Posted
Since a couple of days I give Synfire *another* run
and what throws me off *again* is the fiddly Playhead/Timeruler and
no option to quickly locate precisely at all...
Friggin' Mouse-Clicky-Clickedy-Click-click-clickall day long in Synfire.
Thats plain awful.
So as a suggestion look at this solutions.
(I know for sure theese where coded in no time, so it can't be hard at all. ;) )
I made some animated gifs, I hope they work.
Let me know if not, then I upload them to a hosting site.
The first one is pretty much self explanatory.
As you can see the Playhead has a nice big header above the timeruler
that allows easy dragging to new location and shows a counter when dragging,
so that you can actually *see* what you're doing. Even when zoomed out...
(I can see how this example intereferes with the loop selection in synfire, but just an example on how to improve. Food for thought so to speak. Because often you want just to locate but then you get this small little blue loop-thing when you don't want it. Also maybe higher snap resolution would help already a bit. (up from the max of one, like 2/4/8 or something... )
The second one is even simpler. In the shown software its just cmd-L for "Locate".
Gives you a crappy cheap window where you can just enter the bar-number,
hit return and there you are.
I mean come on.... No, really... Come on... I am not talking about markers, selection sets, memory locations or other more or less advanced stuff here. But about easy things that work and speed up things *considerably* .
This is exactly the stuff that makes me want to throw this thing out of the window yet *again*.
You just get nothing done in time-comparison like with other tools.
Well, I suggested stuff like this before. Stuff that helps people getting their job done faster.
But things are getting dumbed down even more like with that clicktoolbox or whatever.
What the hell.
(Yeah I am ranting again, but thats me. You probably all know that by now... so deal with it. 
I guess I will cool down again in an hour or so... )
Best,
tL.
(EDIT: Again, don't get me wrong, I love this software. Otherwise I wouldn't get so p***sed about it...)
Mi., 09.12.2015 - 20:44 Permalink
For what purpose do you need to select or move the locator so frequently?
Mi., 09.12.2015 - 22:40 Permalink
Okay let me try.
Let me ask you this:
How else do you quickly compare different parts of a project, get transitions right,
get breaks right and *especially* get a more complex arrangement right on projects that
involve more than 4-track GM piano nonsense with a 1:30 duration?
(No offense to my humble piano guys here,just a bit exaggerating.. )
So lets talk about full arrangements with 30+/40+ tracks over a
minimum duration of 06:30 minutes for extended Versions and Club Mixes.
There is no other way.
(At least not without going crazy about the 1000000000 times mouse-click-click-click thing... )
Thats why this stuff is implemented in *every-DAW-Sequencer-Out-There* since day one of Sequencer days.
Thats why you can usually even save & recall marker locations and arrangement markers with keycommands.
Thats why there are hardware transport controllers sold until today
that do nothing else but support this...
If this wouldn't be important then this just would'nt be the case...
The reason for this? Speed. You must be able to navigate a project as fast as possible. Period.
Of course one could argue that we can move to the DAW of choice for this stuff but in my book
this defies the whole Synfire "stay flexible until the end" philosophy.
Which is why I use SF in the first place.
(By the way: I totally understand that despite the high price tag of SF
most of the guys here are just having fun with the software, no real goals that have to be met in xyz amount of time,
no real motivation to get somewhere, no competition to produce against, etc... which is of course perfectly fine...)
See, speed of workflow is why Reaper and Studio One went so popular in no time
and now the same happens with Bigwig.
On the other hand Digital Performer is dying because lack thereof.
Memory Locations are still one of Pro Tools strongest points, thats why according to the duc.avid
(digidesign user community) a lot of PT HD Users don't want to move to another DAW
despite the fact that AVID goes haywire with their crazy licensing subscriptions for HD users
and the software is basically still from 1999...
Again, there is a reason for this. Speed. Get maximum stuff done in minimum amount of time.
This is just essential if music pays your bills.
Hope that explains a little bit what bugs me.
And I apoligize if some words might sound offensive, it's always hard for me to imagine
how a different person reads my posts as opposed to if I would talk to them and
they can hear how I say things..
Anyways, this time I will not throw the towel again so quickly as
I think the strong points of SF outperform the weaker parts by at least 5:1
even if my rants don't support that notion... Now drop 1.8 already... ;)
Best,
tL.
(On a side note: If the rewire transport control would work in both directions,
problem solved already...:))
Mi., 09.12.2015 - 23:18 Permalink
Hey Lytz1,
what you are suggesting is useful, I use markers in ableton live and it's a real time saver. However, I do wonder if I were to look at your synfire projects if they would look like mine when I first started using synfire (structure wise). My synfire project would look very much like my ableton project, long sequences of figures.
