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Old 02-21-2018, 08:41 AM   #1
fetidus
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Default Please help - big decision to switch to Reaper from other DAWs for post + scoring

PART 1:

Hi Guys,

Long time since I've posted here, but I guess I've hit a big transition point in my studio and I could really use some feedback!

I know many threads like this exist, so I ask for your patience as I work through my own personal decision process. Everyone has a unique set of needs with DAWs and it's obviously a personal decision, but I'd like to reach out and get some feedback. I've been on an annoying roller coaster over the years and I really need to simplify my studio, solve my workflow issues, and I need to make some hard choices. Plus I know there are a ton of folks here that have a lot of experience with other DAWs too, so this is a great place to ask the questions, especially re: Reaper in the context of what I need it to do for me.

For any decision like this, the circumstances and usage scenarios are important. Here's mine:

First, I need this primarily for post production, sound design and scoring for film and video. I have a huge library of sound effects and plugins, etc., and use many tracks with a heavy load, so stability, reliability, consistency, etc., are super important, especially when dealing with frame-accurate film/video. I deal with clients with high-pressure deadlines, so it can't let me down when the going gets tough. I also use it for personal projects, so the pressure is a lot lower there, but I'd like to stop the madness of switching DAWs so often.

Second, I've been doing this for a long time so these are not "new" issues for me -- I've been around the block a few times -- so I'm looking for help as an old hand at this stuff, looking to make a potentially big change in my studio, and looking to finally find some peace of mind with my tools. I've been relatively unhappy with my tools for the past few years.

I've used or owned almost all the DAWs on the market, including Reaper, for many years. I'm sort of forced to because of the range of clients I have, and frankly some tools are better at certain tasks than others, although most of the main DAWs these days can handle very similar tasks. With clients, though, time really is money... if I can save time with one tool, I will consider using it. So I've kept my foot in several camps for a long time... maybe too long. And I need to simplify.

And I've honestly never considered Reaper for the #1 role in my studio for post production, film and sound design until now. It's been in the #2 (or #3) backup spot for a while. Not totally sure why, but it never was taken seriously by most of my clients either, and honestly, I had no idea how powerful Reaper had become after all these years. I just haven't been paying attention to the changelog, and Justin does not have a marketing department to sell the latest cool features... so I just flat out missed how amazing Reaper has become. I've recently been doing a deep-dive on Reaper and have been blown away by what it can do. More on that later. I currently mainly use Cubase, Pro Tools, and most recently started migrating over to Studio One, but hit a giant snag.

Current DAWs in my studio: Pro Tools HD 11, Pro Tools 2018, Cubase 9.5 Pro, Studio One Pro 3.5, Bitwig Studio 2.3, Reaper 5.76, plus tons of libraries, plugins, other audio apps/tools, etc., etc...

Recently got rid of the following DAWs to clean house: Ableton Live 9 Suite, Samplitude Pro X3, Reason 9. They just didn't do it for me for one reason or another. Plus my other DAWs covered what I needed.

Former owned DAWs or tested DAWs: Logic, Digital Performer, Tracktion, Nuendo, Sonar (may it rest in peace), etc., etc., the list goes on.

So I've been through pretty much all of them, and I've come to the conclusion that there are really FOUR DAWs that will potentially work for me for my personal situation: Pro Tools, Cubase, Studio One, or Reaper. (I consider Nuendo an option too, but that goes along with Cubase/Steinberg issues for me.)

The rest I don't need to bother with any more, since they are either very unappealing to me, or they are missing too many tools for post production and scoring, so I won't spend any more time with them (with the exception of Bitwig, which I will keep because I love the modulation features for creative experimentation). And BTW, I refuse to get stuck on one platform again, otherwise Logic would be on my short list too.

So, the four contenders for post production, sound design and scoring in a nutshell:

PRO TOOLS - It does most of what I need, is compatible with any pro studio I work with, they are slowly adding missing features, and it is more or less stable these days (cross fingers). Works beautifully with video/film, generally good to very good for post production, okay for scoring/composing, and average for sound design. I do NOT like Avid. Very spotty track record for bugs, performance and stability. I am NOT thrilled with making that the center of my studio again. I keep PT11HD around just for compatibility with clients. I don't enjoy using it. But I will go back to Pro Tools as my #1 DAW if I have to.

CUBASE - It also does most of what I need, but has become much more bloated over the years. I have had a love/hate relationship with Steinberg since the beginning. It is currently not a rosy relationship. Works okay with video/film (the new video engine is far from optimized and honestly not up to Pro Tools standard yet), generally okay with post production (and Nuendo for surround), the best for scoring/composing IMO, and pretty good for sound design too. I also do NOT like Steinberg right now. They have gone down hill in recent years and I'm sick and tired of them. Bugs, broken features, broken promises, incomplete new features... drives me crazy recently. However, it is a very powerful platform.

STUDIO ONE - Also does most of what I need, although a slight step down in key features, but a better overall workflow IMO. A good friend (and outstanding musician and engineer) convinced me to try Studio One after my frustrations with Avid and Steinberg, and I have to say, I really like it. However, after putting it through its paces for a serious client post production video project, I discovered to my great disappointment that it will currently not cut it for me until they improve the video/post features. Long story, but for frame-accurate video sync for ADR, aligning audio to lips, frame-accurate hits, for example, it will not work well right now. For general production, it's really good though. Perhaps v4 will handle post production and frame-accurate scoring when that eventually comes out. So it's currently NOT great for post production and scoring if frame accuracy means anything to you (which it does to me), but it IS pretty good for general sound design due to excellent workflow. I honestly really wanted it to be the one, but it's not looking great for me now.

