generating button layouts

[JimLucas]

Every now and then someone posts the button-note layout for a particular instrument. Some are drawn by hand; some are presented as rectangular tables; but others have neat circles arranged like the buttons and containing note names. In addition to black and while I've seen color used to mark different octaves, and the circles for anglos may even be divided into upper and lower semicircles. I'm assuming that these are somehow computer generated without great difficulty, and I'd like to do the same, so I'm wondering how you folks do it.

 

I'm sure that you who have done that haven't all used precisely the same technique -- e.g., some have been JPG images, while Geoff Crabb puts his into word documents, -- and I'd be more than happy to have several techniques to choose from. Will you oblige me by "spilling your secrets"?

 

Thanks in advance.

Jim

[Greg Jowaisas]

I believe this link will take you to Wes Williams wonderful concertina software site where "Professor Maccann's keyboard designer" is located and may be downloaded:

 

http://www.lvcott.fsnet.co.uk/soft.htm

 

Thanks to Mr. Williams for a brilliant tool.

 

Greg

Edited September 29, 2012 by Greg Jowaisas

[SteveS]

I believe this link will take you to Wes Williams wonderful concertina software site where "Professor Maccann's keyboard designer" is located and may be downloaded:

 

http://www.lvcott.fsnet.co.uk/soft.htm

 

Thanks to Mr. Williams for a brilliant tool.

 

Greg

What a super app - already got the makings of a TT EC layout done - I'll complete it in the coming days.

[bellowbelle]

Years ago, I found a website somewhere... I'll look to see if I can find it still... that offered free printouts of all different geometric layouts and whatever.

 

As I recall, what I downloaded was just the 'brick wall' printout for 81/2 x 11 paper, and I think I drew on my own circles for buttons. I used black pen or marker. Then, I scanned or printed that as needed.

 

Rather primitive, but, that's that.

 

I'll give this example, a PDF -- Valentine 2012 (1544 in the TuneOTron) -- to show how I used my 'system' to jot down my finger placement for the chords I used. (The same link is with the song, in the Tunebook.)

 

But, I'll get back to this thread, later, probably, to clarify if necessary or add a few words. Way tired at the moment....

[gcoover]

Every now and then someone posts the button-note layout for a particular instrument. Some are drawn by hand; some are presented as rectangular tables; but others have neat circles arranged like the buttons and containing note names. In addition to black and while I've seen color used to mark different octaves, and the circles for anglos may even be divided into upper and lower semicircles. I'm assuming that these are somehow computer generated without great difficulty, and I'd like to do the same, so I'm wondering how you folks do it.

 

I'm sure that you who have done that haven't all used precisely the same technique -- e.g., some have been JPG images, while Geoff Crabb puts his into word documents, -- and I'd be more than happy to have several techniques to choose from. Will you oblige me by "spilling your secrets"?

 

Thanks in advance.

Jim

 

Jim, since I'm an engineer, I just draw it using AutoCAD. Kind of like using a sledgehammer to swat a fly, but you use the tools you've got!

 

Gary

[Anglo-Irishman]

I use MS Publisher for this kind of thing.

 

In drawing mode, you can click on shapes - in our case, hexagon and circle - mouse them to the required size, and then shove them about until they look like a concertina end. Finally, you can mark the whole thing and click on the "Join" symbol to fix them in relative position.

This combined "concertina end" element can then be copied and pasted as many times as you need in the document. For Anglos and duets, you'll need two combined elements, one for LH and one for RH.

 

For the "push-pull" indication for Anglos, you can start by making one circle, then drawing a straight line across it, and joining them to one element. Then copy and paste this element as often as you have buttons.

 

To mark the buttons needed for a note or chord, if I remember rightly, you have to "unjoin" the group, mark an individual button (circle) and define a fill colour for it. Do this for all the buttons in a chord, then "re-join" the elements. And you can, of course, make text boxes with note names in them , shove them over the appropriate buttons, and join everything up again.

 

And you can add text boxes with captions (e.g. "Em chord for C/G Anglo") and shove them about to the proper places.

 

It's good to keep some blanks on paper, so that you can make a pencilled note of a new chord or an alternate fingering.

