I'm liking 8 but those grab boxes are just too small

[Timeline]

For me and my eyes it just blows to have to increase the waveform size twice to really grab the fades and stretches. Couldn't we please have larger boxes? Were not even close to covering up the waveform so why not?

[bayswater]

There's a lot of graphic stuff in DP that looks like it was sized when a 1024x768 screen was leading edge. It could be time to reset quite a few font and button sizes for the higher resolution screens we use now.

[kurtl]

I completely agree. I set my monitor to get as big a screen as possible and those grab boxes are too small. The soundbite edges could have a few more pixels to grab also.

[stubbsonic]

On the same subject, the little Tempo "T's" in the Conductor's graphic window are pretty ridiculous. Clicking on a T

[Guitar Gaz]

I recently commented about editing and recording in the Sequencer Window - how small the play enable and record enable buttons are - so when you are playing or recording on different tracks and switching between them, it is hit or miss if you can hit the right button as the buttons are so small. I could not find a way of having keyboard shortcuts to select different buttons in different tracks - so mouse clicking in such small areas is sometimes more tricky than it should be and therefore takes longer.

So I agree it would be nice if selection boxes or some of the buttons are bigger particularly in the Sequencer Window. I know the Tracks Overview is fine but for recording, editing, and comping (when sometimes the Comp tool is not what you need) the Sequencer Window is the only way - so bigger buttons would be much easier.

A point about the Comping tool - its good if you have takes whereby you can edit in a linear fashion (say first bit of take 2, middle bit of take 4, end bit of take 3), but if you like the first bit of take 2 and want to place that later say near the end of a sequence, the Comp tool does not seem to work for me. Hence having loads of takes as tracks in the Sequencer Window and the need to turn play enable on and off quickly. So unless someone can point out if I can do something similar in the Comping window with show takes, the Sequencer Window is the preferred method with takes as tracks and therefore the play enable and record enable buttons are needed (and would be better if bigger).

Don't get me wrong - editing takes in DP8 is still great - but the button size is an annoyance.

[Timeline]

There's a lot of graphic stuff in DP that looks like it was sized when a 1024x768 screen was leading edge. It could be time to reset quite a few font and button sizes for the higher resolution screens we use now.

Well put! If this was Facebook I would just hit the like button.

Oh and G.Gaz, I agree on the comp tool. Seems the entire Comp system should be revamped. I did 10 tracks of drums and three takes and I can't seem to manage it all on my screen.

[Prime Mover]

A point about the Comping tool - its good if you have takes whereby you can edit in a linear fashion (say first bit of take 2, middle bit of take 4, end bit of take 3), but if you like the first bit of take 2 and want to place that later say near the end of a sequence, the Comp tool does not seem to work for me. Hence having loads of takes as tracks in the Sequencer Window and the need to turn play enable on and off quickly. So unless someone can point out if I can do something similar in the Comping window with show takes, the Sequencer Window is the preferred method with takes as tracks and therefore the play enable and record enable buttons are needed (and would be better if bigger).

Not sure I'm following you, but you're talking about taking another section of time from one take and using in the master comp? Yeah, the Comp tool is never going to be able to do that, it only switches vertically between the takes, not temporally. I don't even know if I would want that, sounds extremely complicated and confusing. This is where good ol copy/paste (or "copy/merge" in DPs case) is probably going to be the best and only solution. The one thing that it a little annoying, but probably unavoidable, is that if you do paste something into a section of the master comp, you have to make sure to leave that section alone when comping or it'll get replaced by one of the other takes. That's why I try to leave any temporal moving until after comping if I have to.

[Dan Worley]

Yes, I strongly agree that DP's GUI needs to be improved in this area. Many things are much too small.

I wonder what the average age of a DP user is. My guess is it's easily over 40 years old. I'm going to guess and say it's 43 years old, but it could be higher.

I'm 58, so I'm doing my part in pushing the average up.

Demographics, MOTU. Demographics.

[stubbsonic]

At 50, I'm at the point where my glasses are beginning to "boss me around". I have progressive lenses that require my head to be tilted to the right angle to see properly, and the area that I can see clearly from one position through my glasses is shrinking.

It's natural, normal, and not all that bad. I'm glad the lens technology is improving.

[Shooshie]

At 50, I'm at the point where my glasses are beginning to "boss me around". I have progressive lenses that require my head to be tilted to the right angle to see properly, and the area that I can see clearly from one position through my glasses is shrinking.

It's natural, normal, and not all that bad. I'm glad the lens technology is improving.

I've got four pair of glasses, all non-prescription reading glasses, that I use depending on how close I'm sitting or standing in relation to the monitor. If I'm watching a movie, slideshow or vid, I'll lean back and wear the 1.25 magnification. Sitting normally in the day lit room, I'll wear 2.0, and if I'm looking at tiny objects, as in DP, I'll probably be leaning forward and wearing a pair at 2.5 magnification. Books? 2.75. I keep a small pile of these things in reserve for when the ones I'm using break or get scratched up. In fact, tonight I tried to fix a pair, only to find it impossible, so I kept some of the parts for fixing future ones, threw the rest of it out, and pulled a new pair out of my drawer.

I probably should go to an ophthalmologist, optometrist, or whoever would be good for that, and get trifocals or something. Who knows what damage I'm doing by using reading glasses? And even if it's not hurting anything, it's very cumbersome and awkward. As one who always had extremely good vision (I could read the name of the maker at the bottom of the eye charts when tested at school or doctor's office), this is a very humbling experience.

