If you could build your own DAW...

[Drafhk]

Hey guys,

So I'm taking a class at my university where we basically build a company from scratch. I've done a fair amount of recording in my life, and the one thing that's always stuck out at me is how hard modern-day DAWs are to learn, so I've decided to do my project on coming up with a new-and-improved DAW.

My idea is to make software that really breaks apart the whole process. You'd start with the composing phase with one set of tools/interfaces, then move on to recording (which would have a different specific set of tools interfaces), then on to mixing, then onto mastering, and even marketing and so on and so forth.

I have two questions:
1) What do you think is wrong with this idea?
2) If you could build your own DAW, what features would it have?

-J

[brandondrury]

The only reason DAWs are so deep is because they have to be all things to all people. I've never used half the features in Cubase and I do everything from track live country bands to death metal to trance MIDI productions and even made a few attempts at movie scoring.

Personally, I don't find Cubase remotely complex. I find MUSIC complex, but at this stage I don't see Cubase to even remotely be a hindrance. Is there a learning curve? Definitely. I just accept learning curves as a part of life and don't find issues like "where is this button or feature?" to be as complex as understanding black holes. It's REALLY easy stuff you have to do a bunch of times. So I think it's an issue of time and/or laziness more than difficulty.

As for busting it up into different phases, I'm listening. What exactly are you going to bust from what Cubase is already doing?

I'm all for revolutionary ideas, but I'm going to need more information on what you are wanting to do, exactly.

2) If you could build your own DAW, what features would it have?

I'd take Cubase and add formant pitch shifting, VCAs, automatic key detection, and whatever else I've talked about this week.

I'd prefer to avoid the keyboard, mouse, control surface, and console and have a direct brain connection. That would be faster. (Don't laugh, the technology is out for video games now.)

Brandon

[Drafhk]

Hey thanks for your reply!

I guess the thing that I'd intend this DAW to do would be to really streamline and make the process easy for people that aren't recording masters like yourself but are just getting started. I know for me personally, when I first was getting started, I didn't even know what steps existed in the process, let alone how to take them.

To further expand on my idea, you would be like "okay I want to make a song," and it would start you out in composition mode. Here you'd have a unique set of tools that would help you compose the song.

Then you'd be like "okay time to start recording," and it would take you into a completely different "screen" with different tools and interfaces, and basically walk you through the process of recording all your tracks. Ideally, everything would be laid out ergonomically. The program wouldn't depend on you knowing what you're doing, but would have a bunch of presets I guess which you could tweak if you do know what you're doing, but wouldn't require it. It would walk you through the steps. For instance, you would never have to think "I want to set up a MIDI track that's going to be routed through a VST, and then when that's all done I'm going to freeze the track." The program would ideally do all that for you without you ever knowing what's going on behind the scenes.

And then you'd move on to mixing, and your "screen" would change again. You'd only have tools for mixing, once again laid out in such a way that you're being walked through the process without having to know the specifics about everything. Most of the legwork would be done for you, if that makes sense.

And then you could take it to mastering, and even on to marketing your songs. The total idea is to pretty much remove all except a very gently sloping learning curve, while still being able to access that far more complex functionality if you need to. I actually haven't used the latest version of Cubase, so I can't speak to what they're doing (obviously I would need to research this more fully before any further steps were taken). Are they currently employing an idea similar to this?


thank you!

[thomastx750]

you could just add toontracks EZ Mix to cubase.

[richiebee]

I'd mix together Finale and Cubase and I'd put the interactive phrase synthesizer back in. I still miss how inspirational that thing was. But I can imagine lots of users not needing that degree of precision in their notation that Finale brings to the table, which is why I'm happy to have two separate products. I also believe that when you try to be too many things to too many people, something loses out. Which is probably why notation software and daw's are in separate packages.

[rook2c4]

My idea is to make software that really breaks apart the whole process. You'd start with the composing phase with one set of tools/interfaces, then move on to recording (which would have a different specific set of tools interfaces), then on to mixing, then onto mastering, and even marketing and so on and so forth.

For some musicians, composing and recording is all one process. Or they compose without the help of software (for example, work on a piano piece), and then go right into DAW recording once the composition has been worked out.