Which all brings me to....

REAPER - Also does most of what I need. The dark horse that's been on my computer for years and years, I have consistently used it for dialog editing, due to the wonderful implementation of ripple editing. Little did I know that Justin has been working some serious magic over the years, and I JUST found out about some of the killer features that could potentially replace Pro Tools, Cubase and Studio One for me. Take FX automation and then the genius Subprojects are ultra-powerful features. Wow. Reaper is potentially very good for post production, okay for scoring, and utterly brilliant for sound design (actually, probably the BEST for sound design on the market at this point). In some key areas, it literally blows away Pro Tools, Cubase and Studio One, and all others.

This really isn't a feature-list comparison though. All four of them could theoretically do the job, with various trade-offs and benefits, etc.

Last edited by fetidus; 02-21-2018 at 08:46 AM.
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Old 02-21-2018, 08:41 AM   #2
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PART 2:

I'm pretty solid on the specific features of the DAWs, so my dilemma is not WHAT Reaper can do vs. the others, but really if it can handle a professional environment and workload, day-in and day-out, delivering results for clients over the years as a longer-term solid choice. I'm concerned that Reaper's development process makes it a little too volatile for a consistent, day-in, day-out workflow with longer-term session compatibility, stability, loading up old projects, consistency, etc... but that could just be me worrying too much. I guess one way to phrase the question is... can I trust Reaper and its developers?

Or should I say, developer, singular. Let's face it, the Reaper team is very small, and if anything were to happen to the genius Justin, I am concerned what will happen to Reaper. I'm putting my trust in him in a way, and while it's obvious he's brilliant, he definitely has a different vibe and attitude than any other DAW developer on the planet. That's refreshing and kind of awesome in some ways, but it's also a question about my livelihood in other ways. Yes, I could always switch to another DAW if Justin was unable to continue development, so I don't want to make this too big of a deal, but the whole attitude of Reaper/Cockos/Justin is very much out of sync with some of the kinds of clients I have. To a degree it doesn't matter, since some clients have no idea what tools I use, but I've even had to convince some of them that Cubase/Nuendo was okay instead of Pro Tools. Some just flat out require Pro Tools, and they can't be convinced of anything else. I can't imagine the conversations I'll have when/if I bring up Reaper. It's an education process, and they are sometimes ignorant of what Reaper can really do (I only discovered its depth myself recently) but sometimes that makes a difference between me getting a contract or not. So unfortunately, I have to take that into consideration to some degree.

Also, I'm concerned about possible longstanding bugs and potentially broken features in Reaper due to the frequent updates and development philosophy. I can't verify this myself, since my usage has been pretty simplistic so far and it's been totally solid for me over the years, but if I ramp up the complexity and use the awesomeness of Subprojects, and killer features like Take FX automation, and load it down with tons of VSTi, all locked to a feature-length film, how stable/consistent will Reaper be? How rock solid is it really for demanding real-world professional loads?

I've also read about other issues here and there, such as with Waves plugins, and concerns that Justin doesn't listen to feature requests these days, but rather proceeds forward on his own unique development path (which to some outside perspectives appears random, inconsistent and whimsical). But I can't personally fault Justin -- his approach obviously resulted in what is arguably the most powerful DAW on the planet with some amazing, original thinking. However, it also feels very "unrefined" with the myriad of nested menus, jam-packed option dialogs, seemingly-buried features and inconsistent naming/feature conventions. It can be confusing understanding the structure of Reaper in that context, and I had to dig to find how the most powerful new features worked, etc... and some of those new features aren't even listed on the website -- except as a little note in the changelog or here in the forum!

I'm not afraid of the learning curve, and I already feel pretty comfortable due to years of simple use, but I'm just concerned about the stability/consistency if I ramp up to one of my massive projects. Pro Tools and Cubase are devils I know, but they've delivered time and time again for me for huge projects (notwithstanding the many headaches). And everyone in the industry moans and groans about Pro Tools issues so it's an understood liability/issue. But with Reaper, it's mostly an uncharted territory for me in the professional realm. It needs to be mission-critical in that sense. So I wonder -- is Justin a genius with totally stable software but who doesn't care about certain conventions, or is he a mad genius who breaks things and will mess up my client's projects? There's a big difference.

If I do a quick comparison of the DAWs on my short list, the equation sort of works out like this:

PRO TOOLS vs REAPER - Old industry work horse, long in the tooth, but it's a known quantity, compatible with everyone I need to be compatible with, and if I have a problem with it, it actually doesn't raise an eyebrow. Sad, but true. Versus Reaper, if something goes wrong, I'm going to get a lot of flack, unfortunately. It feels risky to put that much of my business inside Reaper for some strange reason. But rationally, and on paper, I know that Reaper is faster, more nimble, overall more powerful, more flexible, covers almost all the same bases as Pro Tools, and blows past Pro Tools with absolutely killer features like Subprojects and Take FX automation. In theory, Reaper will be a huge asset if it works reliably. On other issues, they are roughly comparable, such as composition/scoring IMO, but Reaper is simply amazing for sound design.

