We’ve been here before.
I too think that it would be amazing if working features would just rain down on us. On the other hand the VCA problems in 7.0-7.1 show how difficult things can get if you take the looking glass and observe the nitty gritty of every aspect that can go wrong.
My guess is that things can get extremely hectic at Steinberg before a release.
My next guess is that marketing needs a new version of Cubase before Christmas every year because they can sell more copies then. Maybe it’s not necessarily the point in time when stability has reached a level that can make the pro audio product management safely sell a new version of Nuendo…
Also pro customers need to be a lot more conservative when it comes to upgrading, because lost or broken features are much more of a problem when there’s a paying customer with tight deadlines on the phone.
Anyway, the powers that be will have a reason and Steinberg is actually one of the few companies out there that I have developed a reasonable amount of trust with. So yes, I would love the news form Cubase 8.5 in Nuendo, but I really need fill to loop/punch preview automation, AAF import and reconform, so I’ll accept the things I cannot change and wait a bit longer.
Although, to your point, the lack of AAF import in CB is absurd… particularly if marketing want to slap a ‘Pro’ moniker on it. I suggested an add-on purchase in CB forum ( like the Nuendo NEK) to get AAF compatibility, but no dice yet. For people working in music Cubase is better on the whole (IMO) … that’s what its for. The lack of pro format support is a bad decision.
Yes, I thought that would become a problem as soon as it became c!ear that the two systems were different.
Maybe they started out the same but then successive desparate Band-Aid fixes over the past year have forced them in to different directions. Mad, unsupportable chaos.
To me it’s just incredibly bizarre. I mean, there’s a pretty clear hierarchy with SB products just like there is with others. You have the cheapest most limited Cubase which then goes all the way up to “Pro”, and then if you want to go “further” you end up with Nuendo+NEK. It makes little sense to not have ‘upwards’ compatibility so that if someone needs more functionality they can add that by paying more for the products higher up the chain. But it really does imply that whatever work you’ve done so far would translate.
So again, if they’re marketing VCA then they clearly want us to think it’s a great feature - a feature we should use - but then we lose easy transfers between Cubase and Nuendo. Weird.
It really feels like something happened to Steinberg’s internal structure a few years ago. Everything used to be much more consistent not just between apps but also between say mixer and project windows.
I think Cubase users (at least, those who know of Nuendo’s existence) have long accepted that they are effectively beta testers for Nuendo, which would explain the staggered releases. I think some internal changes happened with the Yamaha takeover but it’s difficult to translate that into what effects it has had on the software itself. IMHO there must be some rogue programmers still there that are allowed to make random changes without any evidence justifying a need for that change.
I was not aware of the incompatibility. I’m pretty sure that any users who have created projects in Cubase using VCA’s, with a mind to migrate over to Nuendo, will be put off the move by this. Those using Nuendo and receiving Cubase projects using VCA’s will be forced to buy a Cubase license. It seems ridiculous to me that the two programs employ two different systems, creating more work for the devs and more work/cost for the end user. What we should have is one workflow to rule them all. Cubase is not Cubasis but I expect to be able to import a session from it into Cubase and simply carry on. It should be no difference between Nuendo and Cubase. I wonder what drives this kind of broken thinking. I sincerely hope its not Microsofts old business model of asking first, how many licences they can sell you before asking how can they can first help solve your problem.
Personally I don’t mind the delineation of the products by feature set and purpose but incompatibility of shared functions such as VCA’s is a massive mystery to me. A trend away from compatibility is not what we need and I sincerely hope this is not the future they are planning. If it is, we really need to know sooner rather than later.
Fairlight? In the process of looking for an investor, uncertain future, extremely expensive ProStools? All I can say is I good luck. That company has had the worst performance in audio in the last couple of years, don’t see that changing with their strange politics. Unfixed bugs and missing features, slow updates at subscription prices. You will most likely need a lot of additional software/hardware for ADR/video, control room, reconform…while still only having one marker track Pyramix? Never used it, but I kind of like their way of solving things. Much smaller market, higher prices. Might actually be an alternative Anything else, not really audio post and so it’s a waste of your valuable resources.
And you really want to go through that hassle because of the VCA bugs?
For audio post I can see a lot of things that I would want in Nuendo (conform from AAF/EDL being top on the list)
Look at it from their perspective. Steinberg has limited time/resources. I trust them to do all they can to get things right. But now they probably NEED to get into Cubase 9 production or they will lose a lot of money this christmas. At the same time Apple dropped the quicktime bomb on them. So we wait longer for the VCA fixes, it’s not nice but there’s probably nothing they can do about this at the moment. I believe that they would have loved not to run into VCAgate.
To be totally honest I don’t need VCAs and the video thing just annoys me. I would have LOVED seeing Steinberg implementing other NEW features like conform to AAF from field recorder tracks. That would have been quite something. Now I wait for fixes and a new engine…
Oliver
One more thing: If they hire new devs it’s going to take time to get them up to speed. 5 eggs take 7 minutes to cook, how long do 10 eggs need?
I mostly agree with Oliver, its an annoyance for me because I run both Nuendo and Cubase and having functionality that will no doubt be used in one DAW not transferrable to the other is just the same as PT or Logic sessions that get sent my way.
Am I looking to go elsewhere, absolutely not. Steinberg are a solid company and I like the general direction they are going in. Nothing they’ve done has ever put my day to day business in jeopardy. As I’ve said previously, yes its an annoyance but I trust them to prioritise the important stuff alongside with their business needs. Yes, I’m a glass half full guy!
