Get rid of Autoscroll delay?

davelson

Hi all, new user here…. Looking to migrate from BandHelper, but one thing is confusing me.

I’ve created a song which I gave a duration of 3:00 minutes, imported lyrics etc, but when I hit Play the autoscroll does not start for 1:20 minutes… there appears to be no option to start autoscroll immediately when song starts without a delay. From a post last year it was suggested to increase the scroll speed, but that doesn’t remove the delay, just reduces it.

Am I missing something here? In BH I can set an autoscroll pre-roll (delay) time and also a duration for the autoscroll. Is this function not available in Stagetraxx?

Thanks

peter

You are talking about lyrics only songs? Two options to start scrolling earlier:

a) increase scroll speed
b) shorten song duration

davelson

peter So there is no way to control exactly when the autoscroll starts after the song starts playing. The two options you describe just make the autoscroll out of sync with the song duration. Same problem with both lyric only and mp3 attached songs

AnthonyB

Doc Ref - https://stagetraxx.com/user-guide/lyrics/#using-automatic-scrolling

@peter I had to work out through trial and error that for lyric only songs, the manual song duration value influences when automatic scrolling commences. I don't recall seeing this relationship documented? That might be helpful to add to the above doc page?

I assume in the background ST is taking:

Song duration, and
Number of lines in the lyric sheet (or is it lines per visible page, which would differ for different device screen sizes? Does Text Size become a factor?)
and then performing some calculation to determine when autoscrolling will commence?

Also, does the manual song tempo entered value have any influence on when autoscrolling commences?

Once automatic scrolling has commenced, then it just the Scroll Speed multiplier that determines how fast it scrolls? I.e. there are no other factors considered?

peter

You can control autoscroll in detail by adding timecodes.

Without timecodes autoscroll will make sure that you see the bottom of your lyrics when you reach the end of the playback duration (at speed 1.0). With speed 2.0 you will see the bottom when half the duration has been reached. Other values are in between.

davelson

peter ok thanks for the reply, that’s not going to work for me.

Damir

peter Without timecodes autoscroll will make sure that you see the bottom of your lyrics when you reach the end of the playback duration

This should also apply to manual scrolling, at the moment it scrolls to top of page , which is a pain when manually scrolling to the end of lyrics.

AnthonyB

davelson In case it helps, I had a Lyric only song auto-scroll challenge recently where the scrolling wasn't suiting the band. My simple solution was to add a bunch of blank lines at the end of the lyric sheet and then one final line which was just a Comment that said "`End of lyric sheet"

That forced the page to start auto-scrolling earlier, well, technically it wasn't but the perception was that it was autoscrolling earlier, and the band was happy.

peter

What do you mean by that Damir?

Damir

peter What do you mean by that Damir?

When I go it to manual scroll and finger swipe to end of song my lyrics scroll right to the top of screen, this is not ideal as you want the lyrics to stop at the bottom of screen for the reason you want to see as much of the ending lyrics as possible.
I think I know why it’s doing this.
In automated mode I like my highlighted lyrics to be on top of screen as I don’t need lyrics already sung, I think this is the reason in manual mode this is also the stop point of end of lyrics.
But this is not the correct logic , when I enter manual mode means I don’t need synced lyrics and I don’t want my lyrics to end off screen , so when I swipe up manually aggressively as I need my end lyrics I want the end lyrics to stop at the bottom of screen , I don’t want to end up with no lyrics in view due the fact I chose my automated lyrics to highlight at the top of screen.
I hope I have made it clear enough for you to fix this as it is a real pain when swiping manually to end of lyrics.

Hi Peter I just tested that theory, and I was correct, if I choose the highlight of lyrics in the middle then a manual scroll to end of lyrics ends in the middle, what we need is to change the manual scroll logic to always end at the bottom of screen that would make life much easier when desperately scrolling to end of song lyrics.
As I said earlier I would also make manual scrolling behave differently to make it more on stage user friendly, by making sure a swipe up or down only moves one screen worth of lyrics , that way you can with confidence swipe and get the next lyrics without overshooting to a lyric point you don’t need.
It’s a lot easier to swipe two or three times than having to worry where you might end up if you swipe manually.
Remember we are under pressure on stage we need speed and confidence to do things.

peter

Damir When I go it to manual scroll and finger swipe to end of song my lyrics scroll right to the top of screen, this is not ideal as you want the lyrics to stop at the bottom of screen for the reason you want to see as much of the ending lyrics as possible.

You need to enable the override scrolling setting. Then it will not jump back.

Damir

peter You need to enable the override scrolling setting. Then it will not jump back.

Manual scrolling override is activated, and i am having this issue, it apperars to me the logic of manual scrolling lyrics is wrong, this setting should allow me to manual scroll but the end of lyrics logic does not change , it follows whatever the auto scroll setting is set to instead of ignoring this and simply scroll to bottom of screen.
Once i activate auto scroll it should revert back to auto scroll position selection as is.
In manual it needs to ignore that logic and assume the end of lyrics stop at the bottom of screen.

peter

How can I reproduce your issue? When I have a lyrics only song and scrolling override is enabled, as soon as I manually scroll, the scroll speed stepper changes to "manual" and the lyrics no longer move by itself.

