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[Lionel]

I have been playing around with a program called PCDJ which allows me to adjust the pitch of two separate songs and mix them together by using two sound cards to listen in on each channel.  I am fairly happy with it but find myself super frustrated when trying to find songs on my hard drive, the organizational capabilities leave much to be desired Especially in comparison to MJ.  

I already use MJ to dj my weekly radio show but I find myself wishing I could use MJ to dj dance sets.  If only MJ had an attached app that would allow me to adjust the pitch, cue up songs, set cue points, adjust the volume of two separate channels and crossfade.  J River is already my bestest, favorite app and I know my dj friends would go nuts if they could combine the organizational and search capabilites of MJ with dj'ing tools.  Please, please consider adding this capability and corner the market on all in one jukebox apps AND be the King of all dj apps too!

[LCtheDJ]

I'll have to go along with this!  Other, DJ specific, programs are better for DJ requirements but just don't match MJ in organization skills.

I've even used two programs at once before; one would manage the database (sorting and searching the stockpile of tunes) and send the selected track to the play list of the separate playback program.  If these duties were combined into a single program, I'd never have to use another.

Right now the closest I've seen is BPM Studio, but with a price tag of several hundred dollars and some features that don't match my needs, I've passed on getting that one.

MJ is sooo close!  Do you dare go all the way?

[JimH]

We'd like to solve your problem.  Why don't the two of you and any other dj's interested use this thread to discuss what the most critical (not nice-to-have) features are.  We can add 3 or 4 features in V9 and see where it goes from there.

[SeanC]

YAY!  I'm really excited to hear that.  MixMeister is a simple approach to DJ capabilities.  It offers BPM analysis, a graphical display of the songs so that the beat can be matched, cross-fading, etc.

MJ |PLS| DJ capabilities |PLS| EAC like ripping = heaven!

Here's a picture of how tracks can be layed out in MixMeister.

[Lionel]

critical: pitch control, crossfader, ability to set cue points, ability to listen in on both the cue and the program

these are the essentials for any dj!

wishlist: ability to change pitch without changing the key of the music

thank you, thank you, thank you Jim for considering

[jann]

Hello Jim,

really great news!

Here are some links to the most popular DJ-softwares on the market:

www.bpmstudio.com
www.traktor-dj.com
www.atomixmp3.com
www.mixmeister.com
www.pcdj.com
www.otsjuke.com
www.djpower.com

The main things for DJ's are:

Double Player Interface
Different sound outputs for the two players
Play and Cue buttons with very good latency times
pitch control
Very good media library - no work for you, Jim :-)

This should be the easiest way to add DJ-functionality to the Media Jukebox, but personally I prefer the way Mixmeister PRO4 handles it. There's no double player interface, but all the tracks in your playlist are displayed like in the Media Editor and the main thing is, that you can prehear (two sound outputs required) and of course change every transition (mix) in your playlist. You get absolutely perfect mixes as a result.
Maybe you can try the demo-versions of BPMStudio and Mixmeister PRO4, to see the different concepts.

Jan

[Mirko]

My most critical things a DJ-Software has to do:

- automatic BPM analysis (this MJ9 should do?)
- Speed/BPM adjustment (with and without pitching up or down the tone ("nicht die Tonhöhe verändern, nur die Geschwindigkeit"))
- overlay of two songs at places I choose
- voluming down section of songs (e.g. after the overlay/mix)
- burn the created mix to CDR

Not most critical, but importand:
- Volume/Bass/Treble-Adjustment inside of tracks


I use MixMeister myself and don't like the speed up/down-thing very much (it takes to much time to pitch from 120 to 180 or higher; you simply can't do a "pitch em to the sky and going on very slow"-thing). And surely don't like to organization thing (I have to organize my songs by genre using MJ and importing the whole directory-path into MM -> this takes _time_ (because MJ calculates the BPM on every import).


The whole thing could be a (commercial) plugin; I would definitly pay for this.

HTH,
Mirko

[Geoff]

Hi,
I don't know if this is technically possible or not, but I've always thought that a program that could scan a cd and detect the length of the intro on a track(ie without voice) and give a readout counting down in seconds would be very handy when talking into  the start of a track.
Geoff
(the Blues dj)

[Roger the Shrubber]

I want these features too......would be simply marvellous!