 

Cheers,

John

[Alex West]

I do mine on PowerPoint. I'm sure there are easier ways to do it but it's what I've become used to and it allows me to group particular row configurations togerther and also to build up a file per instrument documenting all in one place the keyboard and photos of before, after and jobs yet to do

 

Attached is an example (don't look too closely at the details - I haven't updated this particular file with the correct note values yet!)

 

Alex West

[David Barnert]

When I can get away with it (and the Hayden system I play is perfectly suited to it), I use ASCII text in a monospace font and do it all as unformatted text, like this:

 

|        LEFT HAND            ||        RIGHT HAND
|                             ||
|                             ||  Bb  C   D
|   F   G   A   B             ||    F   G   A   B   C#
| Bb (C)  D   E   F#  G#      ||  Bb  C   D   E   F#  G#
|   F   G   A   B   C#  D#    ||    F   G   A   B   C#  D#
|     C   D   E   F#  G#      ||     (C)  D   E   F#  G#
|                             ||
|(5th Finger)       (Thumb)   ||  (Thumb)       (5th Finger)
| ======HAND STRAP========    ||   ======HAND STRAP========
|
|(C) = middle C (both hands).

 

You just have to think carefully about how many spaces to put between each note.

[david_boveri]

I do mine all "by hand" with adobe creative suite. I believe I use the illustrator program? Anyways it is not cheap but my brother had an extra license so he gave it me. The first one took a few days, but I can make a new scale or layout now in a minute or two. I prefer to give students only the buttons they need for a given scale or key, and I number the buttons and mix blacks and grays to show default and alternate fingerings.

[AlexCJones]

I must have my key layouts indicate the note names in American Standard notation, which means that Middle C is C4 and all octaves starting at C natural. Also, I like to have the notes shown again in regular music notation as well. I think I got that from a layout that someone made for a Jeffries. So, I have had to make my own button layouts. To make them, I use Microsoft Paint, which comes free with the Microsoft Windows operating system.

Start menu-->Accessories-->Paint

 

Here is an example of one I made for my 30 key A E Edgley:

 

Does this one look familiar? This is of the original layout of the 42-key George Jones that I bought from you (Jim Lucas) a while back. I have since had the far left D4 lowered to a D3. (It has been at Tedrow's for over a year for some repair work. I miss it).

 

 

 

Here's of a 40 button GD Bastari that I owned for about a year:

.

Edited October 12, 2012 by AlexCJones

[wes williams]

I believe this link will take you to Wes Williams wonderful concertina software site where "Professor Maccann's keyboard designer" is located and may be downloaded:

 

http://www.lvcott.fsnet.co.uk/soft.htm

 

Thanks to Mr. Williams for a brilliant tool.

 

Greg

 

Thanks Greg, glad you found it useful. You've given the link to my old website, now 'frozen in space', but the latest versions of this tool and others, are on my concertinas.org.uk website linked on my sig below.

 

The originals were produced using Micrografx Picture Publisher 8, which was a magazine cover CD freebie, and which I still use for many image editing tasks. But Micrografx was absorbed by Adobe, so to ensure that Bob Gaskins (or anybody submitting layouts to concertina.com) could produce similar looking new layouts, or modify existing ones, I built a software tool. But the best way is whichever method you find easiest!

[Geoffrey Crabb]

Every now and then someone posts the button-note layout for a particular instrument. Some are drawn by hand; some are presented as rectangular tables; but others have neat circles arranged like the buttons and containing note names. In addition to black and while I've seen color used to mark different octaves, and the circles for anglos may even be divided into upper and lower semicircles. I'm assuming that these are somehow computer generated without great difficulty, and I'd like to do the same, so I'm wondering how you folks do it.

 

I'm sure that you who have done that haven't all used precisely the same technique -- e.g., some have been JPG images, while Geoff Crabb puts his into word documents, -- and I'd be more than happy to have several techniques to choose from. Will you oblige me by "spilling your secrets"?

 

Thanks in advance.

Jim

 

Whilst there are probably much better ways of doing it, as when making concertinas I tend to use the tools I have 'in the box' when generating keyboard charts. I tend not to download sophisticated programmes to avoid loading up the computer unnecessarily but mainly, being a computer numpty, I don't always understand how to use them.

 

Still, here are some notes using Word drawing facilities. Bit long I am afraid but may be useful.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Please excuse any typo's and don't beat me up too much.

 

Geoff