Forae are great since you have a knowledgable community to dwell on something if you have no chance otherwise.
In the case of this thread, this was "loud thinking". Naturally, one´s scope is always limited, so thanks to a few guys who helped me over my blind spots see much clearer.
This threads intention is NOT to change anything or suggest change to anybody. The developers will continue to do their thing.
Since the flame throwers are under way, I phase out.
Cheers,
-helmut
Every company does some pro and contra estimation. Nobody chases a bone blindly.
QuoteListen, you folks who are afraid of effects, don't use them. Let me save
you a bunch of time/thought, the KPA product goal is to never have the profiles tones change through the lifecycle of the product,
this is straight from CK's mouth. So if you're holding out for some
type of upgrade to the core tone of the KPA, you will be waiting an
eternity.
Why this anger? Nobody is afraid. Who wanted to change something in this thread? Are we talking about the same subject?
Besides the customer research every company has to do, the customer has to become clear if a product fits his/her needs, and indeed - his/her wallet. This is the sole purpose of this thread.
-helmut
- Remember, anything digital effect you add to your signal chain will have A/D and D/A converters, which can potentially degrade your tone and most importantly, will definitely add latency to what's already there from the KPA.
This is a valid point. I would not worry about tone, since everything will change tone, or as Heisenberg would probably put it, even looking at a system will change its behaviour. This may be a matter of taste, but latency can be an issue.
QuoteFor the above reasons I'd still love that the KPA continue to be the
"all-in-one" solution that it already is (at least for me), and even
improve on that.
I do not believe that even a hard giggin´ musician does not carry a secret weapon little stompbox with him, but for my personal taste, I am satisfied with a few basic effects anyway. As I said, I have seen people requesting endless features which seem beyond scope.
I see this discourse may have cleared more blind spots for me than for others. 
-helmut
some of you guys seem to spend more time thinking and posting about what the Profiler/Dev Team/Christoph should and shouldn't be doing than playing guitar.
Yes, usually during dead time at the office guitar playing is not appreciated. Moreover, what if you cannot afford neither an iconic amp or the most decent emulator thereof?
QuoteDie wahren Abenteuer sind im Kopf
und sind sie nicht in Deinem Kopf,
dann sind sie nirgendwo
André Heller
QuoteDisplay More2. digital fx are quickly superseded
depends on where you look:
Lexicon 480L, PCM60, 70 etc.
Eventide H3000
Ensoniq DP-4
tc electronic 2290
I agree. I would like to refine my statement to:
2. consumer digital fx are quickly superseded
Quotethat just sounds a bit too dramatic
this is not to be understood without the subsequent sentence.
ad 4) Did you notice that people are cloning other manufacturer´s amp models with the KPA? Models that are meant to mimic a tube amp? A whole new field for experimentation.
have fun,
-helmut
My flow of thoughts was triggered by the forum´s attempts to outline a to-be controller. Many people have many ideas they would like to see incorated in their rig, I had mine.
I know that with the gear you already have there is always some issues which could be improved some way. But what may be a feature to me may be a nuisance to somebody else.
So trying to cater for all that may be endless and ultimately futile. Since a given device cannot cater for all possible scenarios, one might as well abandon this thought, or leave it at what is there.
Maybe the lines I wrote help somebody to re-think their needs, and, indeed, prevent exploring roads that lead nowhere.
I do not want to patronize somebody, just bring a few thought to discussion.
-helmut
Yesterday I wrote in the thread for the
to-be footcontroller about how a stock pot pedal could be
incorporated as a useful volume pedal.
Having that said, I realized that
incorporating more and more stuff into the KPA may make little sense.
Let me explain.
Valve amps have been around for six
decades and are still much wanted. As time went by, they have been
augmented with the effects of the time, such as spring reverb,
tremolo, later chorus, parametric eq and even later cheap digital
effects.
Almost all of those effects have
disappeared again, making their presence on an amp a curiosity,
although some of those sounds have gained iconic status.
Even parametric EQ´s have in my
experience proven to be little accepted by users, because they make
radical tone shifts which would necessitate some performance
switching action that should rather be referred to a programmable
multi-fx device.
If you used the KPA just as it were a
vintage amp, then that´s it. Turn the “amp” on, twiddle the
knobs for slight EQ-ing, volume and gain and there is not much going
to change with this sound.