CUBASE vs REAPER - This is a tough one. They are such vastly different beasts. Where I tend to focus on differences is really that Cubase is more geared for composing/scoring in my scenarios vs Reaper which is extraordinary for sound design, although the two can do most of the same jobs. The issues sort of offset each other in my mind. I will definitely miss the added compositional and MIDI features in Cubase, which are top notch, but I'm super excited to build massive projects using subprojects with Reaper. This is a hard decision on paper. However, when I look at Steinberg as a company, I have really grown weary of their garbage. Cubase has become a bloated mess in some areas, and new features that are forced on us seem incomplete and are poorly implemented. Just very disappointing in recent years. Recent examples of Steinberg's messy work: Direct Offline Processing and the new video engine.

STUDIO ONE vs REAPER - Another tough one. Because if there are two DAWs that are the opposite of each other in many ways, I'd say it would be Studio One and Reaper. While they both share the similarity of relative "newness" to the market (although they are both over a decade old now), and they both can cover most of the same ground, they diverge in philosophy quite a bit. Studio One is about a clean, elegant, thoughtful, consistent workflow, sometimes at the expense of customizable, deep power (and Studio One is plenty powerful BTW). Reaper, on the other hand, is about massive customizable, deep power, often at the expense of clean, elegant, consistent workflow. I tend to lean more towards the elegant workflow side of the spectrum, but there's no denying the sheer power of Reaper once you dig into it. The main downside of Studio One, for me, is that I will have to continue to wrestle with what is an inaccurate video engine right now and generally inferior video features, which is very stressful for film/video post production. It's honestly untrustworthy (in terms of frame accuracy) for some of the tasks I need to do. Overall composition/scoring features are about equal though. And Studio One is no slouch at sound design, although Reaper has it beat by a large margin for sound design.

After saying all that -- would love to know your thoughts! I'm really tired of the DAW roller coaster I've been on, and I'm really out of energy to keep going back and forth.

For now, my game plan is that I'll do a full (but small) client job in Reaper and see how it goes, but I need to be able to scale up to a feature-length film and I don't know a single pro personally that has done something like that in Reaper. I know that there ARE people that have done it -- I just don't *personally* know someone. They all use Pro Tools, Cubase/Nuendo, or Logic. So it definitely feels like I'll be going out on a limb in my own personal circles to ramp up Reaper to a feature-length film.

But part of me thinks it will be worth it -- the whole concept of Subprojects alone is so awesome for film folks, sound designers, etc., I think eventually it will catch on in other DAWs. It's just way too good of a feature that other DAW developers will ignore it IMO. But as of right now, only Reaper does it, and what a killer feature it is. Looking to the future, I'm sure it will take YEARS before Pro Tools does it (if ever), and Steinberg will definitely botch it if they ever try it. So that leaves maybe Studio One... and I will admit, Studio One v4 may be pretty darn good. But will Presonus finally listen to the film people and solve the long-standing issues for video/film/scoring? Who knows? So right now, if I want POWER, then Reaper is the game. But what other headaches will I get with Reaper? I already know the headaches I have with the other DAWs... so please let me know your thoughts! And thank you for taking the time to reply!
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Old 02-21-2018, 09:11 AM   #3
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Hi Fetidus,
First, a disclaimer: You definitely know more about other DAWs than I do, and you are using it in a direct professional capacity. I use it to make recordings for my band. So our clients only care about live performance. I am not scoring films.

The main thing that jumped out at me from reading your posts was "often at the expense of clean, elegant, consistent workflow". I don't see how that is a characteristic of Reaper. It seems more a characteristic of not committing to Reaper. Once you are using it regularly I think your work flow will be as good as any other DAW, there's nothing inherent in Reaper, (that I know of) that should interfere.

The custom actions are my friend, let's just say that. As are the Kenny Gioia videos and Reaper Blog videos. And this forum.

As far as stability, I've been using it since about 2010, I've never had a serious problem with it. I found a bug in Pro Tools back in 2001, when I first started. Their tech support told me that, then.

Maybe keep using PT for the clients that demand it. I assume that's because that you are sending sessions/projects back and forth with them. Other than that use Reaper.

At this point I have about eight years worth of recordings in Reaper, backed up on four different hard drives. If Reaper disappeared tomorrow I would not be happy, but I could manually transfer everything to another DAW. Not the same situation as you, of course.
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Old 02-21-2018, 09:35 AM   #4
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Quote:
Originally Posted by jimmygreenwood View Post
The main thing that jumped out at me from reading your posts was "often at the expense of clean, elegant, consistent workflow". I don't see how that is a characteristic of Reaper. It seems more a characteristic of not committing to Reaper. Once you are using it regularly I think your work flow will be as good as any other DAW, there's nothing inherent in Reaper, (that I know of) that should interfere.
Thanks, Jimmy, really appreciate the response. I think you've hit something here about my not committing to Reaper as being part of my perception of the workflow. I have to think about that. While I believe Reaper has some objective workflow issues with generally cluttered menus, etc., etc., I think that you're right, that if I committed to it fully, that kind of thing would really become minor. So I don't want to make that a huge deal. And it's really not a make-or-break issue. But I will definitely think about my perceptions, etc.


Quote:
Originally Posted by jimmygreenwood View Post

The custom actions are my friend, let's just say that. As are the Kenny Gioia videos and Reaper Blog videos. And this forum.
Yes, I can see that custom actions will probably become my friend too! That might offset some of my perceived workflow issues. And I have definitely run across those videos and they have been very helpful getting me to this point. As for the forum, this is my first post in probably 8+ years. :-) I guess time flies, but yes, I had a good experience with the forum in the earlier days of Reaper.