Damir

peter you can use time synced lyrics song with the setting to top of page line sync and manual scroll override on.
Now play the song and then try to manually get to the end of song, you will notice the end of your lyrics scroll to top of page.
This should not happen.
In manual scroll mode you should get the end of your song lyrics on the bottom of page because you are no longer in auto scroll mode.
The reason I suggest this because if you do a big swipe the lyrics shoot off screen, this is not good when on stage under pressure.
My other suggestion when in manual mode a swipe in any direction only moves one screen worth of lyrics so if you have a long song lyric you can comfortably swipe to next lot of lyrics without overshooting to an unwanted spot of the lyrics, and if you touch and drag your finger you can fine tune your position in the lyrics, this gives us very quick and safe vay to manually through the lyrics.
At the moment a quick swipe is like spinning a roulette wheel that gives you unpredictable results, we don’t need that on stage under pressure.

peter

Damir I think I get it. But this is not a lyrics only or manual scrolling issue but a general scrolling issue when approaching the end of the lyrics. If you selected the highlighted line to be at the top, it will be at the top even if you are at the end of the document. I agree that this is not desirable. The last lyrics line should stay at the bottom of the screen.

davelson Lack of proper simple control over the timing of auto scroll is a deal breaker for me

I don't see an issue there. Timecoding allows very precise control over what is displayed at which time. What exactly are you missing?

Nick

I use lyrics only and had the same issue.
I tried timecodes but they dont work for my band ( sea shantys and Irish folk ), as the timings may change to suit the mood.

I finally settled for a foot pedal using bluetooth, and re-formatted the shantys so that a verse / chorus was always on a complete page, ( chorus and verses if they fitted to the page ).

Took me a while to add this additional function to my lead vocal and mandfolin playing, but now have it working and am able to sync the page turn over with the correct timings of the song. Still get the odd double tap !!! so have to turn the pages back.

However the many other functions of Stage Traxx 3 far outweigh this inconvience, and i live in hope someday the problem will be solved.

davelson

Thanks to all for your replies….

It appears that this is a common issue for users which has not been resolved for me satisfactorily… a shame as the app shows a lot of promise. Lack of proper simple control over the timing of auto scroll is a deal breaker for me, so it’s back to BandHelper….

Cheers

davelson

peter my issue is that i dont want to go through the laborious process of adding time codes to hundreds of songs. I just want to be able to start autoscroll when i push a footswitch and it will start immediately without pause and run until the end of a song, or be able to adjust the exact time of the pause before auto scrolling starts and duration of autoscroll

Damir

davelson so what you are saying you simply want to have full control of foot pedal scrolling like an autocue that television presenters use, when you hit start the lyrics scroll immediately at your pre determined reading speed for that song only, every song has its own speed setting, you then have the second foot switch to reverse direction if needed.
There is nothing to program except a slight tweak of speed to suit every song.
I think that would work very nicely for a lot of very basic users of ST3 that just need lyrics.
I am one of them when using the accordion , most lyrics i need on the phone fit on one to 3 screens worth of space , all i want is to load the text resize it to suit the screen tweak the speed of scroll and go for it.
Ideally i dont even need the foot control or the speed adjustment, if peter made it a quick swipe up / down on screen to get from one full screen of lyrics to another without it scrolling to an unknown position as it is now, it would simplify it even more as i would only need a single quick swipe to get to my next needed screen.
And to top it off to select another song lyric, a swipe to right on screen to choose a different song text is all thats needed, no complicated data entry and syncing , just throw in the text and finger adjust the size of text set speed if needed and go for it.
SIMPLE.

peter

davelson my issue is that i dont want to go through the laborious process of adding time codes to hundreds of songs. I just want to be able to start autoscroll when i push a footswitch and it will start immediately without pause and run until the end of a song, or be able to adjust the exact time of the pause before auto scrolling starts and duration of autoscroll

So these would be 2 modes of operation? One where you have a start / pause autoscroll trigger and one that is automatic where you have a scroll delay at the start of the song and then it would scroll with a certain speed?

I understand the first mode of operation and that could indeed be a good addition. But the second mode requires more tweaking than the current mode? Right now, when you don't use timecodes, all you need to adjust is the scroll speed. With your approach you would need to adjust the scroll speed AND the start delay. I don't think that would be an improvement.

MarkGuitar

peter If I may chip in here. I think having a ‘pre-scroll delay’ would be a very useful addition but without the need for the scroll speed. Surely the scroll speed is what you calculate as you do now? This, but with the additional of a configurable pause before scrolling starts. Then your usual calculation to set the scroll speed based on the remaining time duration of the song. The benefits of having the pre-scroll delay is to help with getting the song started for people who use the page. It would be static for a while before scrolling starts, enabling them to get into the song before it starts moving. Or the alternative, as my old guitar teacher used to always so to me; “learn the material” 😄