thcilnnahoj@Zynewave wrote:
Yes, something like that. Thanks for the mockup. There are pros and cons with that layout. One advantage (IMO) is that you get all controls/track names vertically aligned on all the tracks. Some may think that this improves the overview, while others may think the lack of indentation of the track names disrupts the overview. Personally I think indentation works well in for example a file folder list, but I often find it confusing that the track header controls are shifted around according to group level position. What do people think?
The new way generally sounds like it will take a little getting used to, but I’m fine with either.
It didn’t bother me that the controls are not in line, and in turn it wouldn’t bother me that the indentation level would be displayed a little differently. But then, I rarely have a deeper group level than 2 or 3 (not counting the master group).
Did you say new beta? …I gotta go get a few more cups of coffee then. 🙂
thcilnnahoj@Zynewave wrote:
I plan to adjust the track lane headers before releasing 2.23. In fact I plan to experiment with changing the entire group bar hierarchy display in the tracks region, so that it matches the group header display used in the mixer. Try to imagine the mixer strips turned on the side. This means that the left edge of the track headers will no longer be offset horizontally according to their hierarchy position. This will ensure that e.g. all gain/pan sliders are aligned vertically, no matter what the hierarchy level the track is at. Any opinions on this?
I have a hard time picturing this. Wouldn’t it mean that all tracks moved more and more to the right, instead of only child tracks becoming indented, as the number of “group level strips” (for lack of a better word) increases?
Something like this?
thcilnnahoj@LiquidProj3ct wrote:
I should ask, without trying to be too perfectionist, why do you use a brighter colour in the top of each strip (‘Acoustic Guitar’ & ‘Chords’) and you don’t do it in ‘Track 3’ and ‘Master’?
Those tracks simply have no color assigned to them! 🙂
thcilnnahoj@Zynewave wrote:
I’ve implemented a new “slider with value popup” control type, which I’m considering making the default, as shown in the screenshot. Moving the mouse over for example a send slider will show “Send: -3.20 dB” in a popup above the control. Often you don’t need the full decimal value indicated all the time. I think it helps clean up the UI.
While I agree that you’re better off not seeing numbers (and thus maybe mixing by them) all the time, I don’t understand why it would be better to have them (re)moved in the mixer. Since the faders’ numerical values are represented there at all times, they might as well be right next to or on top of the faders themselves. I see no need for separate fields dedicated to just this. That being said, it seems 9 out of 10 sequencers have been doing it this way all along, so there must be something I’m missing.
If it stays like this, I would propose to rotate the volume fader head by 90° (and maybe round off its corners). Since the numbers are gone, and you don’t have to click directly on the fader to move it anyways, I don’t see a reason for it to be as long/big. Also, the dB scale wouldn’t be overlapped anymore like this.
I’ve tried adding some space between the strips (again), and drawing a frame around the selected strip, similar to the key focus frame drawn around list boxes. Eventually I would like to do the same with the track lane headers. Any opinions on this new style?
I think we’ve gotten to know the frame as just that – an indicator of which list receives keyboard focus in Podium. The actually selected item within the list would still be highlighted with a fully colored box (you can tell I don’t know UI design terminology!). In this case however, the mixer strip is the item… A little confusing, maybe, but I do like how it looks, so please continue. 🙂
Perhaps it’d be worth a try to have the strip background itself receive just a small amount of the focus color along with the frame. On the other hand it might become a total wash with three colors mixed together.
It would also probably be good if the change over to ‘selection framing’ on the track headers would appear in 2.23 already, for consistency’s sake. Also, I wonder if you’re thinking of applying this to items in the arrangement too, seeing as they don’t have any visible controls that would suffer from being dyed.
Other comments on the latest screenshot:
– Personally, I still prefer those faders shaped like pills (elongated beans? :D), with or without value display. The round ones seem so small, especially since the BSMREX buttons just got bigger.
– I find the horizontal fader grooves are too dark, as in too much shadow. The vertical ones look nice, as does the new box around the peak display. The ‘glow’ inside the grooves looks blurry for my tastes, compared to the perfectly sharp 1-pixel glow in previous versions.
Little addition to the buglist:
– When you drag-and-drop an instrument from one track to another, the “drop here” box overlay on the track becomes stuck.
thcilnnahoj@Zynewave wrote:
The colors setup dialog has been extended with settings for “rack/header/strip opacity” and “lane background opacity”. These settings have thus been removed from the tracks region dialog, as they are now applied globally. It also means that the rack, track headers and mixer strips will always have a consistent and similar look.
