Akai APC Mini - custom mapping in Ableton + working lights

Bome Products
1

Hello everyone,

I’m kind of new to Midi Translator and I’d be very grateful if you can help me achieve my goals.
I managed to do a custom mapping to my Apc Mini and I’d like to add another for better control when I do live performances / jams.
So far I have different tracks and groups, and within the groups usually the first track is the LiVE track where I copy on the fly content from the other tracks within the group.
So far I managed to map track 1 to kicks, 2 to bass, 3 to clap, 4 to off hat, 5 to 16ths, 6 to ride, 7 to chord progression, 8 to vocal elements and 9 (the square ones) to some rhythm elements. I’d like to add more tracks with a second Apc Mini mk2 or with my Push2, but I would prefer another Apc Mini.
The mapping works great, I had some fun but I would like to have the lights working and no matter what I did, Ididn’t managed (yet) to get them working.
I tried also the templates I found on this website/forum (Thanks Steve) but aside that I managed to turn the lights on that was it.
Can you please help understand how I can achieve this? Or if possible can you please make a file if it’s not too much of a hassle?
Many thanks.
Regards,
Daniel

2

Hi and welcome to the Bome community!

Let’s take a look at your project. Are you using APC MINI MK1 or MK2?

Steve Caldwell
Bome Customer Care

Also available for paid consulting services: bome@sniz.biz
3

Hi Steve,

Thank you for the fast reply.
Sorry I forgot to mention I have a mk1 that I use for my light show and I easily mapped it in Showexpress, but in Ableton I use the mk2 version I just bought and I want to order another one, as I find working with the apc mini (mk2) is a bit easier that with the Push2 (for the faders).
From my understanding I think I have to add a rule for the columns that when I press a key in that column Bome receives the signal reset (re-init) the whole column, then apply the red color to the pressed key, acting like a solo button in Showexpress.
I think this rule/behavior can be add on the init project you already delivered (thanks again).
Regards,
Daniel

4

The MK2 has more colors and the brightness ( or flashing) of the LED for the 8x8 matrix LED is determined by the MIDI CH it receives on. See this post.

Steve Caldwell
Bome Customer Care

Also available for paid consulting services: bome@sniz.biz
5

I already checked most if not all the posts on APC Mini here on the forum.
Would it be possible when I do the custom mapping that Bome is reading from Ableton if the sequence is active ( to be red) or inactive (to be white), otherwise I’d have to do as I mentioned in the previous message.
Many thanks,
Daniel

6

As long as Ableton Live sends out distinct values when the sequences are active or not, we could use Bome MIDI Translator Pro to translate to the LED values that you want.

Steve Caldwell
Bome Customer Care

Also available for paid consulting services: bome@sniz.biz
7

Can you please guide on how I can achieve that?
At this moment I feel like I want to quit as is very complicated.
Thank you

8

This is how I would do it.

  • Set up a Bome MIDI Translator Pro project with MIDI thru paths from your APC-MINI MK2 to Bome MIDI Translator Virtual 1 and visa versa. Optionally you can create aliases like ‘Ableton’ from Bome MIDI Translator Virtual 1.
    You can learn more about aliases from this tutorial.
  • In Ableton, Set up MIDI remote script as APC MINI MK2 but instead of selecting the APC-MINI device, select BMT 1 That way everything will pass through Bome MIDI Translator Pro between Ableton and your controller.
  • Activate a clip and then in the Bome MIDI Translator Pro screen, turn on MIDI IN so you can see what MIDI it is sending.
  • Create a Preset and set it’s routing from Bome MIDI Translator Virtual 1 (or better still the aliases you created earlier) and to your APC MINI MK2. Any translators in that preset will only look at those ports for input and output
    For more information about device selection, see this tutorial.
  • Create a translator to change the incoming MIDI message from Ableton Live to the desired color and intensity you want for clip running.
  • Follow the same steps for clip stopped changing the outgoing values for the proper color and intensity.

If you want to do that for all clips (all of the pads in the 8x8 matrix), just make the incoming as any note set to pp and then in the rules add ‘if pp>63 then exit rules, skip outgoing action’. Then use pp as your note number for output.

Steve Caldwell
Bome Customer Care

Also available for paid consulting services: bome@sniz.biz