[HN Gopher] A web platform for using YouTube as a drum sequencer
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       A web platform for using YouTube as a drum sequencer
        
       Author : eastmountain
       Score  : 135 points
       Date   : 2025-02-18 02:34 UTC (20 hours ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (youtubesequencer.com)
 (TXT) w3m dump (youtubesequencer.com)
        
       | eastmountain wrote:
       | I think people are somewhat familiar with pressing the number
       | keys while playing a YouTube video to jump to a timestamp,
       | creating a sampler-type instrument. Well, I wanted to take it to
       | the next step. Inspired by playing around with the Arturia
       | Drumbrute, I built a web-based drum sequencer that uses YouTube
       | videos as input.
       | 
       | 32 step sequences, A/B pattern banks, bpm control, save/load
       | pattern functionality, and what I'm most proud of - a page to
       | share your patterns and load in patterns that other people have
       | made.
       | 
       | I'm a musician (https://sweetpablo.bandcamp.com/) and aspiring
       | web developer (https://andrew-boylan.com/) just hoping to get
       | people using this thing before my AWS free trial runs out! Try it
       | out and add your pattern ~
       | 
       | See this page (https://youtubesequencer.com/about) for an example
       | video.
       | 
       | https://youtubesequencer.com/
        
         | 999900000999 wrote:
         | Very neat, at first I was like ohh it's going to download
         | YouTube videos and get disabled sooner rather than later, but
         | this is super clean with embed links. It's definitely a neat
         | project
         | 
         | I actually sample a lot of YouTube videos and it's a cat and
         | mouse game since YouTube keeps disabling it. Eventually I'm
         | going to have to just grab my old phone with a jack and run an
         | aux cord...
        
           | eastmountain wrote:
           | Thank you 999900000999. I think sampling from Youtube is
           | super interesting and I wanted to make it easier to do.
           | Curious what you use to sample from Youtube and to hear your
           | music ~
        
             | 999900000999 wrote:
             | I wrote a small python script that chops the audio from
             | public domain videos into 30 second chunks( you can adjust
             | it).
             | 
             | Since I'm a GUI person I added one. Python is ridiculously
             | good for small tools like this.
        
         | your_challenger wrote:
         | Do we have an example sequence we can load? Would be easier to
         | try it, out without giving it much thought.
        
           | eastmountain wrote:
           | Good point. I added some default video urls and pad commands.
           | You just have to press load video and press play. You can
           | also instantly load anyone else's pattern into the sequencer
           | on the Share Patterns page!
        
         | gedy wrote:
         | Lovely use of technology! Modern day analogy of old time
         | turntable mixing
        
         | fitsumbelay wrote:
         | had no idea of the numberkey/jump link functionality awesome
         | project as well
        
       | webprofusion wrote:
       | A little bit bizarre but I appreciate that a lot of effort has
       | gone into it. Needs a sample project loaded on startup and a more
       | obvious PLAY button.
       | 
       | Could maybe have a simpler UI by default with an option for
       | advanced as most people would be consumers, not creators.
       | 
       | Could be fun to browse other peoples work if ranked by current
       | popularity.
        
         | eastmountain wrote:
         | Hey! Thanks for your feedback. Not beating the bizarre
         | allegations but I do agree with you on the larger play button
         | and I've made it bigger. I also agree about the default
         | project, and I've added default videoUrl and padCommands. I
         | still need the user to press the Load Video button to load it
         | in, unfortunately that's a problem I haven't been able to fix
         | so far. I'm curious, which element of the UI do you think I
         | should remove first to make it simpler? Re: browsing other
         | people's work, yes just go to Share Patterns and sort by Most
         | Liked!
        
       | kennyloginz wrote:
       | Fresh!
        
       | tomglynch wrote:
       | This is a really fun combination of tech and music. I don't see
       | why it has to stop at just drums though!
        
         | eastmountain wrote:
         | it definitely does not ;-)
        
       | lelandfe wrote:
       | Recently came across this 13 year old bit of genius:
       | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3yRx-dd7Jcs
       | 
       | (Desktop/keyboard only)
        
       | tiborsaas wrote:
       | I wish there was an option to select multiple "notes" and adjust
       | the timing of it, it's quite painful to try to match 4 or more of
       | them exactly.
       | 
       | I've made a simple beat:
       | https://gist.github.com/tiborsaas/68f5f31f195bdbdf22952f64e5...
        
       | hannah_creator wrote:
       | Really creative project! Love how you've transformed YouTube
       | timestamps into a music sampler. The social sharing feature is
       | particularly impressive - it turns the tool into a collaborative
       | music-making platform.
       | 
       | I'm curious about a few technical aspects: 1. How do you handle
       | YouTube video loading latency, especially at higher BPM? 2. Have
       | you considered implementing multi-track functionality, using
       | different YouTube videos as separate tracks? 3. Regarding the AWS
       | free tier expiration, have you thought about using GitHub Pages +
       | frontend caching to reduce server load?
       | 
       | As a suggestion, perhaps adding a "Featured Patterns" section
       | showcasing the community's most popular rhythm patterns could
       | help new users quickly discover the tool's potential.
        
       | brianzelip wrote:
       | Love the micro whimsy of <title>Dancing In The
       | Datacenter</title>. An old web vibe for sure.
       | 
       | https://github.com/eastmountaincode/youtube-sequencer
        
       | antidnan wrote:
       | This is awesome!
        
       | schwartzworld wrote:
       | Looks great. Can playback speed be used as rudimentary time
       | stretching?
        
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       (page generated 2025-02-18 23:02 UTC)