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Recording Live Sessions

TiXL can record a live performance — audio plus the MIDI and OSC events that drove the visuals — and replay it later. This is useful for two things:

  • Tweaking after the fact. Adjust audio-reactive thresholds, MIDI mappings, and animations against the exact session you played, without needing the original controller plugged in.
  • Preparing the next show. Run the captured performance back through the graph as you iterate on visuals, so you're designing against real input instead of dummy values.

A single click on the toolbar's record button captures both audio and IO data together. On stop, two clips appear on the timeline: a TimelineAudioClip with the recorded .wav and a LoadDataClip op with the recorded .data. Both files land in the active project's Assets/ folder and show up in the AssetLib.

Quick start

  1. Set the composition's Syncing mode to Timeline (Project Settings → Playback). Recording is disabled in Tapping mode because clips need a coherent playhead position.
  2. Click the record button on the right end of the timeline toolbar.
  3. Perform — play notes, twist knobs, send OSC, talk into the mic, whatever you'd do in a live set.
  4. Click record again to stop.

Two clips appear on the timeline at the bar you started recording. Hit play to replay the session.

What gets captured

Source File Notes
Audio .wav (16-bit PCM, native sample rate) The configured WASAPI input device, or the system default if none is set. Recording works in any AudioSource mode — switching to ProjectSoundtrack doesn't disable mic capture.
MIDI .data (JSON) Every MIDI device currently registered with TiXL. Notes, CCs, pitch bend, channel pressure.
OSC .data (same file) The port configured in CoreSettings.DefaultOscPort.
Variations / Snapshot recalls — Not captured. Recalls depend on the active composition's state, which changes over a live session; replaying them in a different context wouldn't reproduce the same result.

File layout

<project>/
  Assets/
    audio/
      rec-007.wav
    dataclips/
      rec-007.data

The session index (007) is shared between audio and data within one recording so they pair up. A backup copy of each file also lands in %APPDATA%\TiXL<version>\Recordings\ — useful if a project file gets damaged.

Replaying

The LoadDataClip op exposes the recorded data as a DataClip value on the graph. To drive MidiInput / OscInput ops from the recording, chain it through a SimulateIoData op:

LoadDataClip(rec-007.data).Clip ─► SimulateIoData.Clips ─► Execute

SimulateIoData dispatches recorded events through a parallel bus the input ops subscribe to. Replay works regardless of whether the original device is currently connected — MidiInput ops match by device name string, not by hardware presence.

Multiple LoadDataClips can feed one SimulateIoData via its multi-input. Each clip tracks its own source-time cursor; events from overlapping clips fire simultaneously.

The audio side just plays — drop the TimelineAudioClip on the timeline and the audio engine renders it like any other clip.

Tweak / re-record loop

The typical workflow:

  1. Record a session.
  2. Hit play, watch the visuals, see what doesn't react the way you wanted.
  3. Adjust an [AudioReaction] threshold, a MidiInput Range, a parameter curve.
  4. Loop back to play and re-evaluate against the same captured session.
  5. When the visuals are tuned, the next live show should behave the same way against fresh live input.

The recording's LoadDataClip is a normal [TimeClip] — you can move it on the timeline, trim its start/end via the source-range handles, or even drop the same .data file twice for repeated playback.

Editing recorded data

The on-disk .data format is JSON, designed to be human-readable and tool-friendly:

{
  "Version": 1,
  "Metadata": {
    "TixlVersion": "4.5",
    "RecordedAtUtc": "2026-05-28T16:42:11.0123456Z"
  },
  "Channels": [
    {
      "Path": ["Midi", "APC mini mk2", "Ch1", "CC49"],
      "Type": "float",
      "DurationType": "Tick",
      "Events": [
        { "Time": 0.301, "Value": 70.0 },
        ...
      ]
    }
  ]
}

You can edit the file in a text editor to trim or modify events. After saving, the LoadDataClip op picks up the change automatically (file-watch).

Limitations

  • Variation / snapshot replay isn't supported — the active composition's state changes too much across sessions for a reliable round-trip.
  • Hung notes on scrubbing. During edit-time scrub backward over an active note, the note's NoteOff isn't fired. Move the playhead past the note end to release.
  • Multi-arg OSC messages are recorded as separate channels per arg index. Replay sends them as single-arg messages.