Quote:
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Maybe keep using PT for the clients that demand it. I assume that's because that you are sending sessions/projects back and forth with them. Other than that use Reaper.
Exactly. I'll have to keep PT just for ingest/delivery when needed. But I don't want to use it as a general tool if I can avoid it, and I dislike Avid in general. For my last fairly complex project, I did everything in Cubase, and the client didn't have the slightest clue I wasn't using Pro Tools. And recently I tried replacing Cubase with Studio One, but ran into some serious concerns with frame accuracy, and here I am, after discovering how powerful Reaper has become since I last really dived into it.

Thank you again!
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Old 02-21-2018, 09:37 AM   #5
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You mention sound design and post.

Reaper has seen increasingly more usage for sound designers, especially for games sound design!

Scoring for film and video - also possible. You might wanna check this out: http://otr.storyteller.im/
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Old 02-21-2018, 09:48 AM   #6
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Hi Fetidus,
Also, I'm pretty sure you can edit the menus. I seem to remember doing it myself. I think Kenny Gioia has a video on it, although I can't find it now.
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Old 02-21-2018, 09:50 AM   #7
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Quote:
Originally Posted by EvilDragon View Post
You mention sound design and post.

Reaper has seen increasingly more usage for sound designers, especially for games sound design!

Scoring for film and video - also possible. You might wanna check this out: http://otr.storyteller.im/
Thanks, EvilDragon! Yes, I heard that some pro sound designers have switched to Reaper, but I don't know them personally. (Not that I should know them, of course, but to be honest, it's always good to have a buddy who has already made the leap before you so you can pick his brain for common problems/solutions!)

And I have NO doubt that Reaper will kill in sound design. At least in theory. It's phenomenal on paper, so no wonder people are switching just for that. I've been testing subprojects for two days now, and I'm pretty confident it will make a big difference for me... a real game changer... if it's really stable and consistent. And I won't really know until I put it to the test on a client's real-world project. But that's one of the big reasons I wrote this post today... Reaper is now a very serious contender for taking over most duties in my studio. That's not an easy change, so that's why I'm reaching out.

I'll definitely check out the OTR -- I have heard OF people doing real scoring in Reaper, but they just haven't been in my particular circles so I'll be out on a limb on this.

Thanks again!
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Old 02-21-2018, 09:52 AM   #8
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Quote:
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Hi Fetidus,
Also, I'm pretty sure you can edit the menus. I seem to remember doing it myself. I think Kenny Gioia has a video on it, although I can't find it now.
Cool, and this doesn't surprise me. :-) I think with all the customization, you could build an environment that is scarcely recognizable as default Reaper.
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Old 02-21-2018, 09:57 AM   #9
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I just found it.

Action List>Menu: Customize...
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Old 02-21-2018, 10:02 AM   #10
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I just found it.

Action List>Menu: Customize...
Wow, it's almost scary what's lurking in the action list!
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Old 02-21-2018, 10:37 AM   #11
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There's a lot of lurking going on in Reaper, in general.
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Old 02-21-2018, 11:07 AM   #12
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You know much more about DAWs and recording than I do, but regarding this:
Quote:
I need to be able to scale up to a feature-length film
What if you scored an existing movie using only Reaper, either according to your own creative processes, or by recreating what was already there? You'd have a pretty good idea of what the "client" wanted, given that it was already printed. Seems like it would provide a fairly accurate representation of challenges you might run into, without serious repercussions if overcoming them added significant delay.

It would be an unpaid time investment for sure, but it seems safer than experimenting with a client's paid time. And maybe you could go back and "fix" a soundtrack that you always thought was lacking, like that piece of crap Blade Runner

Alternatively, you could do the same with a film student's project - they get a free or very low cost score and you get a no- or very-low-pressure learning environment.

Just spitballin.
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Old 02-21-2018, 11:26 AM   #13
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Quote:
Originally Posted by fetidus View Post
I've been testing subprojects for two days now, and I'm pretty confident it will make a big difference for me... a real game changer... if it's really stable and consistent.
Reaper's probably the most stable DAW on the planet after Reason (and even Reason became more unstable as soon as they added VST support, go figure). If things crash, it is in great majority of cases because of a plugin-induced error of sorts...
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Old 02-21-2018, 11:28 AM   #14
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Quote:
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What if you scored an existing movie using only Reaper, either according to your own creative processes, or by recreating what was already there? You'd have a pretty good idea of what the "client" wanted, given that it was already printed. Seems like it would provide a fairly accurate representation of challenges you might run into, without serious repercussions if overcoming them added significant delay.
Thank you, Reason! It's a great suggestion, and truth is, that would be ideal. In fact, I can think of more than one project that could use some love. It's tough to find the available time, though, but I'm trying to simulate the kinds of problems (aka "challenges") clients give me in the time I have.

I need to hammer Reaper more, but there's nothing like the day-in day-out intensity that really tests it out. The endless back and forth, revisions, tweaking the timeline so often I want to pull my hair out, unpredictable last-minute revisions right before it's due, etc. I just had to go through that last week with Studio One, and that's when I realized there were issues with the video frame accuracy. Last thing on earth I would have thought might be a problem with Studio One, but there it was. And that's what opened the Pandora's box for me to take a hard look at Reaper again. Glad I did though, otherwise I would have never realized Reaper now has Subprojects.