Aww, does that mean all three are linked? So we can’t have that nice full-colored background in the rack?
– I find the half-circle button to be a little vague. In my opinion, it’s just not self-explanatory enough to realize what it’s supposed to do.
Click on it a few times, and you soon realize what it does :wink:. It also has popup help.
Well, something in a similar vein can be said about anything, really – even a hand grenade. 😛
As an interface designer, I’m sure you know what I meant to say. I find the icon non-descriptive of its function (especially compared to the +/- button). Someone who didn’t already know might even think it’s supposed to be a small dial of sorts.
If you don’t agree with this concern then let’s file it away as just another matter of taste.
thcilnnahojOkay, here’s some early critique. 😉
– I see the SMR buttons are colored again… I got used to the ‘clean’ buttons in beta 8 and I’ve actually very much come to prefer it that way.
I’m still undecided on your question whether the faders should be colored or not.
– Speaking of, the B button still comes after SMR in the mixer, directly opposite to where it is placed on the track headers – strange, I think. If you’re concerned about the B button pushing the SMR ones out of line across all mixer strips, then maybe just moving them down a bit would help?
I’m also yet undecided on the changed lighting angle of the SMR buttons in the mixer.
– I was at first not very happy with the rounded side of the selector button plus the padding space to the left. I presume you decided on this because of the ‘+ effect’ button’s shape. However, I haven’t been able to come of with something I like better and that also retains more space. So, hats off to you. 🙂
The only thing I wonder about is how it would look if you kept the design used everywhere else (right-hand side X button also rounded) anyway and just widened the mixer strips by those 4 or 5 pixels needed.
Also, tooltips for truncated device names would come in real handy about now… Since the device icons are in the mixer too, there’s even less space for the most important information. You can see the menu triangles being overlapped by the device names on the master strip, so text will probably have to be cut off even a little more.
– Will the different fader style options still be available or are you planning to clean up and unify the design?
Just saying… if this was a hardware design everybody would soon be complaining about broken-off fader heads! 😛
– I find the half-circle button to be a little vague. In my opinion, it’s just not self-explanatory enough to realize what it’s supposed to do.
thcilnnahojIt already does!
From the changelog of 2.17:
“If the “Zynewave/Podium” application data folder created by the installer is not found when Podium is started, the folder where Podium.exe is located is used as data folder instead. The Podium.ini file will thus be stored in this folder. This makes it easier to run Podium from a flash drive on a PC system where Podium has not been installed.”
thcilnnahojHow about “nothing better to do!” 😆 I’m sure Frits is aware of many of those things already anyway.
– Crash when selecting ‘delete effect track’ from the right-click effect selector menu. Edit: Crashes when deleting a parameter track, too. So it generally results in a crash when you select any ‘delete’ command from a selector button right-click menu.
– When you’re dragging a device to a track, the selector button’s pop-up help gets a little in the way as it blocks the view of the chain.
– When you drag-move a send track below another send, the drag-indicator-line (?) appears below the faders, among the ‘normal’ effect tracks. It might be difficult since as far as I can tell Podium treats effect tracks the same, regardless of mapping type. It’s not a problem, really, but I thought I’d mention it anyway.
– Bypass button color is no longer customizable, I think? Before, it was the same as the color for mute. Probably intentional, but hey, you never know! Edit: Oh, wait, it still is. You just have to close and re-open the arrangement view, so here’s a bug.
– There are source/input selectors on take tracks, where they’re of no use, I think. You could assign devices to take tracks before, but the selectors make it a little more tempting to put things where they don’t belong. 😉
– (Not 2.23 related) I think it’s strange that you can still solo tracks in a group on which bouncing and ‘unload plugins when bounced’ is activated. As long as this option is on you can’t open plug-in editors and all that (since that would mean having to wait for the arrangement to load), so wouldn’t it make sense that there’s no soloing either?
thcilnnahojSome things about beta 8:
– I would say some of the menus are still fairly confusing and could be disarmed a little. The source menu in beta 7 was perfect already, so maybe it’s just an oversight. In beta 8, the right-click menus for the source and input selectors are identical, containing all options for both buttons. Also, there are some options in that menu (fader, meter, bounce) that would probably serve best if they were only in the track menu (right-click on header).
– There’s a crash when selecting “delete group track” from those source/input button menus. It works normally when you select it from the track menu (right-click on header).
