Introduction

Visibox recipes are a series of tutorials that show you how to use Visibox with different software and hardware. In this recipe, we will show you how to use Visibox with Ableton Live to create custom visuals that can be triggered in time with your music.

Ableton Live is a popular digital audio workstation (DAW) used by musicians, producers, and DJs to create, record, and perform music. It is known for its powerful features, intuitive interface, and flexible workflow. And much like Visibox, it's also great software for performing... live... It's right in the name!

Visibox is a powerful visual performance tool that allows you to create custom visuals that can be triggered in real-time using MIDI messages, an Elgato Stream Deck, or the computer keyboard and mouse. By combining Visibox with Ableton Live, you can create custom visuals that are synchronized with your music and triggered in time with your performance.

Requirements

• Visibox

• Ableton Live

• A computer running Windows or macOS

• A basic understanding of how to use Ableton Live

• A projector, video wall, or external display to show your visuals

Why Use Visibox With Ableton?

While Ableton has some video integration capabilities built-in, it is really more oriented towards scoring for picture. You can only have one video clip loaded at a time, and you can’t integrate still images or live cameras. Visibox gives you the ability to add video and image files and connect cameras for much more fluid and flexible control.

Setting Up Ableton Live

Before you can start using Visibox with Ableton Live, you need to set up your project in Ableton Live. There are several different ways that artists use Ableton Live on stage. Many artists use Ableton Live to trigger loops, samples, and effects in real time using the session view. Others open entire projects and play back th eir mixes using the arrangement view.

A great way to use Ableton for backing tracks is to create a separate stem for each instrument in their backing tracks (drums, bass, guitar, keys, etc.) and then route each stem to a separate output on their audio interface. Each stem clip gets dropped into the same "scene" (or row) in the session view. Then an entire song can be triggered by launching a single scene using the scene launch buttons to the right of the session view.

Whatever method you use to perform with Ableton Live, the concepts are the same.

For this recipe, we will be using the session view to trigger clips in real time. This will allow us to trigger visuals in time with our music using Visibox.

1. Open Ableton Live and create a new project.

2. Create separate audio tracks for each of the stem tracks that you'll be using in your performance. For example, you might have separate audio tracks for drums, bass, guitar, keys, and backing vocals.

3. Use the "Audio To" dropdown at the bottom of each audio track to send to separate outputs on your audio interface. This will allow you to send each stem track to a separate channel on your mixer or audio interface.

4. In the "Master" column on the right, right-click on the "1" in the first row and select "Rename" to rename the first scene. We're going to call this "Stop" because it will be used to stop Visibox between songs.

5. Import stems for your first song into the second line of your session view. You can do this by dragging and dropping the audio files into the session view. Ableton will loop new clips, so you will need to disable looping for each clip by disabling the "Loop" button in the clip's Info View.

6. In the right-hand column above the master fader, label the scene with the name of the song.

7. Repeat for all of the songs in your setlist.

8. Create a new MIDI track in Ableton Live. This will be the track that sends MIDI messages to Visibox to trigger your visuals. (We’ll configure these later.)

Connecting Ableton Live to Visibox

Now that you have your project set up in Ableton Live, it's time to set up Visibox to work with Ableton Live. Visibox can be controlled using MIDI messages, so we will be routing MIDI from Ableton to Visibox. This can be done using a virtual MIDI bus, a physical MIDI interface, a MIDI-over-USB connection, MIDI over a network (such as wifi or ethernet), or even Bluetooth. Note that MIDI over a network or Bluetooth may introduce latency and/or reliability issues, so it's best to use a direct connection if possible.

If Ableton and Visibox are running on the same computer, you can use a virtual MIDI bus to route MIDI messages between the two applications. On macOS, you can use the built-in IAC Driver. On Windows, you can use a virtual MIDI driver such as loopMIDI.

For this recipe, we'll assume that you're using a virtual MIDI bus to route MIDI messages between Ableton Live and Visibox on the same computer.

Setting Up a Virtual MIDI Bus on macOS or Windows

We have a separate guide explaining how to Route MIDI Between Applications on the Same Computer. You’ll need to set up a virtual MIDI bus between Ableton and Visibox. It’s pretty straightforward for both Mac and Windows. Go. Read it. We’ll wait here for you.

Setting Up Visibox

Now that you have a virtual MIDI bus set up on your computer, it's time to configure Visibox to receive MIDI messages from Ableton Live.

