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There's a whole another set of devices that we haven't talked
about yet which are Max for Live devices.
So Max for Live is another piece of software that is running in
the background of Live if you have Live 10 Suite.
So it's not going to be an option for you
if you're running Standard, or Intro, or Lite.
But if you've downloaded the demo for the purpose of this course,
you have access to Max for Live.
So what it is truly is a programming language to create devices.
So it's a way to build software.
From a user standpoint,
it's going to look and feel like any of the other devices inside of Live,
like an audio effect or a MIDI effect,
or a virtual instrument,
and they're actually categorized the same way as well.
Headed back over to Live's browser,
you can see that there's a category that's called Max for Live.
Inside of that category,
we have audio effects, instruments, and MIDI effects.
So just exactly the same way that it's
compartmentalized inside of the browser with native devices to Live,
we have Max for Live devices displayed for us in the same fashion.
Let's open it up and you can see that I have a lot of stuff in my browser here,
and a lot of Max for Live devices are free.
You can find them on the Ableton website.
If you have Suite, it's going come with a certain set of them as well.
So if you're looking for more stuff,
it's really easy to go onto the website and
find other devices that you can be playful with.
I'm going to pull on something called Shaper.
So I've got this harmonic progression selected
and I'm going to select Shaper,
and it inserts itself right here.
So you can even see that from a user standpoint,
it looks very much like a regular Ableton device.
They may have some difference in appearances
or the skin is what we refer it to might look a little bit different.
From the place that we're sitting,
this is going to be exactly the same concept
as being creative with an audio or a MIDI effect.
So Shaper is one of my favorites,
and I want to just take a moment to show you how it works.
So you can see I've got this motion,
I've got a wave that's happening.
This is a sawtooth wave,
and I can use the movement of this wave and assign
that movement to other parameters on another track.
In this case, it's the chords.
What I've just explained to you is the basis of how an LFO works.
So shaper device is an LFO, a low-frequency oscillator,
and I'm taking the oscillation or the movement of that wave and assigning
it to parameters someplace else also known as a control signal.
This device also comes in with another name called LFO.
But if you're using Live 10,
you're going to see it listed as Shaper.
So here's the wave,
and you can see I have other waves I can go to.
We've got some really interesting stuff.
Let's map this to the volume on these chords and see what happens.
So all I have to do is click on Map.
You can see it's flashing, telling me it's ready to be mapped,
and I'm just going to click on the volume here.
So if I head over to session view,
you can see that the fader itself is in motion,
and this is the motion of that wave moving back and forth.
So let's press Play and see what happens.
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I've already got a lot of really interesting movement.
Maybe I don't want it to be that extreme when I pull down on the depth.
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Swap it out for another wave.
[MUSIC]
So I'm liking saw moving in this direction
and I've synced it to a quarter note.
So it's emulating a sidechain pumping effect, if you will.
So in addition to the multitude of options you have with audio and MIDI effects,
you also have Max for Live effects,
and there's a lot more that is under the hood here.
So like I said,
Max for Live is a programming language.
So I've opened this patch in presentation view,
and what I'm looking at is the back end of how this was built.
So I have the option of checking out
the signal flow on this device and how it was patched from beginning to end.
So you can see this is extremely complex and this is definitely not for everybody.
But for those of you who are programmers or into coding,
this is a super cool place to experiment
and learn about how these things are put together.
So this one is locked,
but a lot of the ones that you might want to access are not locked.
You can do a deep dive into what's possible with Max,
and in that respect,
it's very much a limitless.
Or you can just use it as a user,
how I've just demonstrated here by using the Shaper device
just like any other device in Live.
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