Anyway, I will definitely hit Reaper harder than I have, and thank you for the suggestion. I just starting pushing Reaper yesterday and it seems to hold up really well. I will have to load up a feature-length simulated mix though...
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Old 02-21-2018, 11:34 AM   #15
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Reaper's probably the most stable DAW on the planet after Reason (and even Reason became more unstable as soon as they added VST support, go figure). If things crash, it is in great majority of cases because of a plugin-induced error of sorts...
I've personally never had Reaper crash on me... and I think I've used it since maybe 2009-ish, maybe earlier, I can't remember. But I've never pushed it either, and my sessions have always been relatively simple dialog sessions until now. I am definitely going to be pushing it hard though. Good to know you've had great stability with it. And BTW, totally agree on Prop Reason once they added VST support.
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Old 02-21-2018, 11:58 AM   #16
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I have nothing to add on the technical side but it is perhaps significant that the BBC rely on REAPER for outside broadcast recording (and elsewhere too I understand).
https://www.soundonsound.com/techniq...broadcast-team

I realise this is not comparable to your intended use but assuming REAPER works" for you in terms of stability in use etc. then maybe you can be reassured that its longer term presence as a developing DAW is at least a good bet.

Incidentally in all you said for me the most surprising thing was that REAPER's scoring was "okay" for scoring in what is obviously a professional environment. Given its recent appearance that is quite something eh?
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Old 02-21-2018, 12:14 PM   #17
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The following are my opinions only.

I am lucky to be a programmer that has programmed for, and/or interfaced with, most of the "usual suspects".

From a pure code perspective, including quality and breadth of 3rd party interface capabilities, as well as general overall elegance and stability, Reaper is easily the hands down winner.

Yeah, the complexity can be daunting at first, work through it, then begin to customize it to your tastes and enjoy

As far as just Justin in the code department, Schwa is a coder too, and there have been others come and go, so no worries in the "bus insurance" department.

As far as stability because of the rapid release cycle, that is actually in everyone's favour -- with small incremental releases, unforeseen side effects of newly added/tweaked features are more easily isolated and fixed. and the crew that hangs out in the Pre-Relase Discussion forum is enthusiastic and relentless about beating the pre-release's into nice stable form before release.

Sure, every now and then nasty bugs creep in, but, once again, they are usual fixed quickly, sometimes within hours !
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Old 02-21-2018, 12:54 PM   #18
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Hey fetidus,

I have been in the same situation as you. I'm a long time Cubase user (over 30 years) and I was also fed up with Steinberg's attitude and the lack of long wanted Cubase features. Like you, I tried Studio One lately and although, it looked promising in the beginning, I was soon disappointed with the features in the film department, track management, etc...

Then, finally, I took the plunge and spent some decent amount of time with Reaper.
There's one thing, I couldn't find in any other DAW: if a functionality is missing, you can script it.
The potential is just beyond.

Just some weeks ago, cfillion created a script by request, that lets you set the timecode at the cursor position. That was a crucial function for my workflow. And if you are a bit nerdy, you can even create your own scripts.

So my advice would be, go for Reaper, it's the most powerful DAW imo.
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Old 02-21-2018, 01:06 PM   #19
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fetidus, I would highly recommend dropping by http://admiralbumblebee.com which is a terrific DAW (and other things) blog whose writer is often on this forum. Excellent information and comparisons of DAWs, very deeply researched and pored over with zero user bias if something is great or not great. Articles are always updated to reflect when a new update has changed what he had written about. Even when it doesn't pertain to issues what I'm using I find it enlightening and an enjoyable read.
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Old 02-21-2018, 01:11 PM   #20
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That's quite an in-depth post.

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Originally Posted by fetidus View Post
the Reaper team is very small, and if anything were to happen to the genius Justin, I am concerned what will happen to Reaper
Honestly I think you have quite a bit more risk with a product whose direction and even continued existence depend on corporate cost/benefit decisions that include factors that are completely exogenous to the software itself.

I think that within the entire DAW universe, REAPER is the healthiest product from a purely financial and business-stability perspective. There is no evidence I'm aware of that any other DAW is a meaningful profit center for its parent company. There is literally zero chance of a change in management, unrelated corporate losses, or a change in business strategy causing a radical change in the direction and focus and continued existence of REAPER.

Having said that, selection bias is likely to give you nothing but pro-REAPER responses here.
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Old 02-21-2018, 01:34 PM   #21
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What schwa says... there's nothing worse than a company that is completely marketing driven.
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Old 02-21-2018, 02:34 PM   #22
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i've had more than one piece of software that i used and liked bought up and disappeared by a competing company. used to use a translation program to encode/decode omf files back in the day. ssl bought the app, doubled the price, then never updated it again. more than sufficiently replaced today by aatranslator which, btw, you should also have in your arsenal.

don't worry about reaper. as you said, time is money. while reaper is inexpensive, it does take a time investment to really make it useful in your circumstance. you need to take advantage of customization, custom actions, and scripting, all of which will take time.

before i made the switch i did nothing but tests and observations and forum reading for a couple of years before i felt like both reaper and i had matured enough to be compatible. from my perspective, it would behoove you to start in on a reaper time investment immediately as that's where the biggest benefits will be had.

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Old 02-21-2018, 02:51 PM   #23
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Originally Posted by schwa View Post
That's quite an in-depth post.



Honestly I think you have quite a bit more risk with a product whose direction and even continued existence depend on corporate cost/benefit decisions that include factors that are completely exogenous to the software itself.

I think that within the entire DAW universe, REAPER is the healthiest product from a purely financial and business-stability perspective. There is no evidence I'm aware of that any other DAW is a meaningful profit center for its parent company. There is literally zero chance of a change in management, unrelated corporate losses, or a change in business strategy causing a radical change in the direction and focus and continued existence of REAPER.

