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Forum: VirtualDJ Technical Support

Topic: Beatgrid drifting with Sampler - Any realtime fixes?

I sometimes use loops to thicken up old 70's tracks, but as they tend to drift, I was looking for a way to pitch-bend the loops I put in the sample bank, like you can on a deck, or pitch-bend the deck to the Sampler.

Is this possible?
 
Posted Fri 26 Sep 25 @ 9:45 am
This is one reason why we've been asking regularly for a fluid beatgrid system a la Algoriddim's Djay Pro.

With Djay Pro, you can load a drifting track up and sync a drum loop to it effortlessly.

That's how I did this Acker Bilk track for example.
 
Given your 70s track is beatgridded by yourself properly (manually), and your loop is a constant BPM (which normally is true if you got it from a sample pack), if the deck playing the 70s song is the master deck, the loop will sync to the gridding done for the track.

An upgrading of the BPM analyzer to be better helps with not having to do much for the first part (your variable beatgrid track) and potentially the second if it is also variable (I'm not actually sure if a vdjsample can be manually beatgridded), but the functionality to sync samples to variable BPM tracks is there.
 
Manually is the problem. We really shouldn't have to do this any more.

You can't really call having to go through the entire track placing markers a "realtime fix". :-)

Ableton Live has had warping for years, Djay Pro has analysis that works pretty much instantly when you load a track, Rekordbox quietly updated theirs recently, Serato has a workaround using Serato Studio....

It's basically only us and Traktor that are left behind - and it seems there's a Traktor update on the horizon, so we may well end up behind everyone.
 
So OP was asking about if his problem (syncing sampler loops with variable BPM tracks) was possible - the answer is yes.

BPM analyzer upgrades (and its benefits) is a related problem but not a dependency (and really is a separate topic) - the only dependencies are the ability to represent a variable beatgrid and the ability to sync audio sources to that via their beatgrid.

With respect to state-of-the art beatgridding at the moment:

The automatic beatgridding still doesn't get time signature changes right (whole other level of difficulty), and there are still cases where the gridding is wrong (e.g. limited instrumentation).
Even Ableton occasionally needs fixing of Warping.

Summary - As it stands right now, there isn't any software that you completely forget about manually intervening.
But it definitely does help (I would appreciate a BPM analyzer update as well).

As for other players - You can use the updated beatgridding in Rekordbox (I guess it's at the expense of more time and way more beat anchors per track), and the Serato Studio requires a whole other software package to achieve that, so that technically doesn't count (you can achieve the same thing with a Rekordbox beatgrid and using a conversion tool to bring it to VirtualDJ).

I would like them to get it right, especially wrt flexibility (minimize the # of anchors generates at the expense of some minor drift in smaller locations), and definitely no sacrific of experience with dependent projects like SoundSwitch.
 
DJ VinylTouch wrote :
the answer is yes

He asked if there was a realtime fix, or if the loops could be pitch bent. The answer to those is no.
 
Realtime was not explicitly mentioned anywhere in his original question:

Quote :

I sometimes use loops to thicken up old 70's tracks, but as they tend to drift, I was looking for a way to pitch-bend the loops I put in the sample bank, like you can on a deck, or pitch-bend the deck to the Sampler.

Is this possible?


and even if that is the desire (realtime pitch bending), a Beatgrid improvement would not be the solution, giving the ability for manual adjustment of the BPM/Pitch of the sampler on the fly would be that, with a pitch slider/pitch bend buttons.
 
It's in the title!

The best solution for the issue of not being able to sync loops with old tracks is to have an updated, smarter beatgrid analysis, enabling DJs to do this kind of thing without spending hours manually editing beatgrids.

If the user wants to achieve this now, then the easiest way IMO is to use Djay Pro.
 
But OP never asked about DJay Pro, OP asked what can be done in VirtualDJ.

I understand the appeal of better beatgridding, but that isn't the same as the software not being able to do the job at all (which isn't a true statement, it can do it (syncing samples to the BPM of the master deck track), just with more upfront work/effort from the user for the beatgridding), and they really are separate concerns (beatgridding updates for better upfront automatic beatgrid generation vs sample syncing to decks using their generated beatgrids).
 
DJ VinylTouch wrote :
OP never asked about DJay Pro

Neither did OP ask about manually adjusting beatgrids. He wanted a "realtime fix".

I wish I could offer a quick fix for VDJ (manual adjustment is not it) but unfortunately Djay Pro is IMO the best solution right now.
 
Well your opinion is yours, but remember, you're on a VirtualDJ forum and should be giving the best help about VirtualDJ, not otherwise.

If OP asks what is out there that can best do the job to the then I understand, but that's not what he asked.

And to be clear OP (sorry about the added discussion):

  1. If you are asking about automatic syncing of samples to the beatgrid of a song in a deck (variable BPM or not), the answer is yes, VirtualDJ does sync the samples in the sampler in realtime to the master deck.
    That all depends on the quality of the beatgridding done for the Track in the deck and the sample.
  2. If you are asking about how to ensure 1) is done as best as best as it could be from the start, VirtualDJ's beatgridding (even with multi-BPM analysis), is often not good enough to do the job upupfront automatically - you'll most likely have to adjust the grid of the variable track manually after the initial scan.
    The absence of this does not mean 1) isn't true.
  3. 1) and 2) However does not provide a way to manually intervene during playback)(e.g. with pitchbend buttons). The most you can do is pitchbend the decks, and if you apply the sample on the decks (scratch bank or deck sampler) you may be able tp adjust the speed of the sample playback (deck playback adjustment ability is a given)
  4. If 1) and 2) are done well enough, 3) most likely is not needed.


