Well, don’t forget that Cubase had it’s own Variaudio developing over that time too. With ARA2 ‘slooowwwly’ coming to Cubae you get the benefits of both… eventually… if you don’t jump ship. (lol)
But, really it comes down to what works for you personally… I’m happy with Cubase to see ARA2 develop over time… But then i’ve came FROM Studio One so have a different perspective and list of requirements than yourself. MIDI SysEx and Mackie Support being a big requirement for me.
Yes, but VariAudio is a bit rubbish though. You couldn’t seriously compare it to Melodyne or Revoice Pro. But yes, I agree it’s what works for you and Cubase finally no longer works for me. It might do in the future and the other DAW’s might prove to be ‘more worse’ than Cubase, but I’m not finding that so far, since I stepped out of The Cave. I can’t be doing with shelving out cash to a developer that doesn’t deliver on their marketing claptrap, they’ve always had a bit of leeway but over the past few years, they’ve just crashed as far as I’m concerned.
For vocals, i find Variaudio (3) pretty good, and i like it’s ease of use - in most cases, since version 3 it gives me a more natural sounding result vs Melodyne - but that’s very subjective and dependant on type/quality of vocal.
Plus if you spend time to construct the project with chord track entries it ties really nicely in to the colour grading and general integration on a whole (Vocal align, and Harmony Generators).
I only have Melodyne Assistant (Upgraded from the free version of essentials you get with Studio One Pro license) to compare it to though, the other versions start to cost the same as Cubase Pro on it’s own… so it’s a consideration for those on a budget looking at Studio One vs Cubase.
However, the fact remains that Cubase has it’s own engine developed in the same period that Studio One was developing ARA, they took a different path… but soon (2022? lol) you will have the full advantage of both. Never tried revoice.
Melodyne Studio was up earlier this year for about £250 using their sales and upgrades etc. You’d never pay full price for it, there’s always deals to be done! Variaudio 3 doesn’t compare with Melodyne Studio or Editor version. It has polyphonic editing for a start. If I recall correctly, I thought ZPlane developed what has been repackaged as VarAudio, not Steinberg? I may be wrong. You might say they backed the wrong horse… I couldn’t say…
Anyway, I’ll keep an eye on Steinberg’s Cubase, maybe I’ll come back or maybe like some on here, I’ll never leave… 
I can’t imagine how much work went into making polyphonic audio work as well as it did in Cubase, but the middle-tier of Melodyne is worth it’s weight in gold (ok, maybe my weight). I recently used it to fix two bum notes in an otherwise perfect guitar part, and I couldn’t hear the edit, and it was much easier than punching in or splicing. I don’t want Steinberg going nuts trying to create polyphonic Variaudio in Cubase and shifting a ton of resources to that while everything else suffers when Melodyne already does it so well. For the folks who want Polyphonic Audio Editing in Cubase I say, “you already have it, it’s called Melodyne, wait for a sale and buy it - it’s absolutely worth it.”
Definitely would like to see the ARA2 issues continued to get ironed out though. Particularly the fades/audio edits not being audible. Ran into that while doing a vocal the other day.
I would love to be able to play a guitar part in and it returns a detection of the chords as the basis for chord track though. I generally don’t use Variaudio/Melodyne as correction - i use them for drafting ideas and creating a ‘perfect’ template for what we should be aiming for.
…I then ‘try’ to record live takes based on that signal being put through headphones. But, then i don’t like a ‘perfect’ sound… I like humane mistakes to be a part of the music.
That’s why i would like to see it added into Cubase. But as Chizzler touched on above, it’s probably another company who develop the detection algorithms and Steinberg will just pay a license and interpret those functions into use in the software. Studio One is very good at doing that already.
IMO, that’s so refreshing to read. One could argue that ‘mistakes’ in a musical performance give it an essence of musical perfection. I’d love to hear a Pavarotti recording put through VariAudio and/or Melodyne. I dare say that ‘mistakes’ would be found. I suspect that the ‘perfect’ audio from that processing would take away something from the performance, not add to it.
It’s a balance, a judgement call, about how much correction to a performance is required. Opinions differ. FWIW, my view is that less is more when it comes to performance audio correction.
Totally… so many people chop and edit their performances to clinical perfection… then they think that some analogue processing on top will provide it some character.
But what so many people miss is that all the great records came complete with humane elements intact, listen to the guitar solo during the outro of Dire Straits - Sultans of Swing… That would be butchered and sanitised to hell with comping and quantize methods today.
What a ridiculous statement. I’ve had Melodyne since it’s inception and even after ARA I still prefer Variaudio for vocal pitch correction. Sure, I use Melodyne for timing, polyphonic pitch correction etc. but Variaudio’s integration (and sound) are great for me.
Disagree. I find it easier and quicker to get good results on vocals than melodyne.
My wake up was listening to the Stones Waiting On A Friend with ‘engineer ears.’ Jagger’s back up vox are so out of tune and time, and yet the song is perfect for what it is.
I suppose it depends on the genre of music, but I find myself backing variaudio off a lot if I use it at all. It can totally deaden a performance. I cannot stand autotuned vocals if I can hear it.
I agree 100%. I came back to Cubase after a long period of time working on other Daws and tuning hundreds of vocal tracks with Melodyne (ARA or non ARA). I find to like and prefer VARIAUDIO more.
By the way… why 10.0.40 Update thread hasn’t still moved to the Announcements section?
Is 0.40 the last update for 10?
Suprised to see the revamped export window but not too sure about the fact you cant have multiple tabs open
Import to pool, audio after export
Realtime export
You’d imagine so, The paid 10.5 update is expected in 2-3 months time.
No, there will likely be at least one more update. That last update use to be quite a time after the release of the next major version. 9.5.50 was out in February 2019 - that’s 3 month after the release of 10.0. And it’s possible there may be an update before 10.5 as well. So, at least one, maybe two more updates. This is not the last one anyhow.
Ah ok, i stand corrected then, apologies.
Ridiculous statement? That’s a bit silly, rude and 100% wrong. VariAudio 3 doesn’t and cant’t possibly compare with Melodyne Editor or Studio. Aside from the quality and lack of artefacts, there is polyphonic editing. VariAudio 3 doesn’t have polyphonic audio editing, so how could it compare? You seriously can’t be that witless surely? It’s like comparing apples and oranges, that’s why I said you couldn’t compare, unless of course I’ve missed something and VariAudio now offers polyphonic editing?
Variaudio sounds better imho, less artifacts compared to Melodyne.
Melodyne can do so much more, none of which I personally use, but others might be dependent on.
Anyhow ARA2 is here, but expecting the integration to be on par with Studio One is not realistic.
Sounds like we need a pitch correction shoot out. Who wants to post their out of tune singing and do a variaudio vs melodyne pass on that so we can compare results?