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Shifting handshapes


Aquilae

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I've got a question about how to author handshapes in sections where fingers are added or removed from a chord.

 

Im my case I have arpeggio-like sections like a 5-7 where the bass note is left ringing out while the note on the next string is strummed. Marking a handshape as-is works fine for this. However, later in the riff a finger added to play 5-9 or pulled off to play 5-5, and I'm not sure how to author the handshapes to properly support this. Each individual note has the correct fingering applied to it.

 

http://i.imgur.com/ET8xyhR.png

 

In this case the added/removed note is only played once before returning to the default hand position. I've tried marking those individual notes with their own handshape but this doesn't work properly in-game, where the new handshape will only show up for a frame or two since the note has no sustain, even if I added a sustain for marking the handshape and then removed the sustain. EOF would also give me a little hassle with this because I would be creating a handshape with only one note.

 

Another method I tried was making each individual note a chord with the unplayed notes marked as ghost notes but this didn't change the outcome. I also tried charting it as an arpeggio but that didn't operate the way I need it to either.

 

I suppose this isn't required to get a playable custom, but having the handshapes follow the song properly would go a long way to making the custom song higher quality.

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Since the note has no sustain it created a handshape that only lasted a few frames before disappearing. EOF would also give me the warning "At least one arpeggio phrase doesn't contain at least two notes. You should remove the arpeggio phrase or add additional notes into it." But these are handshapes phrases and not an arpeggio phrase.

 

I tried adding a sustain before marking the handshape and then pulling the sustain off so the handshape would have a duration to it but that didn't seem to help either.

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I've mentioned it before, but in EOF, handshapes are a special type of arpeggio due to how similar they are in the XML.

 

I tried adding a sustain before marking the handshape and then pulling the sustain off so the handshape would have a duration to it but that didn't seem to help either.

Please clarify what you mean by "didn't seem to help". What did it look like in game? What did the XML look like for that handshape?

 

This is what I had in mind:

http://i15.photobucket.com/albums/a354/raynebc/handshape%20variation_zpsph1k4uyf.jpg

    <chordTemplate chordName="" displayName="" finger0="-1" finger1="1" finger2="4" finger3="-1" finger4="-1" finger5="-1" fret0="-1" fret1="5" fret2="9" fret3="-1" fret4="-1" fret5="-1"/>
    <chordTemplate chordName="D5" displayName="D5" finger0="-1" finger1="1" finger2="3" finger3="-1" finger4="-1" finger5="-1" fret0="-1" fret1="5" fret2="7" fret3="-1" fret4="-1" fret5="-1"/>
...
        <handShape chordId="1" endTime="2.001" startTime="0.500"/>
        <handShape chordId="0" endTime="2.501" startTime="2.250"/>
        <handShape chordId="1" endTime="4.251" startTime="2.750"/>
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I only included gaps in my example to show they're separate handshapes. Like Rockfirstlast mentioned, ghost notes may be the best option for now. EOF's RS export is currently designed to resize handshape/arpeggio phrases to end at the end of the last contained note. I'll have to put some thought into whether that can be improved.

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In the webm I posted earlier was a result of my stretching out the handshapes in EOF with sustains, so at least in the editor it looked like one unbroken handshape but it exported as you see it in the video. I'll play around with the ghost note technique to see how that turns out.

 

Out of curiosity @@Rockfirstlast what did that example look like in EOF?

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The new hotfix honors the handshape phrases' start and end times when writing the XML files:

http://i15.photobucket.com/albums/a354/raynebc/handshape%20variation%202_zpsxmc4jpe1.jpg

        <handShape chordId="1" endTime="2.247" startTime="0.500"/>
        <handShape chordId="0" endTime="2.747" startTime="2.250"/>
        <handShape chordId="1" endTime="4.251" startTime="2.750"/>
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In the webm I posted earlier was a result of my stretching out the handshapes in EOF with sustains, so at least in the editor it looked like one unbroken handshape but it exported as you see it in the video. I'll play around with the ghost note technique to see how that turns out.

 

Out of curiosity @@Rockfirstlast what did that example look like in EOF?

 

I accidentally overwrote it, but it doesn't matter anymore cause the new hotfix makes everything much easier.  No need to end on a ghost note anymore.

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Trip report with the new handshape changes: It works pretty damn well. I had to chart some extra ghost notes to get things just right but hopefully the result in-game will be worth the extra effort for charters.

 

The only graphical hitch I've noticed is moving from a single finger to a barre requires the game to remove the single finger graphic before placing the barre graphic on that same finger causing it to look a little flicker-y compared to the other fingers. This is just how the Rocksmith graphics are going to work though, nothing any of us could do I think, unless it was possible to mark a barre in a handshape finger pattern that only played one finger.

 

I'm going to update the rest of my chart with the change and then see how it that goes before moving on.

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You may be able to remove a little of that flicker by reducing the minimum note distance in preferences, this is why my example above had 3ms of gap between handshapes. If you can describe the reasons that you needed ghost notes to author the handshapes the way you wanted, it may be something I can improve or I may know a workaround.

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I was using ghost notes to retain the correct handshape when moving other fingers around. In this song you have to anchor a finger on a bass note and let it ring out while adding or removing fingers on another string. Some of the notes are only played once before moving the finger again, so the ghost notes allow me to keep that handshape marking on the board and show that finger staying in place.

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http://i.imgur.com/zTDAQI2.png

 

So this is what I'm looking at.

 

The pink lines mark the handshape boundaries, and the little text inside is the handshape for that box. When building these handshapes I would extend the note sustain all the way to the next note, create the handshape, and then remove the sustain. This gave me handshapes that reached until the next change.

 

The green arrows mark ghost notes that I had to add in order to fill in those handshapes where only one note was played in that shape. These notes did nothing in-game but allowed it to save and export without any issues.

 

These ghost notes always ended up being the bass note of the chord since they marked a finger position that I wanted to be locked down between transitions, though since these were simple two-note chords it would always be whatever note wasn't just played.

 

http://www.gfycat.com/SillySmugIndianspinyloach

 

This gif roughly matches up with the example from the editor above.

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Thanks a lot @@Aquilae, I was struggling to get that same effect working for Californication, but with your detailed explanation I was finally able to do it.

 

Also I want to thank @@raynebc for the work on EOF to make handshapes work as good as they do, however, I'd like to ask if it's possible to automate the process above?, it's a lot of work when the song constantly changes the base chords.

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Really the only thing EOF could possibly do to make single note handshapes easier would be for it to automatically add a ghost note at the beginning of the handshape. At least this would let the Rocksmith export succeed instead of fail. Let me know if I understood the request correctly.

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If I add this, the ghost notes will still show up in the chart (it's best for the author to know what has to be added to the chart for it to be able to function). And it could get a bit more complicated for EOF to guess what string you'd want the ghost note on. I may start on just throwing any ghost note on and we can see how critical it is for that logic to change. The more specific the author desires chart behavior to be, the more it requires manually overriding default behavior in the editor.

 

I can update MIDI tone and clap sound cues to not trigger for ghost notes.

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