Having said that, selection bias is likely to give you nothing but pro-REAPER responses here.
I guess this implies that you guys are doing OK financially putting out Reaper, and also have no desire to compete with Paul Allen for largest yacht in the universe? This give me more incentive to look deeper into Reaper as my main DAW. Not that I'm not already doing that.
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Old 02-21-2018, 03:01 PM   #24
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A professionnal example (sound design) : from protools to Reaper

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OnuZIKFAjeQ

https://www.protoolstoreaper.com/

David Farmer : The Hobbit and much more...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=43_JHOCJvsA

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Old 02-21-2018, 03:56 PM   #25
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Hey Guys,

This is great! Thank you for taking the time to read my (very) long post and replying. Lots of great food for thought! I had forgotten how good the Reaper forum is.

@martifingers -- Glad to know BBC takes Reaper so seriously. Things like that do matter in my situation to some of my clients. Trust me, I'll be feeding them that line if they bug me about Reaper. :-)

@Geoff Waddington -- Thank you for your insight. I sure hope the pre-release team continues to be relentless. Gives me a bit more confidence!

@_Stevie_ -- Yes, Studio One has tremendous potential, and I really like it, but it needs a good dose of work for film folks for sure. I think Studio One is really the only other real contender for me, and I'm frustrated that I couldn't make the leap. But I have tremendous respect for it, and at least now I've realized that Reaper has been cooking up a storm for years, right under the radar. I'm very hopeful I might have found a solution here. And as you said, the scripting vastly raises its potential. Excited to explore that. I wonder, if I ever got stuck working on a script, if there are folks here who might take a small fee to consult or help out?

@vdubreeze -- Very cool -- will check it out!

@schwa -- Great point... more food for thought on this. And I have plenty of my own personal examples of DAW/audio/music developers going down the tube for the very reasons you mention. So I guess one never really knows... it's sort of an illusion of stability in a way. Big fancy websites, shiny marketing and corporate fanciness give some of my clients (and colleagues) confidence, but you're right, in the end, it doesn't make a product more secure. Let's just hope that Justin stays in good health and passionate about development, and I guess I can't ask for much more. (Except maybe we can all take a life insurance policy out on him?) Re: selection bias, I'm with you -- been around various DAW communities long enough to adjust for bias. I can usually smell BS pretty far off.

@babag -- Very true. And kinda sad. The most recent casualty of this being Sonar. Will definitely run Reaper though its paces. I like your comment, "... i felt like both reaper and i had matured enough to be compatible." (And, yes, I have a license of aatranslator around here somewhere, although I haven't had to use it in ages)

@machinesworking -- Definitely something to think about. Small is smart, as long as the developers are still passionate about development, and are happy with the finances. Sounds like things are solid from schwa.

@albatteur -- Thank you -- will check them out!

Thanks again, guys!
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Old 02-21-2018, 04:06 PM   #26
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^ regarding developers, you should note that REAPER is developed by Cockos, not just(in).

http://cockos.com/team.php

as you're probably aware, it's also actively developed on a smaller scale by a huge community of talented and inventive 3rd parties who write immeasurably useful scripts, extensions, and effects.
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Old 02-21-2018, 04:11 PM   #27
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Incidentally in all you said for me the most surprising thing was that REAPER's scoring was "okay" for scoring in what is obviously a professional environment. Given its recent appearance that is quite something eh?
Forgot to reply to this part of your comment -- yes, I think Reaper's scoring/MIDI/composition features are comparable to most decent DAWs now, although there are features I will definitely miss from Cubase, for example. But over the years, I found I need a specific set of tools for my approach, and while Cubase has some really fantastic composition features, I ended up not using several of them. In my mind and with my workflow, Reaper seems to sit about at the level of where PT and Studio One are, which is adequate. Where it falls short in some areas, I'll give extra credit for the scripting and at least for me, the incredible Subprojects feature lets me do things that even Cubase can't do, in terms of complex timelines (because I can bump a section out to a subproject which will contain its own tempo map, time signature, etc...) so I can get REALLY crazy if I want to. I think film folks, once they catch on to the potential epic awesomeness they can achieve with subprojects, will be very attracted to Reaper, or be bugging their DAW developers for something similar. It is AWESOME.

Back in the day, I also used Digital Performer, for example, and it has a wonderful feature called "Chunks" -- however, I don't like the rest of Digital Performer, and that's why it's not on my list any more. However, I really, really, really love Chunks. And now that Reaper has subprojects, that more than fills my need for how I was thinking about Chunks. It's not apples for apples of course, but subprojects, in a way, solves a very similar problem, and then takes it to the next level. Subprojects is, for me, like Super-Chunks. You can do SOOOOO much with subprojects my mind is still spinning at how I can take advantage of it... not just in the way I used Chunks in DP, but in all sorts of exciting new ways, especially in sound design. Super, super excited about it. I called my buddy up about it the other day and told him I was doing virtual back flips when I realized what subprojects could mean for my overall workflow!

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Old 02-21-2018, 04:20 PM   #28
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Originally Posted by mccrabney View Post
^ regarding developers, you should note that REAPER is developed by Cockos, not just(in).

http://cockos.com/team.php

as you're probably aware, it's also actively developed on a smaller scale by a huge community of talented and inventive 3rd parties who write immeasurably useful scripts, extensions, and effects.
Yes, thank you -- I still think of Reaper as primarily the offspring of Justin, but I know that other folks are involved. Schwa being one of them, so there was definitely no disrespect intended. But it's still a very small company, but good to be reminded that there are others deep in the source code that could carry on the torch. And I didn't realize that about the community BTW, so that's good to think about. That is a big difference, I think, compared to other DAWs. The very nature of Reaper encourages a very different kind of commitment and experience on the part of the userbase. That's a huge asset. Thanks for bringing that up!

