Where does Dorico try to put keyboard dynamics? Sibelius puts them by default a fixed distance under the RH stave, unless they’re shunted about by magnetic layout. Ideally, they’d go bang in the middle between the staves, as far from the RH stave as from the LH stave. Where does Dorico put them?
Dorico puts them bang in the middle between the staves, as far from the RH stave as from the LH stave, unless there is an obstacle in the way, in which case Dorico will allow a dynamic to move a little way up or down away from the centre point, beyond which it will start to move the staves further apart. It never moves dynamics left (or indeed right) on its own, though you can of course do so if need be.
Well, that is eminently acceptable.
This doesn’t appear to be true in all cases. With the default settings I get the following placement for single and multiple voices:
Apart from not centering the dynamic properly, Dorico seems to increase the distance between the staves excessively, especially when multiple voices are involved.
Adjusting Layout Options: Vertical spacing/Ideal Gaps or Engraving Options: Dynamics/Vertical Position settings does not seem to help.
I’ve had exactly the same problem, with Dorico putting an unnecessarily large space between the RH and the dynamic. The only way I could change this was to change the setting ‘Allow dynamics between braced staves to violate minimum distance by…’ to ‘0’, which doesn’t make any sense at all. Take a look at these two screen shots, one with the ‘minimum distance violation’ set to zero, and the other with it set to 2. I think the default is ⅔, which still puts too much space on braced staves.
zero violation.tiff (188 KB)
two violation.tiff (218 KB)
Daniel,
can you confirm that this is an area fit for improvement, or are we perhaps missing a setting somewhere?
I’m sorry to bump this thread yet again, but I’m really wondering whether my last issue, confirmed by Vaughan above, will be improved or not.
This needs more investigation by the team. I agree that you should not need to set ‘Allow dynamics between braced staves to violate minimum distance by…’ to 0 in order to get the dynamics centred between the staves when there is any kind of protrusion below the staff.
I see. Thank you, Daniel, for looking into this.