VariAudio vs Melodyne

Cubase
1

Hi

I was wondering which of Melodyne or VariAudio you prefer and why?
Are there any things you can do in Melodyne that you can’t do in VariAudio? VariAudio must be lighter on the CPU I assume?

Thanks so much for reading

Bless

Eric

2

Hi!

Using VariAudio for vocal editing most of the time (sometimes other materials like monophonic instruments, for SFX or even for voice-over correction)
Btw useful (obvious :slightly_smiling_face:) tip - try to avoid using it on sibilants and transients when tuning vocals.
It is very handy tool because of it’s integration with Cubase obviously

I prefer Melodyne if surgical voice tuning is needed, also it is irreplaceable tool for polyphonic material editing.
Melodyne is very good at SFX creating also (check out Ian Kirkpatrick streams on twitch)

kind regards, Alexander

3

I find if I have two fairly complicated tools that do similar things I’m better off focusing on one or the other rather than trying to be half-way good at both of them. So I mostly use Melodyne because it works with polyphonic.

I haven’t used VariAudio in awhile so can’t comment about its newer features and how those compare. Love Melodyne’s newish ability to easily remove sibilance.

4

Old post but why not…

I find using VariAudio superior from a workflow stand point. The interface is consistent with Nuendo/Cubase and all shortcuts and key commands just work. Melodyne with ARA is quite clunky in comparison. Sluggish response and key commands tend to not work as well as in stand alone mode. The possibility to work on several tracks at once right in the editor of Nuendo/cubase also is also great.

Melodyne is better at detecting pitch. For “murky” vocals it can be night and day. Melodyne also has better control of transitions between notes. A smoothing cure between notes would definately be a great addition to VariAudio.

The polyphonic mode of Melodydyne is next level. The best way to tune a piano after the fact. Not 100% natural but better that the competition imo.

Wishlist for Steinberg.

  1. Improve the pitch detection
  2. Give us better control of note transitions
  3. Polyphonic…?

Best regards
Johannes

1 Like
5

Mostly a +1 - though, polyphonic capability will be out of scope… but…

  1. a similar ‘sibilance’ detection/handling as Melodyne now has, into VA please.
6

Some years ago, after a suggestion here in forum, I compared both and I found VA a bit more natural sounding.
I used Melodyne for a long time time but when I started checking out VariAudio I found myself reaching out more often for VA till I completely forgot about melodyne.
That was because VA is also more convenient to use within a project.

But I am not happy about certain things.
The most significant is the volume handling of individual notes and group of notes. That is to say that there is none. You edit individual notes and when you select many of them and try to edit then you lose all the previous volume edits for the individuals.
Also no option to choose between “standard solo” and “elastique pro” for the variaudio editing.
I 've made some topics about these issues a year ago or so.

Variaudio Volume?

VariAudio “Pitch Drift” and “Elastique pro” algorithm

7

+1
I’d welcome it if SB looked into both points you raise :smiley:

However, I guess I haven’t hit the volume issue so much as I’m only rarely adjusting that inside VA. Any needed gain changes on words or bad sibilance say, is usually pretty obvious and is handled on the event itself (split event around the word and adjust/crossfade). Then I bounce, and then go in to VA and do all the pitch correct stuff.

1 Like
8

I hear you, that’s the way I am doing it also as a workaround for VA’s issue.
But the truth is that would be significantly faster if I could do it in VA since I would introduce no fades, no selections/splits, etc. We got every note and phrase there ready to be volumed without worrying about the fades etc.
But yeah we have to adapt I guess

1 Like