Yes there are other tools out there that are better currently at upfront automatic generation - it is up to you to decide if you want to move to a different ecosystem to get that functionality (that is a complete move away from VirtualDJ, not a workaround, and it is always your choice 🍺).
 
Yes thanks, I'm well aware of where I'm posting. Like I said, I wish I could offer a VDJ solution - but there isn't one, and rather than just saying no it can't be done, I'm offering an alternative.

I do the same on other forums, and most people have no problem with it.

IME it's standard practice on other forums too, whether they cover software or hardware. If someone asks whether X is possible, if it's not, people offer alternatives.
 
Hopefully this will give further clarity to my issue:

The problem is, I am seeking to modify, in real-time, either the sampler or the track playing, to prevent or resolve the drift that can occur when using anything with a fluctuating but consistent tempo, even if slightly.

Since transients meters are not read in real-time, and the level of beat detection, at the this time is somewhat poor when it comes to anything non-electronic, I was seeking a workaround until true flexibility is resolved.

VDJ is amazing but pales in comparison against DJay Pro's Fluid Beatgrid. My aim is to continue use of my Traktor Kontrol S8 to live remix and 'reinforce' tunes, but can't because the sampler and track appear to be locked.

Manually beatgridding a library of track, pre-click or drum machine is not realistic for any working DJ, of any serious level, so I wonder if there was a way to detach both components, in the same way as Sync on Virtual Dj works (which is a brilliant implementation, btw).

Hope that brings clarity; as we all want this Digital DJ platform to succeed.
 
So as said before, VirtualDJ will sync samples to a master track's beatgrid, even if that track is variable in BPM (has multiple anchors), and I've even verified that as recently as today before answering.
Manual beatgridding of an entire library may be unrealistic indeed. The best you can do currently is pick the tracks you may want to play that have variable BPM and then grid those.
DJay's beatgridding is great no question, and until VirtualDJ gets an analyzer update to match, your best bet is to work within what was described (grid the tracks you need). If you want a more automated workflow, do the grid analysis in Rekordbox (which has an AI-based beatgrid update that is accurate) and import that into VirtualDJ via DJCU or Lexicon for your use.

If you want to be able to manually adjust in realtime, that's a hard thing to achieve, because you'll need to be able to detach the syncing of samples and in VirtualDJ you have to select if a sample would sync with the master deck in advance. There might be some vdjscript that you can use to deactivate syncing of a sample on the fly to then allow pitchbending/nudging of the master deck (there may be a feature request in there somewhere).
 
Did you try to use multi bpm analysis on the track btw? Depending on the amount of drift it might already add sufficient grid points automatically
 
Adion wrote :
Did you try to use multi bpm analysis on the track btw? Depending on the amount of drift it might already add sufficient grid points automatically


Yep, this was the first stuff I tried. Unfortunately, even though many tracks have consistent rhythms, VDJ doesn't always understand the downbeat, and then I have seen 'ramping' of tempo, when I'm seeking something to play straight.

I'm guessing Beat detection and beatgridding even moderate tempo fluctuations must be really hard to program; as DJay Pro seems to be the only one to do it to any level of real-time competence; Serato Studio has for analyze but not for Serato DJ because you can't adjust the downbeat without wiping it. Not sure of Rekordbox, but get the feeling there's some issues with that, as I'm sure they would be raising it as a feature.

Previously, I would use Ableton to 'flatten' tracks, but even that has to be done one-at-a-time and checked for transient 'crunches'.

It seems as though DJay Pro's algorithm is doing a couple of things; an initial analysis of the track, then a real-time update by 1/4 based on each bar length average discovered...or something like that?

As I've mention in another post; it must be something specific and complicated that they solely have the IP for, as I've not seen this in any other DJ software that exists.

My dream is that VDJ Devs can resolve it; as VDJ is the most versatile of all of these platform, and would probably be getting far more conversion than what DJay Pro has now, as the No.1 DJ application, currently.
 
If you actually try Rekordbox's implementation, you'd see it's very good as well.
Fluid Beatgrid might be patentable as IP, but beatgridding itself (and any updates to it) is not, Beatgridding is a standard feature in pretty much all DJ software, so DJ vendors are probably free to implement upgrades how they see fit.

My hope (for all of our benefit), is Atomix make the algorithm flexible enough to tweak its performance (e.g. adjust the window of considering as a constant BPM so that we can control the number of anchor points, allow rescan of subsections of the song), but still choose reasonable defaults so that it performs really good without needing input (default window = 2 bars or something like that). The flexbility is not a requirement though as long as its default performance is comparable to what's out there and considered good enough (important for ppl who don't like searching for settings).

Relative rankings of DJ software is subjective (not really relevant here).