There are many different approaches to capturing and processing music, often depending on the nature of the music. A highly customizable, multifaceted DAW would be interesting, but that requires the user to learn how to customize it before actually doing work. It might make sense if the program already came with a number of templates for the most common approaches.

[garageband]

If I could summon a magically predeveloped DAW, I'd want one that was touch screen-native. That's all. "Customizable" requires complexity. I want simplicity not customizability. The one-size-can-be-made-to-fit-all paradigm hasn't done most folks right. It just needs to do what do what it does the way it does it. The hard-to-learn aspect come down to figuring out where stuff is that you want to make it do and which of the myriad of controls to ignore. Complexity also interferes with stability and that is THE most important parameter concerning this software.

Sibelius has this really cool ability to rapidly re-size systems from the GUI. DAWs need more of that. I wanna be more like CNN's Magic Map Man John King when it comes to running this thing.

[acidfrost]

A software that would combine cubase with guitar pro for composition would be great. Wouldn't have to reprogram my midi from one to the audio each time.

And extend cubase's variaudio range. I had singer singing higher than C3

[bozmillar]

This is a hard one. I'm in too deep to know what I would have wanted starting out. To me, the complexity and features of reaper is what makes it worth using. I'm pretty sure I didn't feel that way at the beginning.

I think the problem is trying to do a one size fits all and does everything daw. For me, composing/tracking/mixing/mastering are all done in one phase. I don't do those steps sequentially, so if the daw forced me to do it, I'd toss it out. That seems like a huge hindrance to me, but maybe it wouldn't be for someone just starting out.

Also, the workflow changes quite drastically with different styles of music.

What about garage band? Wasn't that designed to be as simple as possible to use for a beginner? I also heard that studio one is supposed to be simple to use.

[Firedance]

I tell ya what I would really love - a very simple sample mix, using the stock software plugs/fx and featuring just a few tracks, where all the processing is there for the user to see. It would give an example of the what the software is capable of and also a very nice intro to 101 mixing maybe.

[Mackanov]

To me, all a DAW has to do is get out of the way when I need to do stuff. All software, actually.

I also heard that studio one is supposed to be simple to use.

I'm using Studio One now and it's not "simple" per se - some things take some getting used to, but it's miles better than Cubase in terms of workflow and the interface's got a better layout, way more organized. It definitely gets out of the way much better than Cubase.

[brandondrury]

This is a hard one. I'm in too deep to know what I would have wanted starting out. To me, the complexity and features of reaper is what makes it worth using. I'm pretty sure I didn't feel that way at the beginning.

In many aspects, I'm still at the beginning. I used the Audio Warp tool in Cubase for the first time last week. I just wanted to give it a whirl. Pretty fun. It may get some use in emergency situations. Cool. I'd imagine Cubase has 50 major functions that I'm completely oblivious too. Not knowing them doesn't really affect me directly, but it's nice knowing that in 3 days I'll learn about a new feature that saves me 30 hours of BS this coming year. THAT is what I like about a complicated program.

Brandon

[the evil]

If you are a beginner just starting and dont know much, just setting up the inputs and outputs can be confusing. I think the biggest problem with a lot of the software is that they dont have process names that are intuitive and dont explain exactly what they are capable of in the manual.

A huge problem is not many of us read manuals and when we do the manual doesnt explain what we are trying to do...

If anything there should be a setup wizard or a help menu that really helps you setup inputs, outputs, devices, etc. and gives you real information about what youre trying to do.

There is some things in cubase that does this, for example when you setup a vst instrument, cubase asks if you want to create a midi channel which is automatically setup for that vst instrument.

I think that in most cases there should be less track and other presets. For me they were never any help and made things worse.

[rook2c4]

If you are a beginner just starting and dont know much, just setting up the inputs and outputs can be confusing. I think the biggest problem with a lot of the software is that they dont have process names that are intuitive and dont explain exactly what they are capable of in the manual.

A huge problem is not many of us read manuals and when we do the manual doesnt explain what we are trying to do...

If anything there should be a setup wizard or a help menu that really helps you setup inputs, outputs, devices, etc. and gives you real information about what youre trying to do.

Sometimes I find it helpful to search the internet to figure out how to do what I want to do - for example, in a dedicated forum or in a youtube tutorial video. Although my first step is always to try to find the information in the manual before combing the internet... it's good to be armed with the proper terminology as well as some idea where's what in the DAW's menu.