SpectraLayers 6 ARA on Logic Pro X?

SpectraLayers
1

I am running SpectraLayers 6.0.10, build 192 on Logic Pro X 10.4.4 on macOS High Sierra 10.13.6. I don’t seem to be able to select SpectraLayers as an ARA plugin. Am I missing something or does it just not work (yet).

I am able to select and use Celemony’s Melodyne as an ARA 2 plugin, so I know how to do that, and that it works.

Has anyone (including SpectraLayers developers) successfully done this?

2

Logic Pro needs a different kind of ARA plugin : most ARA DAWs use VST-based ARA plugin, while Logic Pro requires AU-based ARA plugin.
Right now there’s no SpectraLayers AU ARA plugin because Logic Pro’s ARA implementation wasn’t optimal (such as no window embedding, and the need to press space or play each time you need to refresh the regions), but it will be eventually coming. It will probably be revisited by the end of year.

Meanwhile, you can still set SpectraLayers as a Logic Pro editor :

  1. In Logic Pro, choose Preferences > Audio > Sample Editor > External Sample Editor.
  2. Browse to /Applications/SpectraLayers Pro 6.
  3. Select a sample and choose Options > Audio > Open in SpectraLayers (or press the Shift+W shortcut).
3

Thanks for the explanation. Please do announce in your version release notes when you achieve this compatibility.

Yes, I am using SpectraLayers as my default editor now. On an older DAW/Windows XP platform I had been using Cool Edit 96 up to Adobe Audition 2.0, so many years back, which had spectral editing, and I have been making do with Audacity on my late-model Mac in the mean time, which is so awkward and rudimentary. I do hope SpectraLayers picks up interest. I remember Melodyne’s humble beginnings, and I was a beta tester for their version 1 back in 2002, that quickly becoming my go-to application for note-based musical editing of audio files. Yet, back then, Melodyne was so obscure that it was as if I had found a hidden treasure. For general purpose audio editing, SpectraLayers should have the potential to become the go-to audio file editor for professionals in the mainstream, and I think that compatibility with all the different DAW platforms is an important goal to achieve.