Hi,
had issues and saw lots of posts about how vca faders were messing with automations in previous versions.
is this still the case in 10.3 ?
Still broken.
Omg., I just started to mix a doc with that thing today 
Make sure you have automation nodes at the beginning of tracks/channels that you control. I recall a fair amount of the problems were solved by that.
VCAs by themselves are “okay”. As soon as you add automation into the mix then VCAs are broken and I wouldn’t recommend using them at all in their current state. Unless you are aware of all the pitfalls you can run into the situation where your mix is destroyed either when automating new elements, loading the session etc.
This bug (out of many) for example is still an issue:
- Create a new project
- Create an audio track
- Set audio track to -10dB FS
- Create a VCA which is connected to that audio track (VCA @ 0, audio track still @ -10)
- Draw some automation on the VCA channel which goes from 0 to -oo (e.g. a few bars into the project)
- Position the cursor on the VCA automation which is @ -oo and save the project
- Close the project
- Re-open the project
- Position the cursor at the front of the project
→ Expected: Audio track would be @ -10dB FS at the front of the session with the VCA @ 0
→ Action: Audio track is now @ 0dB FS with the VCA @ 0
This feature has been introduced 5 years ago. 
I haven’t had time to go through all the older bugs, most of which were fixed. I did do a quick test today and it seemed some of what I’d do was totally fine and worked as expected.
(I did not test the close/re-open bug)
Once I get time I’ll revisit it I suppose. I’d just say for now simply create a real simple test project and go through the automation workflow you normally use and see if everything behaves appropriately.
Does Lloyd’s of London insure against permanent disablement due to software stress?
worked on a mix yesterday.
today i listen… dam i miss some music… i look at the vca track looks ok… audio tracks also.
so i guess my ear was tired i push fader for what i need in the mix and realise the compensation i do is exactly the value i added yeasterday on the VCA track overall…3.5 dB i mean it’s weird.
Also i think i got the bug you described above i tried to move vca to -infinite and closed open session.
tracks with automations where fine but some tracks left at 0db where not playing until i move the fader a little bit. (no mute/solo)
i prefer not to use this vca until prooven safe. i’m afraid to loose to much time wondering if i’m crazy or not.
You’ve just described using them in a nutshell. You can’t trust them to give expected results and I wouldn’t recommend them to anyone in their broken state. Unbelievable that they have never worked properly after all these years…
1 Like
This is really bad. We can’t use VCA’s like this.
And BTW, technically they should be called DCA’s and not VCA’s, because the later was used for analogue circuitos.
Hi,
I’m updating my mix template for 5.1
Are VCA safe and working now (11.0.41) ?
Nothing has changed
Use automation points on all tracks and you should be fine. In other words make sure that if you want to control a bunch of dialog tracks using VCA for example that you have automation points by default on those tracks in your template even before you start working. As long as automation is written before you start tweaking using VCA it seems to me to work fine.
I have automation points on all my audio and VCA tracks in my templates. All at unity.
What @MattiasNYC has said. They have not fixed the issue, but this is a workaround that allows you to breath easy if employed as per above.
It is not a workaround. You need initial parameters before you can safely rely on automation. The fact that other DAW’s enable initial parameters by default doesn’t make that the Steinberg system is broken.
Fredo
Let’s be clear - it is a workaround and Steinberg’s system is broken. Writing initial parameters is not an elegant solution for a lot of scenarios and then if you’re forced to write automation points and then use other things like trim automation, that is also broken for some use cases.
To be fair though I think we’re ending up with different interpretations of words now. From my perspective the question of whether or not something is designed well is if we can logically anticipate what it does, and also if it can be “defended” as good when it doesn’t work intuitively.
The example provided by twelvetwelve simply isn’t intuitive, nor does it seem logical to me. Technically it seems a VCA should offset whatever the position of a track’s level is (or fader), and if the track has a fader at -10 and is saved that way then it should recall that way. But it doesn’t. There just doesn’t seem to be any good reason for why it should be recalled the way it is. And not only that but reading the description and thinking about it technically it really seems that something is just “wrong”, either in the design or how it was executed.
So while I agree that the solution happens to also be “best practice” (at least for post) it doesn’t really imply that this isn’t a… “suboptimal” design… for lack of a better word.
PS: There are other things the Nuendo automation system doesn’t do logically which I think can easily be argued to be a design that isn’t “optimal”.
1 Like
The decision to write (or not write) initial parameters is a user choice. (The Cubase users were strongly against this “feature” when it was introduced)
The fact that other DAW’s (rightfully) write initial parameters by default doesn’t mean the Steinberg way is “wrong”. Just accept it is a user choice. And it only need a single action.
And as for workarounds.: That’s what we do. Every day. Trying to find better and faster ways to do our job.
Fredo
What is the benefit of the “Steinberg way” in this case?