This is something that comes up every so often but doesn’t seem to go very far, mostly I guess because people - not being professional interface designers! - don’t tend to know a good way to explain what it should be changed too.
Be good to get a good discussion going to see what people think. Are you happy with the way the mixer interface works in Cubase? Or do you think it’s overdue somewhat of a few tweaks, or even a total overhaul and redesign?
Steinberg - are you planning any sort of major changes to the way the mixer works visually, and if so would you like to engage with us on it?
I think the main bugbear for myself, and my colleagues, it that you can’t see and edit the Inserts, Sends and EQs at the same time - you have to switch between them. And by default, new tracks show the EQ display - which with the way the mixer works I tend to not use anyway, tending to use EQ as an insert to save having to flick between different views.
Here’s how it looks on a few other DAW’s:
Pro Tools
Here this shows each track with 5 inserts and 5 sends visible, along with I/O. Not sure if you can expand this to more, or how much you can control in terms of send level straight from the interface - can someone expand on this? I’m not really familiar with PT.
Logic
This is even better - all inserts, sends, I/O and EQ are shown on one display - you can clearly edit send level straight from this too - although it sucks that it just says a buss number rather than what it’s actually sending to. Can this be changed?
Samplitude
Also cool - and more traditional style EQ controls which some may prefer (I prefer the graphical style personally). Another clever thing about Samplitude’s mixer display is that it can be shrunk and stretched, in a zooming in - zooming out sense. Not sure how useful that is unless you have a tiny monitor or bad eyesight, but it’s still quite cool
Now you’ve seen these, and how you don’t have to flick between different view modes, can you see how Cubase’s mixer is a bit of a pain? Also, it shows that Cubase’s mixer is a bit inefficient in terms of screen space - everything is pretty ‘chunky’ compared to other designs.
Be interested in hearing if people do prefer Steinberg’s way of working as compared to the competition, and what they like about it. It is quite handy being able to have the big VU meters and more detail in certain modes, but it would be good if it could be more modular.
At least, would it not be good to have an ‘edit all’ mode, that maybe showed everything something like this rather crude mock up I’ve done below:
Takes up same amount of space as currently.
Perhaps it could be modular? Set the number of inserts and sends you want? Increase the display size to fit more? Any reason not to have unlimited number of inserts and sends? Ability to re-order on screen, and perhaps that re-ordering defining the channel flow?
Your thoughts!