Last weekend I (guitarist) learned a lot about midi and CV in Dwarf. I tried to turn the decay knob of a reverb effect via midi. The idea was to extend the reverb tail of the reverb infinitely if needed, so that you can, for example, let a final chord “fade into infinity”. To do this, I programmed a PressNRelease command in the midi controller that sets the reverb’s decay button to 100% when the footswitch is pressed and back to the normal value, about 8%, when the footswitch is released.
I first used Midi learn to address the decay button directly to the Midi controller. The result was quite good, it echoed for ages, but you heard a loud crackling sound at the moment of sending the Midi command and also when releasing the footswitch. This shows me that the Midi command leads to an abrupt change in the value, which then naturally also results in a switching noise.
I then connected the Control to CV plugin in between, i.e. the decay control of the reverb with the “Control to CV” and the “Control to CV” button with the Midi controller via Midi Learn. And lo and behold: no more switching noise! I think I know why: The “Control to CV” turns the button virtually, albeit very fast, but it turns it. Whereas the Midi command directly on the Decay button leads to an abrupt changeover, which then leads to the side noise.
CV seems to me to be a real “secret weapon” that is not immediately obvious to guitarists, because many CV plug-ins are also fed with CV signals that a controller on the pedalboard does not normally send. The Dwarf doesn’t have a CV connection either, which means that you can’t use many of the CV plug-ins in the Dwarf (am I seeing this right?). You probably can’t use that many for guitar, but I think I’ll take a closer look in the next few days.