We expect this around early December
Thank you for the info, james!
Yes, the i2M is monophonic, but our pitch-detection technology allows for multiple notes being played and tries to track the main, dominant note. That's what makes it "robust", so even if you're a bit sloppy it can often track without problems
Understood! I think I saw some Japanese guitarist on youtube playing several notes at the same time with i2m, but since I don't speak Japanese I didn't quite get it
Yes. For some reason, users either shy away from the forum, or can't find it -- but it's clear enough on the web site and mentioned in the user manual! Any thoughts you have to get more users here would be very welcome.
I think there are 3 main problems with your products in overall:
- for reasons completely obscure to me, they seem to be getting a lot of bad hype on the net. Before coming to this forum and asking you questions directly, I did a small survey; the general consensus for g2m seems to be "yeah, ya' know, this is, of course, just a toy, but may serve as a good introduction to the world of MIDI". And someone always adds: "But you must understand, for 100 bucks it's quite good". Well, my opinion is that for 100 bucks it is not "quite good", it's f**king unbelievable. I've been using g2m for, let's see, almost 2 months now, and my sole complaint is the lack of envelope tracking, which shouldn't even be a problem if you're not using an E-Bow or a sustainer.
- now, the people who are actually praising the products are simultaneously spreading a whole lot of misinformation. The perfect example would be the SweetwaterSound guy on youtube, who says (quoting): "You can never play more than one note on this particular device. And that just doesn't mean single lines (sic!), it means that each of your notes can't bleed (sic!) into the previous note, so you have to play it in a (sic!) slightly detached manner." Exactly this statement prompted me to come to this forum and ask if I can only play staccato with g2m, which is, of course, untrue and ridiculous. Another example would be "use the neck pick-up, this is gonna help the g2m convert your guitar to midi" from EtCeteraDistribution, who, as I understand it, is a prominent guitarist.
- so why are people saying this stuff? Here we come to the 3rd problem: your device is too good, meaning it's too intuitive. No bundled software, no buttons, just input and output
I can understand where the "detached manner" statement comes from: when I first plugged in g2m, I tried a few VST sax plugins, and all of them sounded out of tune when playing legato; this was, of course, due to the fact that pitch bend settings for the plugins and for g2m were different. Once I got myself a good MIDI sampler (Kontakt), I was able to adjust the pitch bend of the instruments to 2 semitones, and viola! the whole thing worked flawlessly from that point on. Now, if g2m had a big sign on it (remember, people refer to the manual only as a last resort) saying "you'd better adjust your pitch bend settings"...
Regarding the neck pick-ups thing, I play bridge pick-ups almost exclusively, and have never had any problems with g2m tracking the notes.
What I think you could do to remedy the situation:
- first of all, as I've mentioned already, it had been my experience both as a programmer and a guitarist that people rarely read the documentation, instead relying on their own observation skills. What people really like to read/watch though are tutorials and video lessons
The E-Bow guys pulled a clever trick: they include some lessons on a bundled CD, which has a link to their website with more tutorials. Although your devices are really intuitive, the sheer amount of misunderstanding that I referred to before warrants a possibility of creating 3-4 such "lessons".
- second, the pairing "E-Bow + i2m", although I haven't tried it yet, really seems to be, I don't know, like a new way of playing guitar? Both devices are monophonic in nature, and E-Bow solves most of the problems people may encounter while playing g2m/i2m - for example, as I've said before, it mutes the adjacent strings. Consequently, Axon/Roland devices are an overkill for E-Bow players since you can't play more than one string at a time with it. Maybe you could develop some kind of a partnership with E-Bow folks, promoting the products of each other, or maybe even creating combined "E-Bow/i2m" sets at a reduced price?