Using a footswitch to trigger bindings

I recently purchased a Logidy UMI3 (http://www.amazon.com/Logidy-UMI3-MIDI-over-Controller/dp/B002YL81RW) foot controller for the purpose of being able to trigger Media Players via bindings.

The pedal itself comes with zero documentation and there is none to be found on the manufacturer’s website.

I know that it comes pre-set with the footswitches, by default, to send a “note on” message. There is a control panel available to configure the pedal, however it crashes pretty much every time I use it.

When I attempt to set up the binding the UMI3 shows up as a MIDI input device, however no matter whether I use the “learn” function for the binding or select the device and “note” directly in the options for the binding, there is no response to my pressing the footswitch.

In fact, I seem to be unable to trigger a binding in any way other than pressing a note on the main keyboard, which I would rather not do. Cantabile doesn’t seem to want to respond to my hitting one of the controller’s transport buttons either. I know I must be missing something… any ideas?

The pedal comes with a program that you can use to assign whatever values and controls to the buttons you want. If you go to the downloads section of the Web page it’s all there.

You can also use Cantabile’s learn function to assign routes and such to whatever value the Logidy is sending.

http://www.logidy.com/?pid=5

Racked… I have their program, however it tends to crash when I try to do pretty much anything. I have an email in to them about that issue. As for the learn function, that’s the first thing I tried. I get no response from Cantabile when I hit one of the switches, same with the transport buttons on my MIDI controller. The only thing the learn function seems to want to recognize is pressing a note on the controller.

Just replied with email (because I saw that first). I really haven’t had any problem with mine. Downloaded the software and I think I only ran it once to assign the buttons. I’m running Win10 and I think I have patches up-to-date.

Is the Logidy MIDI port being listened to? Under Tools->Options->MIDI ports be sure it assigned to Main Keyboard or another enabled port. Just messing with mine and that’s what I came up with.

I checked it, the port was not assigned. I did assign it, tried all options, and still no joy. Also tried a brand-new USB cable to make sure it wasn’t the fact that I was using a cable scavenged from an old printer. No effect.

When you set up your pedal what signal did you choose? I still have it set for “Note.” Should I be trying something else?

Well, this is interesting. I planned to make a few screen shots and share them here. However, I’m having the same problem. In the past, I’ve used Bome MT for all MIDI devices. I’m in between gigs and re-working things. With MT out of the circuit, C3 doesn’t see the Logidy. If I run everything through the MT Virtual MIDI, it does. Just fine. Also, the log file for MT show the Logidy working just fine. With or without using the virtual MIDI port. C3 just doesn’t see it. I did the usual uninstall/reinstall, deleted the Logidy instances from the Windows Device Manager, and re-booted a couple of times. Hasn’t changed. I can choose the Logidy in MIDI ports, assign it various way, but nothing works unless MT is involved.

I’ll try to get some more testing in tomorrow–depends on “the real job”.

Richard

First off, thank you so much for posting about the Logidy UMI3. I had been scouring the web looking for a sub $100 USB MIDI footswitch controller with expression pedal input, and had no luck at all finding one. Of course, I almost never look on Amazon except to compare prices with other sites.

I use the UMI3 with my Surface Pro 4, and it’s mostly stable. I have had the utility crash on me before, but it’s typically only if I unplug the UMI3 while the utility is running, or if I don’t have the UMI3 plugged in when I launch the utility. I have the pedal setup to output CC values for the 3 footswitches.

A couple notes on how to use the utility properly. When the UMI3 is plugged in, and running the setup utility, the pedal will use whatever is set in the utility, regardless of what you had saved to the device. The default setup is to have the 3 switches play C4, D4, and E4 notes. Unfortunately, there doesn’t seem to be a way to have the utility default to a particular setup, so you have to load a setup every time you launch the utility.

You can also save a setup to the device, which will run whenever it is plugged into a computer, as long as the utility is not running.

Also note that the sequencer features (stepping through several notes or CC values) is only available through the utility. The footswitch alone will only output single values.

Hopefully that helps.

I am just getting nowhere fast. Part of the problem is every time I want to try changing something with the control panel I end up having to completely reboot. Once I have launched successfully and closed the control panel, it will crash the next time I launch it until I reboot.

Regardless of how I set up the binding, the learn function does nothing when I step on one of the switches, I cannot get the target media player to do anything except when I assign a key on my keyboard controller as the trigger.

At a loss as to what to do with this thing. I’d return it and try a different option if there actually was another option to try. I really need to be able to trigger things without having to stop playing what I’m playing to plonk another key.

Are you still using Note events? I would use the Control event option.

Try opening the control panel and setting each of the pedal events from Note to Control. By default they are set to CC 60, 62, and 64. Then go to File, and choose “Save to UMI3”. The footswitch LED will blink once to confirm that it has been setup. Then close the control panel.

In Cantabile, manually set the binding event to “Controller (No Edge Button)”, with the CC set to one of the CC values. That’s how I have my bindings setup, and it works for me.

@Allen: I think I’ve found the source of why my Logidy occasionally just goes to sleep. I skimmed Brad’s Glitch book the other day and made a note to research/implement a few things. One particular standout was USB power settings. The suggestion that the power saving be disabled seems to have fixed the issue I had. Apparently, Bome MT kept it from going to sleep.The situation I’ve had is that C3 would just quit responding to the Logidy. I would have to occasionally unplug the USB cable and plug it back in C3 would almost immediately begin responding to it again.

Try unplugging from the USB and re-plugging. The MIDI light on the Logidy should flash as you connect.Then try learn mode in C3
.

Well this is a fine how-do-you-do! Turns out, @OrangeBug and @RackedBrain, it seems you were both right!

I took a closer look at the pedal and noticed that the USB light wasn’t blinking, it was just solidly on. So I unplugged it, made the change under power settings to disable the USB “power saving” setting, then plugged it back in.

After that it only blinked when I stepped on the pedal. But still, Cantabile did not respond to pressing the switches. So I opened the control panel and set the buttons to CC as well as the binding event in Cantabile as suggested, saved to UMI3 and voila - works exactly as it should.

Thanks to both of you for sticking with me on this one and helping me find the solution. I was one more fail away from returning it and spending money I really don’t \need to be spending on a more elaborate foot-pedal setup.

Nice work, gents!

1 Like

I think I’ve found a solution to my dilemma. Created binding between a pedal and the metronome controlling the “tap tempo” function. A bar or so before I need to trigger the media player, tap the tempo on the pedal and when I trigger the media player, voila.

Now I need to figure out why the binding between the midi footswitch and the media player isn’t working. It was working, then it wasn’t. Not sure why, but it was 3:30 AM and I wasn’t in the clearest of heads to try to sort it out.