This document describes the process of setting up Novation Nocturn controller with a
MIDI mapping that is suitable for use in Lightroom. Nocturn is not a native MIDI
controller, but it’s Automap driver software implements MIDI ports. This means that
Automap has to be running at all times, otherwise the Automap MIDI port is not visible.
Because of this, the initial setup process is also a bit more complicated.
Here’s the software you need:
First, you need to install Automap software. I used 4.3.0 for the screenshots, but
the process should be similar with any version.
Start AutomapServer from Applications. Plug-in Novation Nocturn controller if it
is not yet connected.
Open Preferences menu (shortcut ⌘,) and
select “Software Setup” tab.
On the left, there is an option “Advanced” (this is the generic MIDI interface, I don’t
know why they call it advanced). Select it.
Under “MIDI ports”, select “Automap MIDI” as both input and output.
On “MIDI Channels”, tick channel 1 (when you are more advanced, you can come back and tick more channels)
Next, move over to “Mixer/Plugin Mappings”.
On this display, you should see the channel 1 selected on the previous screen. Highlight
it, and click “Edit mapping…”
This is the same view you would get when you press view button on the controller. Click
“Choose”.
Now you need to find the automap mapping file for Knobroom. It is shipped with
the plugin package, but since OS X treats it as a package, it is a bit complicated to access.
My suggestion is that you open a separate Finder window, navigate the Knobroom directory
(right click and select “Show Package Contents”), inside it you will find directory called
“mapping” which has Nocturn_All_CC_Encoder_8Note_Buttons.automap file. Drag this file to Automap’s
“Choose File” dialog, and click “Choose”. Now the knobs are configured.
You can rename the mapping as “Knobroom” by clicking the name field.
Now the Nocturn is configured, it is sending sensible data on MIDI channel 1, next we have
to configure Lightroom mapping.
Start Lightroom, open “File” -> “Plug-in Manager” from the menu. First you have to
install Knobroom plugin. Click on “Add”.
Navigate to folder where you have extracted the downloaded Knobroom zip package, select
Knobroom.lrplugin, click “Add Plug-in”
Now the plugin is installed, but it has no mapping of MIDI controls to Lightroom sliders.
On the right side of the screen, you can see different configuration sections. Section “MIDI Mapping”
is where we configure which MIDI message does what in Lightroom. For Nocturn, Knobroom comes with a
ready-made mapping file.
Click “Import mapping”, and select Nocturn.json, click “Choose”.
Now you have loaded preset and we are almost done. Later on, if you wish to change the
mappings, you can use the little pulldown menus to select a MIDI control and how it
is mapped inside Lightroom.
Now we can start the actual plugin. Click “File” -> “Plug-in Extras” -> “Start Knobroom”.
The last dialog will show up, and this is the only action you have to do when you start working, other steps were just setting up.
Select “Automap MIDI” as both ports (if you can’t see them you probably do not have Automap running)
Knobroom is now running. If you open “Develop” view and history section, you should see entries starting with “Knobroom”
Hope you like it!