PCDJ - how the heck to organise the tracks?
Mixmeister - not quite there with database views, etc

My wishlist:
Practical interface (no fancy eye candy confusion)
Auto BPM
Auto beat mixing
Crossfader (2 player deck view)
Pitch shift
Cue points (2 per track)
Volume equalization (replay gain?)
Mix/transition preview (pre-listen/cue on headphone out)
Individual track eq would be cool

My dreamlist:
Joystick-enabled 4 speaker pan
Viz only out to data projector

Thanx for listening...

[JimH]

BPM is in version 9 as part of "audio analysis".

[Mirko]

@Geoff: MixMeister does this quite well.

[Slikvik]

I have to say that although Mixmeister is very good and has a big following, I don't think it will sit well in the MJ UI and it is not the most user friendly of DJing packages (something that should be important as an MJ feature.)

May I suggest that you look at www.carrotinnovations.com for Virtual TurnTables (VTT) it was actually one of the original PC DJ programs.

Basicaly it main starts with a file/playlist manager (like MJ but not as good.)
It also has a little mixer pop-up window with crossfader etc and two (or more!) jog shuttle pop-up windows for each song with cue points and pitch controls etc.

I think this pop-up ability of virtual mixer and jogshuttles would fit perfectly with MJ's existing interface without requiring any reworking.

As a side note you can buy a splitter from electronics stores (£5)that allows VTT to work with one soundcard and still switch channels in the headphones only!

I will post a screenshot next.

Cheers guys

[Slikvik]

Heres the VTT screenshot:

[Lionel]

I think Slikvik is on to something with the interface for Virtual TurnTables (VTT). The user interface most similar to real turntables or cd decks would be best for most users. I am just looking for a way to add to my selection at a gig by having a portable, massive collection available on my laptop from which I can field most any request (which MJ already does) AND be able to integrate that with my cd deck and turntables by having the essential 3 or 4 dj features added to MJ.
My first impression of Mixmeister is that it's too techy. I was just reading the thread discussing how complicated MJ should be and agree that if an app gets too fancy it narrows the market of buyers somewhat. With that said, I'd still like to reference an article that I think illustrates that adding these features to MJ is essential because integrating a digital library with traditional dj tools (FinalScratch) is probably where dj'ing is going to in the near future

"Interestingly, a combined hardware and software product from N2IT Development called FinalScratch made both of those developments possible for Hawtin. FinalScratch allows DJs to control digital files stored on a computer from a vinyl record encoded with digital data."
READ FULL ARTICLE HERE

FinalScratch Homepage

[Lionel]

I would prefer to see an interface closer to a cd deck, like PCDJ.
I think a pop up window like VTT or in place of the visualizations on MJ

[SeanC]

JimH -

How can we help promote/expedite DJ functionality in MJ?

[JimH]

Sean,
Thanks.  Maybe try to boil down the list of requests to the 3 or 4 most important.

Jim

[Platypus]

I use PCDJ a lot, with the DMC-1 dual-cd style controller. Works a treat. I find my track organisation requirements are very different when dj'ing. I want them listed by genre and in bpm order. Leave MJ as a home player. It excels at this, whereas PCDJ is geared solely towards playing out as a DJ.

[SeanC]

Well, I'd say the priorities are as follows:

1) ability to change pitch without changing the key of the music
2) Ability to sequence songs.  We've seen a number of votes in this thread for Dual-Player support.  I prefer the MixMeister approach where you lay out the songs, mix them as you see fit, then hit Play.  It's more synonymous with a playlist in my mind.  However, either approach can work.  Somehow allowing overlay of two songs at places I choose.
3) Auto beat mixing
4) Multiple cue points
5) burn the created mix to CDR without having to mess with a 14-step process using Disk-Writer.

Wishlist items
1) Dual-output support would be required for any live work.  This means that we can cue up a track and preview it via headphones while the main sequence is already playing.  This makes use of two sound cards.
2) Volume/Bass/Treble-Adjustment inside of tracks
3) Plugin support, either VST or DX.