Velocity off versus velocity on

[kenrob2037]

Hi All,

Can someone explain what velocity off means and does?

I'm pretty sure I know what velocity on does, but velocity off has thrown me.

If I change velocity off from 0 to 127 on a midi note, it does nothing.

Cheers,

Rob

[Mark Bliss]

I think... (Admitting I am way "out of my midi lane" here)-
But I think that is a rarely used and perhaps instrument specific CC that you can generally ignore.

But I dont go that deep into MIDI. Its just not my thing.
Maybe @cactus-head can explain it.

[cactus-head]

The wording was a little unusual to me, but I see in the Mixcraft MIDI editor there is Velocity(Note On) Velocity (note off).

I'm not the wordy type (winks at Mark) so I'll try to keep this short. Velocity is just a range 0-127 that is a measure of how fast a note was triggered between it's start trigger point and end trigger point. This measure is mostly used to determine how hard a note was played. If it is zero, then the note is not played. If it is 127, the space between the triggers was very short and usually means the note was played hard (loud).

Note On and Note Off are different. These are called status (bytes). If you had a MIDI keyboard, you press a key, the status of Note On is sent. A Velocity value is recorded and sent at the same time depending on how agressively the note was played. When the you lift your finger off of the key, the status of Note Off is sent and most commonly the default for the Velocity is 0.

In the early days of MIDI, not all manufactures adhered to strict rules when developing device or programs. Sometimes a piece of hardware or a program doesn't actually recognize or transmit a Note Off Status Byte. The way they would determine that a Note was off was by setting the Velocity to 0. So today, you may find both cases. An actual Note Off Status byte or Velocity set to zero is meant to say "stop playing." Most often you'll see a Note Off with a Velocity of 0. Some older MIDI files may have just the Velocity set to 0.

Your question: Velocity (Note Off) to something other than zero in Mixcraft... You might get midi notes that never turn off in the background. If the same note sounds, it's velocity might be affected by what was set last. In general, it's not something you will have to set unless there's a program that will respond to it. Depending on the device, a synthesizer might be programmed to respond to a combination of Note Off and Velocity > 0

[kenrob2037]

That makes sense. So velocity off is just a numerical expression, it does not do anything, as opposed to velocity on which changes the volume of a note.

When I open a midi file in Mixcraft, all velocity off setting are at zero. When I play into Mixcraft and edit a midi note, all velocity off settings have a numerical value, usually just a bit less than the velocity on number.

I thought velocity off might play a part in decay, after touch or volume, but it does not.

Cheers and thanks for the explanation.

Rob

[Mark Bliss]

Again, velocity doesnt always equal volume. Depends on the instrument.

In simple terms, depending on the instrument- it may just trigger different samples.
IE: in some in some multi-layered sample instruments, a higher velocity data signal would have an effect on the timbre other than volume.

Simple vsti, yeah-usually vel=volume.
But I have seen some cases (for example) where velocity was set to alter the playing style. For example pluck/strum/tremelo. Or the softer or harder attack of a bow on strings. Etc.

[Acoustica Greg]

You can even make your own layered instruments by changing the velocity settings when you add instruments to a track.

velocitylayers.png (16.19 KiB) Viewed 1629 times

In this example, one instrument would play with a velocity of 0-30, another with 31-60 and a third with 61-127.

[kenrob2037]

Thanks, Greg.