Modern tube amps usually have two ore
more channels that can be performance switched. Usually those are
voiced for different sounds (or there would be no need for them), and
the KPA can cater for that. That may be a viable reason for a
performance control (footswitch).
Fact is, effects are quickly obsoleted,
tube sound has proven resistant against the abrasion of time.
There are mainly two usage scenarios
for amplifiers:
a) live performance. The amp is not
only to used to generate tone, but also for reinforcement. The
traditional way of arranging effects including reverberation is
guitar-effect-amp-speaker or at best using a dedicated effects loop
in the amp. This fits the concept of the KPA well because in its
origins, the KPA is a chameleon amplifier and it is said to do this
well.
b) recording. Loudness is not necessary
to achieve tone with the KPA. Effects may come after the “amp”.
Typically, effects used to create a spatial illusion (such as reverb)
come after the amp (-simulation). Note however, that many producers
these days prefer to record an entirely clean signal which is
re-amped by software later, so the KPA´s amp mimic-ing
capability might not even be called for in this chain, letting alone
alleged FX, except for the musician to feel natural.
Effects should IMHO stay outside of
this concept for several reasons:
The conclusion is, IMHO the KPA should
do what it can do well, namely emulating a (tube) amp´s
response and functionality, which has proven to be a relatively
timeless feature, with little more performance switching than
changing a profile, and refer FX gadgets to external devices or any
subsequent studio processing, unless those models were made in a way
that users could change them and create their own. There is a huge
wealth of untapped ingenious energy amongst users, as the software
world has proven.
This is my opinion, based on decades of
interest and work on musical gear, and not everybody must concur to
that.
-helmut
The other thread on the to-be footcontroller seems deserted.
One more idea on a expression pedal. If this were to be used as a volume pedal *seriously*, like a pedal steeler would (ab-)use it, it rather be rugged. I have a Digitech floor effects processor, which has a rugged non-contacting (magnet?) rotary position detection, the DSP translates this to a perceived constant angular-displacement-to-loudness change, meaning that you have the feeling that if you push the pedal down so much it will become louder in a predictable way.
Unfortunately, most simple pot pedals, Ernie Ball, Goodrich, you name them, have pots built into them that are not fit for the task. Being in the audio path, they will become scratchy soon. By this time I have not mentioned any quirky taper they may exhibit.
The Telonics is one of the few one that work, but is, compared to the task it finally fulfills, very pricy. They map an artificial pot taper onto a digitally controlled resistive element via microcontroller. The position is sensed non contacting. Their argument is that their signal path is completely analog.
However, once you are digital, as in the case of the KPA, this argument is irrelevant. You might as well change the volume with the DSP - no big deal.
So, to come to the point, if the KPA foot controller allows for a stock pot volume pedal to go as exp pedal, as many of similar devices do, this is fine, as long as provision is taken to re-map a perceivedly natural audio taper onto an arbitrary pot taper, which would make some sort of "profiling" of the pedal necessary. And yes - the usual MIDI control range 0-127 is too coarse unfortunately. You hear the steps.
Now this is something to get your teeth in folks 
.
A small step for a DSP, but a giant step for the hard pumping steel player...
-helmut
Hope I am in the right section here.
I do not see an expression pedal on the proposed floorboard. Let me explain. I am part of a huge worldwide community of steel guitar players that have an increased interest in the Kemper amp. Unlike "standard" guitar players, who occasionally rock the pedal, steel guitar players (particularly pedal steel) continuously rock their volume pedal.
Normal pot pedals are useless, because good quality pots are not longer produced, and those of good quality have the wrong law. There are some very very pricey dedicated volume pedals that have a complicated analog or mixed signal solution to this.
In contrary, a comparably cheap multi-fx processor has a volume pedal in the bargain. This is a very easy task for a digital system. They are all mechanically solid contactless (magnetic or whatever) pedals and the DSP does the rest. If this alone were the objective, the discussion would be over already.
However, none of those pedals can be used directly with a pedal steel, not for sonic reasons, but the thing does physically not fit under a guitar. It would need to be detachable. Programmable laws would be nice, but ultimately not needed. Log is fine.
To sum it up: The steel guitar world is craving for the Kemper. They would go for a switch board (which is problably not ultimately needed), but they need a fine resolution volume controller. Stock pot pedals are not fit for the task, it would need to be contactless. And it would need to be detachable.
Since this discussion seems to be in a state where things can still change, that might be easy to incorporate. And I guarantee: people are waiting for that. They have no other option.
Thanks,
-helmut
