain the same, as Orb Composer is taking its best
approximation of what chord is expected for a particular bar.
XIV. Clip Editing Interface
A. The clip editing interface in 1.5+ has been changed to be one single
window which allows you to edit all parameters of a clip, rather than the
previous tabbed version. This simplifies your music editing workflow.
B. To access the Clip Editing Interface, click on the sliders icon on the clip
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C. Density increases or decreases the number of notes per bar. Higher
density results in more notes per bar. Lower density results in fewer notes
per bar.
D. Rhy. Prop. (meaning Rhythm Properties), is used to create quick rhythmic
repetitive patterns without having to rely on Orb Composer to hopefully
randomly generate such a pattern. For instance, 16th will create entire
bars of 16th notes in a sequential pattern and follow your chord
progression. 16th on beat will create 16th notes on every beat, off beat will
be a 16th note on every off beat. The same rules apply to 8th notes.
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XV. Drum Sequencer
A. The drum sequencer allows you to quickly create custom rhythms and edit
the rhythms generated by Orb Composer’s AI.
B. When you change the sequencer, the MIDI will automatically update.
C. Keep in mind that the sequencer maps to General MIDI Drums, so if
you’re using drums that are not aligned with General MIDI, you may not
hear your output until you move the notes generated for the clip(s) you’re
working on. However, also note:
D. If you edit the MIDI of the drum clip in any way, the sequencer will no
longer function to edit the MIDI.
E. Transition Pattern - The transition pattern differs from the main pattern in
that it will fill in the last bar of a block with a different pattern than what is
used in the Main Pattern.
XVI. Deformation
A. High or low deformation allows for midstream pattern changes within
single blocks, which results in more unique patterns that continue through
a piece. High deformation increases the spread of patterns, and low
deformation decreases the spread of patterns.
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XVII. FAQ and Opening Tickets
We love receiving your tickets (link here) because it gives us a chance not just to help
you, but to improve our software for everyone. However, we strongly encourage you to
explore our FAQ prior to opening a ticket.
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