Does anyone have any tips for managing multiple instruments through saved pedalboards / snapshots?
Planing on using a Dwarf for bass guitar and synth bass (Midi over usb).
I’m imagining there might be situations where I would have preset 1, 2, 3 for the bass and preset X, Y, Z for the synth. My understanding of the docs means I would have to make multiple combinations (eg. 1X, 1Y, 1Z, 2X etc) or get creative with A/B boxes to mix and match the two instruments… Is that understanding correct?
Are there useful workarounds anyone has found, or ways of setting it up that could make life easier for this sort of thing?
I think you’ve got the gist of it. There’s no formal concept of an instrument at the pedalboard level, you’re dealing with signal channels and things that operate on those signals. A snapshot (preset) saves the whole pedalboard so you’ll need a snapshot for each unique combination of instrument presets as you’ve identified.
I’ve used my Duo with varying combinations of guitar, mic, and midi keyboard. A challenge is that one can quickly use up available actuators for switching between snapshots. I have a 4-button foot controller with exp. pedal that I use. What’s worked well for me is to have 2 or 3 main snapshots (often for verse, chorus, lead/intro) The other footswitch or two I might use for a specific plugin, switchbox, or override. My Duo is on the back of my (physical) pedalboard so I don’t rely on its footswitches as much, but will often have another plugin mapped and often a mute/kill switch for the mic which is handy.
As the pragmatic cheerleader here, I have to point at out that the current interface for editing and managing snapshots leaves a lot to be desired. The list for managing snapshots is very basic and cumbersome to interact with as you add more snapshots to a pedalboard. If you’ve created several snapshots and decide to change something about your pedalboard like add or replace a plugin, you’ll have to edit all your existing snapshots to make sure they are in the expected state relative to the new change. The snapshots feature is a powerful part of the system but the user experience around editing and managing is a little rough at the moment.
I hadn’t even considered how to switch between all of those different combinations. Yes this would be a challenge, even with the extra control offered by a midi keyboard.
I can’t fully remember the roadmap leading up to the release of the Dwarf, I will have another look and see if there are any additional improvements planned for snapshots.
A formal concept of ‘instruments’ or ‘groups’ at a pedalboard level doesn’t sound like a small change. It does seem like a (relatively) straight forward thing to begin to calculate demand for, which could help with prioritising a feature like it.
I think I will start planning out my signal paths to not rely on using snapshots. Bass often doesn’t have the same mid-song change requirements as other instruments which helps a bit.
I’ve tried to play around in the GUI using https://github.com/moddevices/mod-ui but I couldn’t work out which instructions to modify for MacOS and it wasn’t loading plugins in a Linux VM. Pencil and paper until then
We are definitely planning improvements to the user experience of snapshots.
The MOD Dwarf has a function, triggered by pressing 2 footswitches at the same time, that allows you to switch between controlling the parameters, and navigating the list of snapshots (or pedalboards).
When you are in “navigation mode”, you will be able to re-order, rename, save and delete snapshots from the device. In this mode you will also be able to manage your banks and pedalboards.
This also means that managing, and especially reordering snapshots from the web interface will be made easier.
