3 Zone Mesh Head, Superior Drummer 2 (SD2)

[alexmcintosh]

I've had great success with my DIY 'Cake Pan' Mesh Heads with 2 Piezo's (one Head, one Rim). I've set them up in Megadrum as 2 Zone, with Positional Sensing (ie. CC out).

But.. there's hardly any software (VST's) that will use snare drum etc, with positional sensing. Superior Drummer (SD2) does have multiple zone inputs for snare drums especially. So, with some advice from another post I tried to set my drums (snare) up as a 3 zone drum...
But it's a disaster. I can't make it work out well... a Head (center) hit makes everything trigger: 3rd Zone, Head, Rim, Pressroll.

Can anyone help me with this?? Here's a screen shot of my setting.

3 zone Mesh Head.jpg

Sincerely;
Alex

[dmitri]

I'm not too sure what problem you are having. Is it with positional sensing on the head? Or is it with zone separation between head and rim? And why are you setting up Pressroll on the 3rd zone which with piezo/piezo snares is used for rim shots only?

[alexmcintosh]

dmitri;
thank you for the reply..
Zone Separation is my problem (Positional Sensing is great). I'm trying to get as many articulations from my piezo/piezo drum pad as possible.
Yes... the PressRoll on the 3rd Zone, was a mistake, thanks for pointing that out. I've switched it over to the Head, and that's working nicely now

I still seem to get everything when I'm hitting the Head. How is the 3rd zone suppose to work? Should it be triggered between the Rim & Head zone? And, what does the MidPoint width do? I would assume it would make a larger 3rd zone (mid) section?

Thank you for any help
Alex.

[dmitri]

3rd zone a piezo/piezo pad is for rim shot, i.e. when head and rim are hit simultaneously.
Please read about MidpointWidth in http://www.megadrum.info/content/pads-settings
For correct head/rim zone separation you should set HighLevel correctly on both the head and the rim and then adjust Midpoint on the 3rd zone.

[alexmcintosh]

Dmitri;
thank you. I've gone through but still having troubles..
I'll set my Snare to 'Single Piezo' and get both Head & Rim triggering great: High Level set great, no duplicates, etc. But once I switch it to a 3 Zone Yamaha it will trigger both, and a generate double hits on the Rim during a center head hit. It just can't seem to separate them or have a natural separation from head to rim.
Help...?

Alex

[dmitri]

So how did you adjust MidPoint and MidPointWidth?

[alexmcintosh]

Dmitri;
here's a screen shot. I've got the 'Mid Point Width' set to 0 and the MidPoint favored to the Head shot. At this current setting I'm getting only head shots. In my picture I start out with 'Single Piezo' setting. Then switch it to 'Dual or 3way Yamah'. Then I hit the Head (get a Head reading). Then hit the Rim (get two more Head readings); the Rim doesn't trigger. If I move the MidPoint toward the Rim a little more I get exclusively Rim shots; although there will be a couple of Head readings that do appear.
What the heck am I doing wrong??

Sincerely;
Alex.

[dmitri]

1. DynTime, DynLevel, MinScan should be set to close values between Head and Rim on dual zone pads.
2. HighLevel must be set correctly on both Head and Rim zones.

After that the zone separation between Head and Rim must be adjusted with MidPoint. I've had no problems with zone separation when testing with Pintech 10", Roland PD-125X or Drumtec 14" so if it still doesn't work for your pad then it might be something is wrong with the signals from your pad. It hard to tell what could be wrong without my hands on the pad .

[dmitri]

1. DynTime, DynLevel, MinScan should be set to close values between Head and Rim on dual zone pads.
2. HighLevel must be set correctly on both Head and Rim zones.

I also would suggest to do the following test after that:
1. Place Head and Rim into different XTalk Groups.
2. Hit the Head several times and post the MIDI Log screenshot here.
2. Hit the Rim several times and post the MIDI Log screenshots here.

[alexmcintosh]

2. Hit the Head several times and post the MIDI Log screenshot here.

Head Shots.jpg

2. Hit the Rim several times and post the MIDI Log screenshots here.

Rim Shots.jpg

The above MIDI values were taken with the following settings:
Head=38
..High Level=550
..DynLevel=8
..DynTime=12
..MinScan=40
..Type= 3way Yamah
..XTalk Group = 0
..Threshold=13
Rim=37
..High Level=230
..DynLevel=8
..DynTime=12
..MinScan=40
..Type= Piezo
..XTalk Group = 1
..Threshold=13
3rd Zone=40
MidPoint = Left Side, 4 clicks in.


I adjusted a Potentiometer for the RIM, so I could get the identical Levels, and scans

I noticed the Rim gets the strongest hit when I hit the head (FYI, I have a CakePan setup, so the rim piezo is sitting below the center head.). The gets a stronger toward the rim, but never as strong as a direct head hit. This does leave me with a sinking feeling on the RIM Piezo setup

Sincerely;
Alex