– Something goes wrong when you create a second master group… input/source selectors appear on the master tracks.
– If you use horizontal meters on track headers, the SMR button group gets pushed to the right a little too far, regardless of horizontal track size.
– It’s possible still to unhide effect tracks with ctrl-h, although they have a little graphical issue here. If you remove it eventually, the help text for the minimize lane button points to this shortcut.
thcilnnahojthcilnnahojHm, here’s another problem, though not related to 2.23, I believe:
Auto-assigned audio inputs will be muted as soon as there’s an effect track added, caused by the moved fader position in the chain…? If I move the fader down to the bottom track, it works fine again.
I don’t quite understand why this would disable the input, since I can move the fader wherever I want and still get a signal from a directly assigned input. In any case, I don’t think this is intentional.
Two more smaller ones:
– Empty effect tracks keep the name of the previously assigned device after it has been unassigned. Not really a problem, but a bit strange.
– I think the source selector could be disabled/removed for less clutter when an audio input is active on a track, provided it can be detected what type of input is assigned. Or is there any scenario in which someone would want, for example, a synthesizer and an audio input playing on the same track? (Edit: Uhh, apart maybe for vocoding? Though I don’t know if that’d even work this way)
thcilnnahojTwo more problems:
– If you switch from the tracks profile to the editor or mixer (resizing all tracks) and back again, some tracks won’t show the device chain, even though they’re the same height they were before switching profiles. At the moment it can be remedied by just moving the scrollbar.
– Clicking the source selector shows the effects menu instead of instruments on a group track (if it has child tracks). I often use groups for drum samplers, with the sampler assigned to the group track and child tracks containing MIDI data for one instrument each. In beta 7, I can only force an instrument onto the group track with drag-and-drop or before creating child tracks.
thcilnnahojOK, I understand. I’ll look forward to the tracks region options then, and will use the GP for effects stuff. 🙂
But please do consider some kind of indicator that makes it clear not everything’s visible.
I would guess not many people size their tracks large enough to accommodate displays for source, 4 effects and one send, for example. If on top of that you have level controls at different points (like CQSD), it can become confusing again whenever the chain is not shown.
The only thing that I can think of right now that would be quicker than zooming or resizing is a “maximize” button, besides the minimize button, so you could switch between the original track height and a large enough size to display the whole chain… Too many buttons again? 🙁
Another thing:
The group panel seems to have a slight problem with key focus. You can use keyboard shortcuts (like delete) normally when a track’s selected. As soon as you set focus to one of to list panels, you can’t set it back to the GP any other way than clicking inside another editor space.
It becomes a problem after you drag-and-drop a device onto the GP or a track header, for example, or if you open the inspector with the F keys.
thcilnnahoj@LiquidProj3ct wrote:
Sorry I don’t understand… quick question… why is there any need to have a popup panel if you have the same in inspector and mixer?
Actually that’s why was asking if it’s still under consideration. It’d be fine for me if the new GP was used for effects display and handling in the arrangement view (on one track, otherwise it’s better to use the mixer, of course).
But then… the thought of a “panel to the right of the track header (semitransparent overlay on the track lanes)” makes my mouth water. 😆
thcilnnahojI think all button click behaviours are just perfect by now. 🙂
I especially like that you can simply click on a send track to show or hide send level controls – that’s a great idea.
Two problems:
– In the floating inspector, if I select a track and don’t move the mouse, most of the time Podium will appear to become stuck and CPU use goes up.
– It seems that the active selection font color is ignored on faders at the moment.
@Zynewave wrote:
In beta6 the effect record buttons are finally gone. The track lane record button will also record enable all plugin effect tracks.
So if I got this right the correct way to record only automation now is to either just bypass the input (from my experience, auto-assigned audio inputs don’t overwrite anything anyway), or create the parameter track in advance and set it to record by itself?
I can’t find the post anymore, but you said something like you were planning not to display effect chains on the track headers, and instead add a button that would open an overlay for track management. Are you still considering this or do you think the new GP should be generally used for viewing and rearranging effects? I think if I want to see a track’s effect chain in the arrangement view, I’d prefer this overlay box to zooming in or resizing the track.
I have one final (a little more advanced) suggestion, maybe for another time: Multiple track selection by ctrl-clicking track select buttons, and by click-dragging over the buttons (this mouse action is used, for example, to set multiple adjacent tracks to solo/mute in Logic). When more than one track is selected, you should then be able to drag-rearrange them together and… then I woke up. 😉