Change Pitch Wham range via Footswitch

[AngryBuzzy]

Hello all - I'm new to the Helix Floor. I'm trying to create a preset that allows me to drop pitch an octave (-12) via the expression pedal and then up an octave via expression when a footswitch is engaged. When the assigned switch is disengaged I'd like to go back to down an octave (-12).

 

If I could do this using two separate footswitch assignments that would work too.

 

So far I'm unable to make this work.

 

Thanks!

[eschworld]

I'll give it a shot.

I will build a patch for this and post it up on Customtone under "eschworld" later today.

 

 

[eschworld]

24 minutes ago, eschworld said:

I'll give it a shot.

I will build a patch for this and post it up on Customtone under "eschworld" later today.

 

 

To clarify, why do you want the expression pedal to do this or part of it?  Why not just use two separate pitch ("simple pitch" in the synth/pitch menu), and assign the -12 to one footswitch and +12 to the other?  If you don't need the whole pitch sweep (ie. the classic whammy sound with all pitches in between, using the "pitch wham" in the synth/pitch menu), then the simple footswitch method is all good.  DOn't expect the -12 and +12 to sound exactly like you are actually playing those notes, but they're convincing enough hopefully with the mix on each set to 100%.

 

I've attached the patch to this post and I will put on customtone right away.  It is a dual amp patch but I disabled one path so it wouldn't detract from the mix 100% on the two pitch footswitches.

 

Please try it and see if it does what you want... let me know and I have a couple other ideas that I can post as well if this doesn't work for you,

 

pitch-12+12fs.hlx

[Verne-Bunsen]

I don’t think you can use a footswitch to change the assigned value of a parameter assignment like that. Although I’ve often wished that you could.

[HonestOpinion]

On 4/24/2019 at 10:48 AM, AngryBuzzy said:

Hello all - I'm new to the Helix Floor. I'm trying to create a preset that allows me to drop pitch an octave (-12) via the expression pedal and then up an octave via expression when a footswitch is engaged. When the assigned switch is disengaged I'd like to go back to down an octave (-12).

 

If I could do this using two separate footswitch assignments that would work too.

 

So far I'm unable to make this work.

 

Thanks!

 

A quick and dirty approach is to do this with snapshots. There may be better approaches out there but this is one way to do it.

 

First add a volume block to your preset to keep things simple. Then and add a whammy block and just assign for example the whammy block's 'Toe Pitch' parameter to Snapshots and then set the 'Toe Pitch'= "+12"  in one snapshot and 'Toe Pitch' = "-12" in another snapshot. Set 'Heel Pitch' ="0" in both snapshots.  I would make sure the whammy block was not selected on the expression pedal (Helix default is Volume= EXP2 and Whammy=EXP1) and that the whammy was bypassed in both snapshots when I switched the octave range on the snapshot footswitch though or you are going to get some pretty wild octave leaps from up-octave to down-octave.

 

It occurred to me that a potential drawback of the above approach is that when you engage the expression pedal toe switch to engage the whammy you will be either plus or minus an octave. You can use the auto-engage feature on the expression pedal to get around this or alternatively you can reverse the Heel and Toe settings but both approaches have their drawbacks. Auto-engage can make it tough to calculate exactly where to park the pedal for the max +/- one octave interval setting without accidentally bypassing it. The second solution which reverses the Heel/Toe settings may or may not mess with your mind as you have to work the expression pedal in reverse.

 

So if you want a more involved solution. I included both "enhanced" methods below in case you wanted to try them. Both methods assume that you have a volume block set up on EXP 2 and the Whammy set up on 'EXP1'. Helix will set the volume and whammy blocks up to EXP2 and EXP1 respectively by default if you are only using the Helix's built-in expression pedal.

 

Auto-engage method:

1.  Select the whammy block
2. Go to Menu --> 'Bypass Assign'.  Select whichever expression pedal you have the whammy block on ( Helix defaulis 'Switch'="EXP 1")
3. Set the Position parameter to the pedal position at which you wish to engage, e.g. 'Position'="95" and the Wait parameter at whatever gives you enough time to return to the heel-down position before engaging the Whammy block, e.g. 'Wait'="400ms"
4. Now when you switch snapshots when you press the toe switch to engage the whammy you will have time to rock it back to heel down before it engages (at +/-  12 intervals)

 

Heel/Toe settings reversed so that whammy is engaged with expression pedal toes switch it starts at 0 intervals/steps:

 

1. Go to Menu --> 'Bypass Assign' and set Toe Pitch' = "0" for both snapshots.
2. Assign 'Heel Pitch' to Snapshots and set 'Heel Pitch' = "+12" in one snapshot and 'Heel Pitch' = "-12" in the other snapshot.
3. Make sure EXP2 is selected in both snapshots so that when you switch snapshots the whammy block is not engaged.

[AngryBuzzy]

Hey, thanks for everyone's help. I took the hlx file created by eschworld and made the following changes:

1) Changed the Simple Pitch blocks to Pitch Wham blocks

2) Assigned each Pitch Wham to a switch (Footswitch 3 and Footswitch 4)

3) Set one to have Heel Pitch of 0 and Toe Pitch -12

4) Set the other to have Heel Pitch of 0 and Toe Pitch of +24

 

I think it would have been easier to understand what I was going for if I'd added that it's for the Black Keys song Lonely Boy. He uses a pitch wham dropping an octave in the beginning of the song and at one point in the middle. At the end he uses a pitch wham going up 2 octaves.

 

Thanks

pitch -12 +24.hlx