1. Open Visibox and from the MIDI Inputs submenu, ensure that the virtual MIDI port you created earlier is selected.

2. Create your visual set list in Visibox. Drop in your videos and images, or use cameras to define the visuals you want to trigger. Some artists use a single video file for each song, while others use multiple video files that can be triggered independently. Create as many Songs as you need.

3. Open the MIDI Map window (from the Settings... or Preferences... submenu) and select the virtual MIDI port you created from the "Input" dropdown menu. The default settings may be sufficient for your needs, but you can customize the MIDI mapping if you want to use different MIDI notes to trigger your visuals.

4. Scroll to the bottom of the MIDI Map window and ensure that “Select Song Via Program Change” is set to either “Song Order” or “Program Identifier.” In “Song Order” mode, program change (PC) 1 will activate the first song, PC 2 will activate the second, and so on. However, if you reorder your songs, you’ll need to adjust Live to send different PC messages. “Program Identifier” mode allows you to assign custom identifiers to each song. Right-click on the Song and select a number from the “Program Identifier” submenu. If you choose 33, now sending PC 33 will always choose this song, no matter the order of the Songs in your Project.

Sending MIDI Messages from Ableton Live to Visibox

Now that you have Ableton Live and Visibox set up to communicate with each other, it's time to send MIDI messages from Ableton Live to Visibox to trigger your visuals. You can do this by creating a MIDI track in Ableton Live and adding MIDI clips to trigger your visuals.

Visibox organizes Clips into Songs. Each Song may have multiple Clips. Think of a Song as a palette of visuals that are available to trigger through MIDI. Songs can be activated by sending MIDI program change messages to Visibox. You can either activate songs via their order within your Visibox project or you can assign custom IDs from the “Program Identifier” submenu when right-clicking on a Song. This will allow you to rearrange your Project without messing up your MIDI program change associations..

It would be nice if Ableton Live had a way to send program change messages when selecting a scene. Unfortunately, it does not. However, you can use MIDI clips to send program change messages to Visibox when you launch a scene in Ableton Live.

1. At the bottom of the MIDI track you created in Ableton, select the Visibox virtual MIDI port from "MIDI To" dropdown menu. If you are running Visibox on a separate computer, select the MIDI port that sends between computers. This will send all MIDI messages from this track to Visibox.

2. Now create a MIDI clip in the MIDI track for each song in your setlist. You can do this by double-clicking in the clip view area of the MIDI track.

3. Make sure that the MIDI clips are not set to loop. You can do this by clicking the clip and then going to the bottom clip window and deactivating the “Loop” button (see below). You only want the MIDI clip to trigger once when you launch the scene.

4. Click on the MIDI clip to open the MIDI note editor. In the MIDI clip, double-click on the first note to create a new MIDI note. Open the “Launch” tab in the clip window.

5. For each MIDI clip, set the program change option to the number that corresponds to the order of the associated Song in the Visibox Project. For example, if you want to activate the first Song in your setlist, set the program change to 1. If you want to activate the second Song in your setlist, set the program change to 2, and so on.

6. By default, Visibox's Clips are triggered by MIDI notes starting with middle C (MIDI note 60, or C3). Note 60 triggers the first Clip in a Song, note 61 triggers the second, etc. You can change this in the MIDI Map window if you want to use different MIDI notes to trigger your visuals. This "Stop" action is triggered by MIDI note 48 or C2. In Ableton, set up each song's MIDI clip to send the appropriate MIDI note to trigger the visuals in Visibox. This might just be a single MIDI note, or it could be a series of MIDI notes that trigger different Clips throughout the Song. For example, to select the first track in your Visibox playlist and play the first video clip, set the program change to Pgm 1 and add a midi note at C3. 

Integration

Now that everything is set up, you can quickly add more videos and image files to Visibox. You can create Camera Clips to show live-action on the screen to your audience. In addition to the silent videos that may play over your music, you can also add videos with sound in Visibox. Lots of performers will use these for walk-on introductions or interstitial “vibe” content – clips from movies, TV shows, ads, etc – to play between songs.

Playing out is as simple as connecting your computer to a screen for the audience. Most performers use a video projector or professional video wall. But you can connect to a TV or anything with a video input.

Wrap Up

Visibox is designed to make it easy to create immersive visual performances. By combining Visibox with Ableton Live, you can create custom visuals that are synchronized with your music and triggered in time with your performance. This recipe has shown you how to set up your project in Ableton Live, connect Ableton Live to Visibox using a virtual MIDI bus, and send MIDI messages from Ableton Live to Visibox to trigger your visuals. Express your visual creativity and give your audience something to remember!