Katana - Expression pedal and MIDI Implementation

Started by mercury1, January 03, 2017, 04:53:24 PM

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mercury1

 After some reservation I finally did the firmware update for the katana 100 I've been enjoying immensely since purchasing mid December. I'm wondering if anyone else felt like the response in the guitar volume changed somewhat? It seemed like I had a lot more travel in the knob that cleaned the sound up before actually lowering the volume. Nevertheless no boss tone studio without the update.
I loaded up some of my favorite pedals one of which was Harmonist. I was hoping there would be some role the expression pedal could play in the harmony patch i.e. keychange, but all it does is volume on this patch. Also the panel knob only works as interval change. I thought it would have been more logical to have a static interval and least the ability to change key on the fly without the computer. After talking to Roland support today it seems the only thing the expression pedal will do is volume and wah at this point . I'm wondering if the head with midi in has a cc# for keychange and is it possible that some of the  fx parameters ( keychange ,leslie speed, etc) will be accessible in the future firmware updates. I got two expression inputs on my ga-fc and one on the back of the amp and all I can control is volume and wah, am I missing something?.....I still love the amp.
Gr-55, Gr-33, Gr-1, Vg-88, Jamman looper, Brian More 88.13  ,/ 8.13 , Fender hm strat( gk-3 ), Hammer( int gk-2) , Behringer V-ampire Lx1200 / fcb1010

Elantric

#1
QuoteI got two expression inputs on my ga-fc and one on the back of the amp and all I can control is volume and wah, am I missing something?

that reflects the reality of the current Katana firmware 1.02


Refer to Katana FAQ
https://www.vguitarforums.com/smf/index.php?topic=19048.0


With current Katana firmware 1.02 - only the Wah or a redundant Volume can be controlled by the "FX Expression pedal" connected to GA-FC


And this is the entire official released Roland Katana Head MIDI spec - however using MIDI over USB, these MIDI commands work for all versions of Katana


There is a user "reverse - engineered"  Katana MIDI - Bridge effort by Steve Hirsch which is much deeper:

QuoteBut if you are brave enough to run my MIDI bridge code on a small embedded computer, sky's the limit (including external access to the missing presence knob):

https://github.com/snhirsch/katana-midi-bridge

This is not plug-and-play, however.  Some hacking required.

https://github.com/snhirsch/katana-midi-bridge/commit/c5466aa5bbcdc5b91b230b591ab72ec8da9738f0


vtgearhead

Thanks for the plug, Elantric.  I'm continuing to chip away at the MIDI bridge, but since I'm back at work it's going slower.  Most recent update was to implement log scaling for volume CC messages.  I have no idea why vendors like Roland and Line6 persist in presenting volume controls as a linear function.  A simulated log taper makes pedal operation much more natural. 

I have a direction to expose all the internal knobs as assigns, but implementation will take a while.

Magiamusical

I manage to program an old Roland FC-200 foot Ctl to change the channels and turn off/on the effects. One annoying thing is to change between PC and CC I had to use a FS-5U which is another pedal on the floor.

I guess there's no way to use the FC-200 expression pedal to control the volume, at least I haven't found a way.

I'm in the process of getting the GA-FC but is not in stock neither on the local stores nor online.

Still very happy with the Katana Head
Godin LGXT, Les Paul Studio w/GK3, JTV89F w/GK3, GR-55

gumtown

Just been going through all the effects and testing the GAFC with EXP pedal into the "FX" controller jack.
So far all it does is WAH or Volume, nothing else.
So why have the ability to use 2 EXP pedals, the FX one is only useful while the WAH is engaged all the time.

I was hoping the EXP FX control would at least do dry/FX mix for some of the 'active' effects.

???
Free "GR-55 FloorBoard" editor software from https://sourceforge.net/projects/grfloorboard/

stevewillow

Hi Magiamusical -  how are you getting on with the FC-200 controller with the Katana head? Are you on firmware 2 now and do you see any improvements with the FC-200 with that? Thanks for any help - from anyone - with getting the FC-200 to work with the Katana head.