So, yeah, I'd certainly support MOTU's do-over of the tiny graphics in DP, but I'd hate to see them get much bigger. Maybe a better way would be a magnifier that could appear with a click, kind of like what we see when editing text on an iPad or iPhone. The problem comes when editing a lot of data. Too many of those little handles and icons, crammed together, become impossible to edit without zooming way in.

If they increase the size of them, it should be only by a pixel. The ones in Logic were large, and I found them very clunky to edit. Not at all precise.

Shooshie

[Timeline]

A point about the Comping tool - its good if you have takes whereby you can edit in a linear fashion (say first bit of take 2, middle bit of take 4, end bit of take 3), but if you like the first bit of take 2 and want to place that later say near the end of a sequence, the Comp tool does not seem to work for me. Hence having loads of takes as tracks in the Sequencer Window and the need to turn play enable on and off quickly. So unless someone can point out if I can do something similar in the Comping window with show takes, the Sequencer Window is the preferred method with takes as tracks and therefore the play enable and record enable buttons are needed (and would be better if bigger).

Not sure I'm following you, but you're talking about taking another section of time from one take and using in the master comp? Yeah, the Comp tool is never going to be able to do that, it only switches vertically between the takes, not temporally. I don't even know if I would want that, sounds extremely complicated and confusing. This is where good ol copy/paste (or "copy/merge" in DPs case) is probably going to be the best and only solution. The one thing that it a little annoying, but probably unavoidable, is that if you do paste something into a section of the master comp, you have to make sure to leave that section alone when comping or it'll get replaced by one of the other takes. That's why I try to leave any temporal moving until after comping if I have to.

Not to change subject but,Never? What about from completely different projects in he future. I would have loved to grab drum licks from other projects the last time i did drums. Maybe this could be another thread for sure cause i have some ideas on how they could do it nicely.

One would be creating a single stereo image of all related tracks involved and bundle them as an edit like Apple does when you zip a file but with a single stereo waveform analysis which appears in the final project your doing. At that point it becomes editable from another project. Anyway, a new thread on this would be helpful.

[bayswater]

I probably should go to an ophthalmologist, optometrist, or whoever would be good for that, and get trifocals or something.

By all means go to an optometrist if you have a need for something other than a simple lens with a uniform curve, the same in both eyes. But don't get trifocals. They require you to hold your head in a particular position to look at things at a particular distance. You'll have neck aches forever. I have a few prescriptions, each for a specific distance. One is for working at my desk on DP. These have large lenses for a wide viewing angle, and help with the tiny fonts and objects currently under discussion elsewhere, and allow me to sit at a comfortable position for long periods.

[Guitar Gaz]

Not sure I'm following you, but you're talking about taking another section of time from one take and using in the master comp? Yeah, the Comp tool is never going to be able to do that, it only switches vertically between the takes, not temporally. I don't even know if I would want that, sounds extremely complicated and confusing.

Extremely complicated or confusing? Why? If you have an instrumental section with the same chords going round and round and you record several takes of soloing, why would you want to restrict yourself to the bits you played in the same place of the section? As explained you may play something later in the instrumental section which would work better earlier, and vice versa. Or you may have repeated lines of vocal in say a chorus, and you might want to move a later section of one take to the earlier part of a comp vocal track.

The Comp tool does not allow that but that does not mean you would not want to do this. Which is why I was criticising the size of the buttons in the sequencer window as to do the cut and paste method you have to turn takes into tracks and then switch constantly between takes by play enabling those takes, cutting and pasting, and then turning the play enabling off on that track, and on in the comp track. Its is just fiddly with buttons that small.

The comp tool does not seem to allow you to move the comped part to a different place in time. It is a clever way of comping (say in the vocal for a verse when there are no repeating lines) but it doesn't work for editing when you are moving the position of a piece of the take earlier or later. Hence the editing in the sequencer window with constant need to switch the play enabled take.

[bayswater]

GG, I must be missing your point.

When you use the Comp tool to select a segment in a take, that segment appears in the comp track. If you move the mouse cursor there, it changes to a select tool, and you can move that segment anywhere on the time line, or to alt drag it to make copies at other times. Or, you could alt drag the take with the segments you want to reuse at other time point to another take, rearrange that in time with the cut and select tools, and then use the comp tool to put those shifted segments into the comp take.

Either way, you have to tell DP what take you want to use, the boundaries of the segment the define the segment you want, and where in time you want that to end up. How would making it part of the Comp tool function make it easier? Wouldn't it make it more complicated by requiring you to always specify the start time of the segment in the comp track, even if you're doing a basic comp?

[Guitar Gaz]

GG, I must be missing your point.

When you use the Comp tool to select a segment in a take, that segment appears in the comp track. If you move the mouse cursor there, it changes to a select tool, and you can move that segment anywhere on the time line, or to alt drag it to make copies at other times. Or, you could alt drag the take with the segments you want to reuse at other time point to another take, rearrange that in time with the cut and select tools, and then use the comp tool to put those shifted segments into the comp take.

Either way, you have to tell DP what take you want to use, the boundaries of the segment the define the segment you want, and where in time you want that to end up. How would making it part of the Comp tool function make it easier? Wouldn't it make it more complicated by requiring you to always specify the start time of the segment in the comp track, even if you're doing a basic comp?

You are correct - you can of course do that and it works quite well - perhaps I find it easier to listen to a whole take and then highlight the bits I like rather than use the comp tool. But you are right - the comp tool is more flexible than I had given it credit for. My comments about the size of buttons in the sequencer window remain - but perhaps I will try harder to use the comp tool and show takes as it might be less fiddly than my current method. Thanks for the feedback.