are we going to get stems

[dj_cross_fade]

This seems like a big thing

[RoJeC]

Could you give a little description on 'stems'. Don't get a proper translation that helps me to understand your suggestion.

[DJ Vintage]

Hi Rojec,

He is referring to multi-track tracks. Those are commonly called "stems" in the audio engineering community. The new version of Traktor will support "stems", allowing you to easily edit tracks on the fly. It seems to be an extension on their remix philosophy.

Frankly, I don't believe it has a place in Cross, imho.

If you are into that kind of thing, Traktor is the place to be, they are moving away from jogwheels, moving away from non-NI hardware and with the whole new stems thing, clearly moving even further into the Producer/DJ corner.
NI has the background, the software and the gear to accomodate that particular kind of DJ-ing.

It seems to me there are way more things to be done to make Cross even better than it is now. Stems would not rank high on my priority list for sure.

[discopex]

Hi Rojec,

He is referring to multi-track tracks. Those are commonly called "stems" in the audio engineering community. The new version of Traktor will support "stems", allowing you to easily edit tracks on the fly. It seems to be an extension on their remix philosophy.

Frankly, I don't believe it has a place in Cross, imho.

If you are into that kind of thing, Traktor is the place to be, they are moving away from jogwheels, moving away from non-NI hardware and with the whole new stems thing, clearly moving even further into the Producer/DJ corner.
NI has the background, the software and the gear to accomodate that particular kind of DJ-ing.

It seems to me there are way more things to be done to make Cross even better than it is now. Stems would not rank high on my priority list for sure.

+1

The stems will eventually cover just a tiny fraction of available music out there. Deep/techno djs are probably the ones that would benefit with new multi track releases that also suit those particular styles. But for traditional/top40/request djs with thousands of old tracks in catalogue, edits, bootlegs, specials - no real use.

[RoJeC]

Never to old to learn. ..
Thanks for explaining.

I'll stay with my multi track tool.. know for sure that I never developed skills to modify tracks for the better. Maybe sometimes after many retries.

But good to know it is a new development. ..

[Stormcaller]

I can see it happening if it takes off and becomes popular. Right now the devs have bigger fish to fry.

[dj_cross_fade]

nice i see this being a good thing when i mix hip hop

cant wait for what mixvibes does next

[Singu]

Yeah, i'd also welcome that. It's a format based on multichannel AAC format that Native Instruments proposed as an open format with extension .stems.m4a, and a suggested industry standard for multi-track songs, with the assumption that these files may become available for purchase from producers so inclined. It's specified that up to 4 stereo tracks (8 channels) may be contained in such a file.

As yet another alternative to the .stems.m4a format, there are some multi-channel Vorbis files on the internet with extension .mogg

I'm not quite sure what to do about it, because it neither fully fits the standard deck nor the sample deck. Finally, no Trakor supporting this format has been released yet, projected release June 2015, so there is no UI prototype to get ideas from.

DJ Ean Golden demonstrated an Alpha of Traktor containing no specific UI. The stems file was loaded into a normal player deck, but he had a controller mapped with 4 mute switches and 4 volume controls per deck to fade the individual tracks, with no visual feedback.

Since stems are song-length as opposed to generally short samples, i believe retaining player UI may be important rather than incorporating them into the sampler deck, also to use hotcues, beatgrid and navigation features.

[MusicMeister]

Stems as an option would be nice.

It's a file that allows you to mix multiple portions of the file to others. This means you can use the bass line and vocals from one dropped over the drums and melody from another.

If you do blends, mashups, or live remixing - or even if you just do long mixes where you drop out the bass line, etc and replace it with the next track's you'll find that this could be beneficial.

It's basically a 4 track file that plays back normally in any player that supports MP4 audio. It would take a little work to implement and obviously Traktor has a leg up in this area - but it's been accepted by a few online music stores (Beatport and a few others) and being that it's open and without licensing, it would make sense to consider supporting it.

I wouldn't put it high on the list of things to implement, but it would be something I'd have on the board for the long term as a potential.

More information can be found here:
http://www.stems-music.com/stems-faq/index.html

[BoldFaceType]

MV,

Now that STEMS are here, and we actually have specifics on the format and implementation, do you think well see support for it in the future? Doesn't Cross already support Mp4 format? IF that's so, it seems like a *relatively* easy thing to add.

On a side note, I must disagree with one of the previous posters (DJ Vintage???) IMO, STEMS would be a very natural addition to Cross. One of the programs strengths is the fact that it supports so many different audio formats. Its a selling point the separates the software from its competitors. I've been waiting years for MV to leverage that strength more to their advantage. If it's not a terrible amount of trouble why not add it? One more reason for Tracktor users to switch (best Pioneer support and STEMS). To my knowledge Cross supports more audio formats than Serato and Tracktor (possibly even VDJ, but I haven't researched this). The addition would help make Cross's sampler more robust, something I think would be a logical next step (I've always wanted more control in the sample decks, a *proper* sequencer, or a more intuitive browser would blow the lid off the feature).

Great job on the v3.3.11 update MixVibes! I had to use v3.2 until a stable 3.3 was released. I've been using the latest version for several days now and so far this seems to be the magic number.