Cubase 14 GUI design regressions

[wavefunktion]

Are you able to provide any technical insight into the possibility of upgrading GUI components to vector graphics instead of raster graphics ? is this technically possible ?

[battleangel]

Fader and meter looking identical is a no go for me.
It completely messes up the readability.

I just looked at the pictures of how Logic Peo Mixer looks like and it’s so much easier to look at and to distinguish channels. In Cubase it’s the opposite.

[jmtapadas]

Ooops, sorry, didn’t catch it!
Merry Christmas!

[jmtapadas]

There’s no visual separation between elements, and when there is is in the wrong place (the fader lane and metering, for example, shouldn’t be visually separated. Also the fonts are smaller than they should, with little contrast. Most of all, glancing at the full mixer, there’s no imediacy in grasping different sections, etc.

[Aleque]

I am already making a new little prototype mockup of Mix Console. It takes time because I also have to take plenty of breaks from it, otherwise it’s hard to notice things that could be improved.

It’s a fine balance between: 1). What was good in the past 2). Respecting some of Steinberg’s current design intentions and 3). What I’d prefer myself.

[Pablin_Drummer2]

Hello ED and thank you for speaking out. This is what I meant that at least someone “from the inside” gives us some light, but please, let’s not wait for C15 for these changes.

[wavefunktion]

The MixConsole should have a subtle contrast separation between the Faders and the dB meters.

[Pablin_Drummer2]

More, please, like C12 for me is the best MixConsole,ever.

[wavefunktion]

It’s difficult to push the contrast separation too far before it just starts to look weird.

Here’s a more aggressive version:

Medium version:

Subtle version.

The main point being is that some kind of separation is needed.

[Pablin_Drummer2]

If you can’t, I would understand. but the more loaded the bottom of the meter, the better for me (just my personal case.) or the clearer the rest.

[wavefunktion]

Can you post a screen shot to demonstrate ?

[Louis_R]

Judging by the speed at which they post new examples, I’m sure @wavefunktion could deliver a complete UI overhaul in a week. No pressure though.

The designs are amazing and it’s exactly what I had in mind when it came to improve contrast and separation.

[wavefunktion]

Well here’s another example.

Reworked toolbar for better visual separation / clarity:

[Streamworks_Audio]

Don’t mean to hijack this thread, but it does have me thinking…

Which version (let’s say since SX) had the best interface?

Back in the day of SX, the ‘gloss’ look was all the rage - elements that looked like light was shining across them. Since then, the pendulum is swinging away from that and UIs are getting flatter and flatter (anybody remember all the rage with the reflective images Apple used all over it’s website).

[Antoine-B]

Full support for User Customisation ! Let us decide color scheme, font sizes.

Further than colours I’d like to add my own buttons & functions to load things faster (place your fav track presets, macros etc…)
WORKFLOW matters more than stuffing in a couple of new plugins.
The post :

Cubase custom GUI and UX improvements

I made a mockup to illustrate. Top is current GUI on my widescreen with arranger window not maximised so as not to make too wide a mockup. (so there is much more space than what is shown here so ample case for customisation). Bottom is proposed layout, with default Cubase bars assigned with an intelligent positioning on the left (not fixed, but a ratio of screen size, that favours being on the left) and the proposed User layout on the right. The User area could have direct buttons, eg load or…

The suggestion :

[Aleque]

First draft, just to get something done. The interface is pretty complex, so it’s not an easy task to balance out the colors and everything else. The column on the left is a selected track and I tried to make it pop from the ones on the right (the unselected), while still keeping the text readable.

Any feedback would be nice, so I can keep tweaking. My own feedback so far would be this: Perhaps there is too much white text, which is “in your face”. And maybe the unselected tracks could have brighter outlines.

And here are the original pics from the OP.

C12:

C14:

Also, I could do the lower part of the Mix Console later (with the faders and various buttons), but it would be easier to do lower part, if we could decide on the color of the upper part.

EDIT: Just tweaked the colors a little. Not sure how it is now.

[cubasiko]

@fese

Preface: I recently updated from C12 to C14 (skipped 13). I remember reading here that several people back then were highly critical of the new UI changes, but I was really shocked how bad it really was. I know that application looks are highly subjective and that several people also like the new look, but I am not talking about the looks here, I am talking about things that got objectively worse since Cubase 12, especially legibility and contrast (I am not twenty anymore and got deteriorating eyesight, so sue me…)

I reset all User preferences to default in both version, so every screenshot is the default settings as if new installed. Sure, you can change some colors here and there, but the color customization options in Cubase are too sparse to really fix all the contrast problems…

To be fair, there are actually some areas where C14 is actually better than C12.

Totally agree, Cubase 14 is uglier and the control room is horrible, in my opinion

[Googly_Shakespeare]

@wavefunktion

Reworked toolbar for better visual separation / clarity

Coloured icons would be nice, instead of these outlines. Like in the old days, ah, when I was just a lad…

[wavefunktion]

Coloured icons would be a nice optional setting to have in the preferences.

[Louis_R]

Perfect.