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Old 02-21-2018, 05:07 PM   #29
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Concerning scripting help: actually the forums offer anything you need. Just ask a question in the scripting forums and you usually get help. There's this great scripting course series from X-Raym:
https://www.extremraym.com/en/reascript-video-console/

I'm very thankful for the scripts people create, so I gladly donate to show my gratitude.


Quote:
Originally Posted by fetidus View Post
Forgot to reply to this part of your comment -- yes, I think Reaper's scoring/MIDI/composition features are comparable to most decent DAWs now, although there are features I will definitely miss from Cubase, for example.
Can you name some features from Cubase that you will miss? Maybe there are already some scripts for that.
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Old 02-21-2018, 07:27 PM   #30
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Quote:
Originally Posted by _Stevie_ View Post
Concerning scripting help: actually the forums offer anything you need. Just ask a question in the scripting forums and you usually get help. There's this great scripting course series from X-Raym:
https://www.extremraym.com/en/reascript-video-console/

I'm very thankful for the scripts people create, so I gladly donate to show my gratitude.

Can you name some features from Cubase that you will miss? Maybe there are already some scripts for that.
Thank you, _Stevie_! I look forward to exploring the whole universe of scripting!

What do I miss from Cubase? Well, that's a loaded question... there are MANY things I miss from Cubase, but before anyone chimes in and says, "why are you leaving Cubase then?" -- I have many, many reasons. The first being that Steinberg has basically burned me too many times... I'd have to swallow a lot of frustration to go back, plus deal with super frustrating issues that are not fixed. But in a nutshell, their behavior has just worn me out... and while there are many parts of Cubase that are great and powerful, there are many parts that are broken or needlessly crippled for me, including new features. I just can't trust them any more. One of the last straws was the idiotic mess of direct offline processing. It's current incarnation is a joke... especially when you consider the awe-inspiring power of Reaper's Take FX automation which is light years beyond Cubase's direct offline processing.

Anyway, there are indeed things that I miss, and I have mostly been living without them as I started migrating to Studio One, which is closer on par to the MIDI/composition features of Reaper.

But if we're being real, if we're just talking about general MIDI/composition stuff, then I'd say the entire way Cubase handles MIDI and composition overall is just very comfortable to me... that's a large part just my familiarity with it of course, but it's also very well designed and full-featured -- more so than other general purpose DAW options out there IMO. There's a reason why a lot of serious composers are sort of stuck inside Cubase, if they rely on many of those tools. I can live without many of them, though. But I do miss the way the Chord Track works, for example, Chord Editing in the MIDI editor, even the way quantize works in general is very well designed, the integrated transpose panel, scale correction, length tools, overlap, etc... it's really all there, easy to use, pretty much a benchmark for other sequencers. But none of that is truly unique... and most sequencers can do that or get pretty close.

Every MIDI and instrument track has built-in MIDI modifiers, etc., and I had grown very used to using the MIDI inserts when needed. Some of the MIDI inserts are pretty decent. There are approximations of some of them in the MIDI JS plugins in Reaper. But the Steinberg Arpeggiator is pretty good for just a simple bundled MIDI insert, for example, especially that it allows you to use a custom sequence as part of the arp. There are other tools out there on the market that are far more powerful, but built-in, it was nice to have. It's also got an LFO MIDI insert, a decent little beat sequencer, chorder, standard tools to modify MIDI data, mini step sequencer, and then the ancient, but legendary MIDI transformer, that people don't realize is still pretty dang powerful. Altogether, that's very useful stuff for MIDI in the box, boom, no third-party tools needed. When you add in the Chord Track, how it interacts with the rest of the DAW, then Note Expression, articulation management, etc., it's just an excellent environment for composers. And recently I started getting into the Sampler Track, which is fantastic for sound design, although it's not really composer related, it lets you be creative and quickly move to MIDI playability. I definitely miss the potential to jump from the Sampler Track right into Halion for crazy sound design. Great workflow... but again, there are ways to do something similar in other DAWs.

There are a bunch of other things that I never used... Chord Assistant, Drum map, Chord Pads, but I did use the List Editor. Overall, the whole composition/MIDI environment in Cubase is just very mature and deep. Even the new metronome is honestly fantastic, if that counts. I didn't end up using it much since I've been transitioning out of Cubase 9.5, but it's frankly pretty great. I loved the click patterns. The best DAW metronome I've ever seen. I miss other nice, usable minor features like multiple marker tracks (we need this in Reaper!), etc.

And granted, I've found some Reaper scripts that cover several areas, and I'm sure there are many more out there... plus I can create something if I absolutely need to, so I'm okay with Reaper's MIDI for now. Do I miss that Cubase stuff? Yes, but I have already learned to live without a lot of it as I have been trying to transition out of Cubase, plus there are reasonable workarounds for most of my needs. In the end, the notes are all that matter and when it comes down to it, I truly only NEED a MIDI controller and a basic sequencer most of the time, even for really complex projects. But all that other stuff is very nice when I look for it or want to lean on an extra tool. I do hope Reaper continues MIDI/composition development, but it's reached a reasonable level for now. I'm probably forgetting some stuff.