Now i break my songs up using containers, this has a many benefits. You can jump between different parts of the song by selecting the appropirate container. Not only that but my sequences suddenly became very short 8 bars max (if you ignore parameter changes like filter cutoffs, or pauses). This really really helps your workflow when jumping around a track and also the visibility of it. No more scrolling right right right forever to get to see the figures.
Making use of the options for play and pause to resume playback from the last start position is a god send.
There has also been some work with the ios addon which uses the action server to control synfire from an ipad. Although i dabbled with this, i abandoned it as i couldnt be bothered assigning all the key sequences.
You might find some of these suggestions help speed up your workflow while waiting for andre to add your suggestions.
Mi., 09.12.2015 - 23:44 Permalink
I agree with a lot of what Lytz is saying. His comments may sound a bit harsh but like he says, the written word usually sound a lot worse than when it is spoken. I'm surprised at Supertonic's response because I would have thought it was obvious why you want to move the locator around a lot during composition. Isn't this exactly the kind of feedback Andre was asking for on another recent hot topic? Maybe Cognitone should start a sticky on GUI improvements. I would ceratinly start making a note every time something annoyed me (that I just live with) and would start posting to a sticky.
One thing I can think of off the top of my head is when you set a snap option (e.g. 4) and select the line tool on the arrangement page. If you then double-click the phrase to go into the phrase editor, it defaults back to 8 and the span tool again. Why can't Synfire remember your settings? Very annoying!
I see what you're saying blacksun, but if your song is 98 bars long it still has to be 98 bars long in Synfire. This may be made up of several containers, many of them aliases, but it is still 98 bars long. That's another thing, sometimes I'm at a container alias but I've lost track of where the original is and there's no easy way to find it!
Do., 10.12.2015 - 00:40 Permalink
Now i break my songs up using containers, this has a many benefits. You can jump between different parts of the song by selecting the appropirate container. Not only that but my sequences suddenly became very short 8 bars max (if you ignore parameter changes like filter cutoffs, or pauses). This really really helps your workflow when jumping around a track and also the visibility of it. No more scrolling right right right forever to get to see the figures.
Hey B', thanks for the input. Indeed I work like you with short patterns/sequences/containers all the time in every software, because I have nearly every 8 bars some change and/or some fills or things coming in/going out and some other stuff going on. So long patterns didn't make sense to me anyways. ;)
(Exception of course long controller rides and modulation)
But even selecting the containers (while indeed helpful) has its issues:
a) still involves a lot of mouse-miles
b) is just not fast enough compared to just hitting a key no matter where on the screen your mousepointer is at that time.
In SF you have to go up the whole screen/down the whole screen friggin all-the-time-all-day-long man... :D
c) doenst help when you need pre-roll time, which I need a lot.
(i.e. you want to start the playhead a beat or two before the "1", which I need *a lot*, because of fills, mini-breaks and transitions. )
There has also been some work with the ios addon which uses the action server to control synfire from an ipad. Although i dabbled with this, i abandoned it as i couldnt be bothered assigning all the key sequences.
Ah, totally missed that. But in general the idea isn't bad. When SF at least would somehow "know" where the rewire host is on the timeline
I could write a macro that locates in the rewire host, switches to synfire and plays with just one keystroke needed.
but as far as I know the Cognitone transport bundle works only one way and also doesn't "read" the rewire hosts songposition.
By the way: Someone of you guys tried hooking up Synfire to an external DAW Controller?
(Like a Euphonix Mix or something with a Mackie MCU/HUI or something like that?)
I see that there is an external sync option with MMC (Midi Machine Control) does this work two-ways?
But I guess shuttle and scrub and stuff like that are not supported anyways, right?
( I mean obviously not in realtime, but so that it's possible to remotely move the ruler/playhead?)
Thanks again for the suggenstions B',
tL
Do., 10.12.2015 - 00:56 Permalink
His comments may sound a bit harsh but like he says, the written word usually sound a lot worse than when it is spoken
Hey Pete. Yep. But I know I am also a hot tempered pr*ck at times... :)
That's another thing, sometimes I'm at a container alias but I've lost track of where the original is and there's no easy way to find it!
Thats exactly one of the issues you get when you can't locate quickly. You have to "look around"..
Which again involves a lot of mouse-miles, which take approx. 10x more time than just hitting number-keys
and may on the long run very exhausting for your mousehand. (At least I know it is for my hand... ;) )
Cheers,
tL.
