When working in MIDI-heavy projects (especially with sample libraries), efficient CC lane management is a must. In this guide, we’ll cover how to do so both with REAPER’s native capabilities and using a very powerful script.
This guide assumes you've gone through Part 1 of this series.
NATIVE CAPABILITIES
Most CC Lane behavior and functionality is fairly intuitive and can be customized via editing mouse modifiers and menus. To familiarize yourself, I recommend exploring the various settings in “Options->CC/velocity lane” (right click above the piano keys if the MIDI Editor is docked) as well as the mouse modifiers and context menus for the CC lane contexts:
However, there are a few not-so-obvious features that warrant further explanation:
- Left drag a CC lane handle to resize that CC lane. Shift+left drag a CC lane handle to resize all CC lanes relative to each other.
- Double click a CC lane handle to hide/show that CC lane.
- Vertical zooming will work inside individual CC lanes.
- Double click a CC lane panel to select all events in that CC lane. Shift+double click a panel to add that lane’s events to the selection.
- Mouse wheel scroll while the cursor is hovering over a CC lane name to scroll through lane assignments.
- Right click a CC lane name for a useful context menu.
I also highly recommend assigning a keyboard shortcut to the MIDI Editor action “SWS/BR: Toggle hide all CC lanes except lane under mouse cursor (set lane height to [n] pixel)”. This will allow you to toggle enlarge whatever lane your mouse is hovering over, like so:
Note: at the time of writing this, there have been several CC lane management features (such as drag-and-dropping lanes and MPE-friendly per-note channel selection) in development in various pre-release builds of REAPER. As these features are rolled out I will do my best to keep this guide updated.
MACCLANE SCRIPT
While the previous section details how to work with individual CC lanes fairly efficiently, what about entire preset configurations of CC lanes? While this is possible to configure using custom actions, a far more elegant solution exists in the form of the MaCCLane script by MIDI scripter extraordinaire Talagan:
To introduce you to using this script, we’ll now walk through setting up the configurations shown in the example above.
First off, we’ll need to actually start the script up. To do so, run the “Script: talagan_MaCCLane.lua” action from the Main action list. Now you should see a small ‘+’ sign at the bottom of any open MIDI Editor window, like this:
Note: if you want the script to start up whenever Reaper starts up, you’ll need to assign “Script: talagan_MaCCLane.lua” as an SWS Start-Up Action.
The script works by creating “tabs” at the bottom of the MIDI Editor that, when activated, recall various preset configurations. We’ll create two of these tabs: one for working with virtual pianos, the other for more general virtual instruments. The piano tab will need access to the velocity lane and CC64 (sustain pedal), while the virtual instrument tab will need access to the velocity lane, CC1 (Mod Wheel), and CC11 (Expression).
- Create, assign, and resize CC lanes in the MIDI Editor until you have the configuration you want for the Piano tab.
- Left click the ‘+’ icon at the bottom of the MIDI Editor. This will open the configuration window for a new tab.
- Under the “CC Lanes” heading, select ‘Custom’ from the dropdown menu. Then click the small blue arrow button (located right next to the blue ‘+’ button) and select ‘Displayed CC lanes (Add missing)’. This will set the tab’s configuration to whatever CC lanes the MIDI Editor currently has open.
- Fill in the “Name” text field at the top of the configuration window to what you’d like the tab’s name to be. It should look something like this:
- Click the green ‘Save’ button at the bottom. The tab will now appear at the bottom of the MIDI Editor.
- Repeat steps 1-5 for the ‘Virtual Instruments’ tab.
You’ll now see both tabs at the bottom of any MIDI Editor in the project. Left click on a tab to instantly recall that tab’s CC lane configuration. If you need to change anything about an existing tab, right click on it and select “Edit”
As you might have already noticed, this script is capable of recalling much more than just CC lanes; you can think of it as a “MIDI Editor Preset Selector”. Note that at the time of writing this guide this script is still being actively developed, so there may be even more features available than shown above. I highly recommend taking some time to explore its capabilities and use it to suit your particular workflow.
Documentation and detailed instruction on its usage can be found on the official forum thread.
Part 1 - Set Up
Part 2 - Editing Tools
Part 3 - Zoom Control
Part 4 - CC Lane Management ← Thou art here
If you find this collection of scripts useful, please consider donating to Talagan here to support him and his valuable work. If you have a bug report or feature request (or just want to say thank you) for this script, visit the official forum thread.
If you're looking for more scripts beyond those mentioned in this series, I maintain a Google Sheet Database of MIDI-related ReaScripts
The theme I'm using in the screenshots and GIFs is the Reapertips Theme