Do., 10.12.2015 - 11:58 Permalink
Thanks for your input and feedback, Lytz. I appreciate it. And I perfectly understand the need to jump between different locations all the time. Maybe the confusion is more about why it would require the use of the playhead to do that.
The playhead is a very weak tool for selecting a place or portion of your song. It's not persistent, doesn't have any relation to content, doesn't bear a name and, as you correctly pointed out, requires fiddly mouse juggling. I agree this can be improved.
As blacksun pointed out, containers are the actual locators in Synfire: They are persistent, have a name and literally include the content and action you want to jump to. Unlike DAWs, Synfire doesn't handle music as a linear stream of notes (or long figures, whatsoever), but rather as a non-linear arrangement of parameters that generate this stream.
Working on a song in a linear fashion, that is, by editing very long parameters (especially figures) means a lot of unnecessary navigation and mouse miles. It also somehow defeats the purpose of using Synfire in the first place. You will rather want to move stuff around, experiment, re-arrange, re-use, etc.
As a rule of thumb, everywhere a change is happening in your song, there should be a container carrying the parameters that introduce the change. This could be new phrases, harmony, dynamics, or just Pause parameters to mute or unmute individual tracks. These places also quite naturally represent the locations you will want to jump to.
Everyone works differently, but as far as I am concerned, the only instance I am using the playhead is for starting playback outside a container, to check a transition. I never use it for navigating a song, or editing. This would be too fiddly. The structure view is a complete map of my song. I can jump to any place of interest with only a single click and edit what's in there right away.
I'm at a container alias but I've lost track of where the original is and there's no easy way to find it!
I agree it would be nice to assign a number or something to containers, so you can jump quickly. And a command to jump to the original of an alias. This is a good feature request.
It would also eliminate much of the mouse miles Lytz is talking about.
If the rewire transport control would work in both directions
Jumping to some place on the timeline in Synfire won't reliably select the container your content is in. But it can at least be helpful to jump you to where those containers are. I'll check that again.
Do., 10.12.2015 - 12:20 Permalink
By the way: Someone of you guys tried hooking up Synfire to an external DAW Controller?
For Synfire's transport control, this makes sense. Not so for scrubbing and real-time stuff.
I see that there is an external sync option with MMC (Midi Machine Control) does this work two-ways?
It's SPP, aka MIDI Clock, and its useless if you already have ReWire working.
Transport sync can't work both ways, unless you could jump back in time. Synfire needs to start ahead of the DAW in order to feed the Drones with music. If the DAW starts first, it is impossible to catch up.
Do., 10.12.2015 - 13:43 Permalink
The playhead is a very weak tool for selecting a place or portion of your song. It's not persistent, doesn't have any relation to content, doesn't bear a name and, as you correctly pointed out, requires fiddly mouse juggling. I agree this can be improved.
This is why I included the second .gif and the "cmd-L" example which proposed
a small popup box that let you just enter the bar number from the keyboard. ;)
Working on a song in a linear fashion, that is, by editing very long parameters (especially figures) means a lot of unnecessary navigation and mouse miles. It also somehow defeats the purpose of using Synfire in the first place. You will rather want to move stuff around, experiment, re-arrange, re-use, etc.
And again, read my answer to Blacksun. Thats exactly what I said already. Longest containers I use are 8 Bars because of similar reasons.
As a rule of thumb, everywhere a change is happening in your song, there should be a container carrying the parameters that introduce the change. This could be new phrases, harmony, dynamics, or just Pause parameters to mute or unmute individual tracks. These places also quite naturally represent the locations you will want to jump to.
Not in most electronic music styles. You need a preroll before the "1"
(a.k.a. *not* a clean start at exaclty bar-1 from the container) very *very* often.
But its not a big deal. Really. I am easy again. Just was upset yesterday because my friggin mousehand was hurting already after hours of up/down/up/down moving/clicking and so on. Its just that I'm usually used to applications where I can do this stuff in a matter of under a second.
Jumping to some place on the timeline in Synfire won't reliably select the container your content is in. But it can at least be helpful to jump you to where those containers are. I'll check that again.
Hmm. Yeah I see. But that would at least help with quick auditioning of parts. Thanks for considering.
Thanks,
tL.
Do., 10.12.2015 - 13:39 Permalink
For Synfire's transport control, this makes sense. Not so for scrubbing and real-time stuff.
Indeed. I also forgot that there are no fwd/back buttons on SF transport. Maybe that would be also an idea. So that you could move the playhead
1 bar at a time forward and backward. At least that could be hooked up to an external controller. Might already help.
It's SPP, aka MIDI Clock, and its useless if you already have ReWire working.
Ah, yes. I've read that wrong. Bascially a MTC protocol, isn't it? However Rewire doesn't do anything with an external desk that has
MMC/MCU/HUI Transport controls... :)
Transport sync can't work both ways, unless you could jump back in time. Synfire needs to start ahead of the DAW in order to feed the Drones with music. If the DAW starts first, it is impossible to catch up.
Man, I always forget that Synfire needs to render ahead. Of course that can't work.
Anyways. Thanks for listening... ;)
tL.
Do., 10.12.2015 - 17:50 Permalink
If we had a quick way to jump to containers (shortcuts) and a "Play with Pre-Roll" option, that would already help.
Absolutely!
Are bar numbers really that useful? I mean, don't they change all the time anyway?
I don't understand. Bar Numbers are always the same in all sequencers I know...
Bar 33 might have a different timestamp because of BPM or tempochanges or whatever,
but bar 33 is always bar 33... Or am I missing something?
They are indeed useful. I know the most important 4 and 8 bar numbers up to 257 since quite some time.
With most of my releases ending at 193, 209, 217 or 233, main break happening very often at 49, 57 or 65 and so on...
Clubsound usually has very often a pretty strict structure, so ararngement-wise there is a lot that often happens around the same bar numbers.
(US Radio Pop same deal, even more strict structure, but I am not too much into that kind of stuff... :D )
Between 122 and 128 BPM I can tell you pretty close out of my head to the second at which timestamp Bar 41 happens for example.
Thats not because I am very bright, it's just because of more than 15 years doing the same stuff every day, all day long.
Hit some numbers in a locator box for a month or two and you'd be amazed how well you will know
at which time and part of the song you are *without even having to have that darn thing running*
So yeah, they are useful..
Best,
tL
Do., 10.12.2015 - 20:56 Permalink
id like to suggest if you can add a jump to bar N dialog, that this gets enhance with the ability to select a range by bar number. Im only talking about the main time ruler at the top, not the ones inside a container shown in the lower display with the figures. Options could also include shortcuts to zoom to selection. Markers would still be useful if they could be key driven but container selection by key would be a compromise.
Just had a thought lytz1, you could create 'dummy empty' containers by selecting the parts of the song you want to 'test' and doing a create container. Then you can jump between them, these can overlap the containers for different sections and would, when you play them let you listen to the transition. Hard to explain but hope you get what I mean?
Do., 10.12.2015 - 21:23 Permalink
id like to suggest if you can add a jump to bar N dialog, that this gets enhance with the ability to select a range by bar number. Im only talking about the main time ruler at the top, not the ones inside a container shown in the lower display with the figures. Options could also include shortcuts to zoom to selection.
Yup. Main ruler at the top would be the way to go. Now what you are suggesting *especially* with a combo "zoom to selection"
would be even more awesome, because that would be even more flexible.
Just had a thought lytz1, you could create 'dummy empty' containers by selecting the parts of the song you want to 'test' and doing a create container. Then you can jump between them, these can overlap the containers for different sections and would, when you play them let you listen to the transition. Hard to explain but hope you get what I mean?
Yeah, I know what you mean. Excellent idea. Especially for transistion auditioning.
Didnt think about that. Great, thanks.
Cheers,
tL.
Fr., 11.12.2015 - 16:22 Permalink
Yes, you can overlap containers.. to try getting a satisfying transition..listen to it and decide if it is musical make sense for you. I did this earlier in some songs already.
There is a special name for this type of composing...i forget
Fun composing this and with unexpected pleasing musical results what never good be achieved by strict composing, because there is a lack of musical knowledge to get this effect and furthermore it takes not much time to do overlapping.
I think it is called : slip composing
Fr., 11.12.2015 - 19:39 Permalink
Jan,
the suggestion I came up with was for auditioning the tune where two containers meet and the composer wanted to listen to the end of one and start of the next. Rather than keep moving the play head around with the mouse, creating a container that overlaps the range you want to preview allows you to just select that empty container and press play/space, It was just a cheat while andre codes some more updates ;)
Fr., 11.12.2015 - 20:01 Permalink
Blacksun,
Yes, you are right its about auditioning a transition in a songpart when Synfire is running ( it is not the actual transition handling by slipcomposing technique)
I am excited to see how it works now the new coded functionality in Synfire ..it could be more suited now for making a whole new transition .