Studio One is clearly simpler in terms of MIDI/composition features than Cubase, but it was also doing the job for me. Presonus could have gone further with their Note FX, BTW, which is just limited to a decent ARP, and a few other key tools -- sort of wasted potential, and nothing like the power of Cubase. But we'll see what they do in Studio One v4. And honestly, the scripting in Reaper put it on par with Studio One for now, IMO. I suppose if someone were to invest the time in scripting, they could get close to what Cubase can do in those areas, and I bet there are some killer scripts out there, so Reaper has great potential.

And all that is just part of the equation. I will trade all the extra MIDI functionality in Cubase for the genius Subprojects feature in Reaper. That opens up other doorways and solves so many problems, it blows past Cubase for several kinds of jobs I do. That is honestly a game-changer for me. That's the feature that prompted me to really take a hard look at Reaper again.

That, plus the Take FX automation, which again, totally blows away Cubase's direct offline processing. (Crushes it into the embarrassing joke that direct offline processing currently is.) If pro Cubase sound designers only knew powerful Take FX automation is, and then coupled that with Subprojects, they'd honestly be blown away. I know I was. It's just insane. Nothing, and I mean nothing, can touch it right now.

Anyway, another long post... but I better call it a night. Thank you all again for your feedback! Looking forward to learning more!
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Old 02-21-2018, 10:20 PM   #31
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That's quite an in-depth post.



Honestly I think you have quite a bit more risk with a product whose direction and even continued existence depend on corporate cost/benefit decisions that include factors that are completely exogenous to the software itself.

I think that within the entire DAW universe, REAPER is the healthiest product from a purely financial and business-stability perspective. There is no evidence I'm aware of that any other DAW is a meaningful profit center for its parent company. There is literally zero chance of a change in management, unrelated corporate losses, or a change in business strategy causing a radical change in the direction and focus and continued existence of REAPER.

Having said that, selection bias is likely to give you nothing but pro-REAPER responses here.
This !
Examples abound, lately at Cakewalk. But even a company like Apple killed a product like Aperture with no clear reason. Yet it's not like Apple doesn't have the money to maintain it.
But otoh the truck factor is high at Cockos.

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Old 02-21-2018, 10:34 PM   #32
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Recently got rid of the following DAWs to clean house: Ableton Live 9 Suite, Samplitude Pro X3, Reason 9. They just didn't do it for me for one reason or another.
Would you care do write down those reasons for completeness ?

A bit off-topic, I'd like to point out that I started to use Reaper not as a "normal" DAW but as an audio tool that allows me to create a versatile Live keyboard playing setup, I did not find any other software (including dedicated ones like "Forte") that were versatile enough for what I had in mind.

Of course after that decision I stopped trying to use other DAWs (I considered Cubase and Audacity) for multi-track recording, mixing and "production". Why take another blow with a learning curve and money shell out ?

I suppose similar thoughts are viable with other musicians that have Live playing by software in mind. That is why I'm trying to collect appropriate information and put together some documentation and useful tools for getting them started in an easy way.

Thanks,
-Michael

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Old 02-21-2018, 10:55 PM   #33
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I look forward to exploring the whole universe of scripting!
In fact there are at least two very distinct areas you can do scripting: You can enhance the functionality of Reaper itself by ReaScripts (programmed in EEL, LUA or Python), and you can do "JS" effect plugins (usable completely like VST(i) plugins) in EEL.

I have no experience with RaScript, but there are lots of them that seem to work great to make users happy who have special needs.

Regarding JSFX, I did dive rather deep into those, doing Midi filters and some audio plugins, some if those using the built-in FFT functionality. This works great and the performance is absolutely stunning !

On top of that, for really advanced scripters (like a friend of mine), there is "Beyond Python" that exports the complete Reaper API (that otherwise is available for Reaper extension plugins done in C++, and partly to ReaScripts) via OSC and hence TCP / Network to external scripts done in Pythen and hence allows to seamlessly integrate Reaper in a "master" program.

-Michael

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Old 02-21-2018, 11:00 PM   #34
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This said: For any advanced user it's a must to install two extensions to Reaper:

1) SWS provides a lot of "standard" functionality you might know from other DAWs and miss in Reaper, plus a lot specific goodies, plus "LiveConfigs" that can be used as the basis for building a Live setup (e.g. for Keyboarders or Guitarist).

2) ReaPack allows for easily finding and installing a huge basis of available scripts.

-Michael
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Old 02-22-2018, 04:09 AM   #35
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We shall be using Reaper, together with DaVinci-Resolve for colouring and audio in our new post room. We have yet to decide on a video system. (Maybe Hit-Film with DaVinci-Resolve.)

Unfortunately, although Reaper is ideal for sync'ing ADR and lining up FX and Foleys, (stretch markers on mouse pointer and on one button!) it still does not have a 5.1 or 7.1 panner on the channel strip. Also, there do not seem to be any plans to make 3D sound (Atmos and/or DTS-X) run in Reaper.

If the OP has a deep involvement with MIDI and is making film scores, CuBase is really the system to go for, but just for the MIDI. Parent company Yamaha has always had a deep and long-lasting commitment to the music and audio industry.

Avid-ProTools? I dislike the company and I dislike the software even more, so AA-Translator to the rescue, if a PT project is insisted upon. Also, Avid remains on life-support and if certain figures in the industry did not demand its use, Avid would be gone in a heart-beat! I would be very reluctant to commit to a system from a company that is so deeply in debt that every piece of code, patent and IP has had to be handed over to its creditors! Q4 and annual results come out in about one month's time.
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Old 02-22-2018, 04:40 AM   #36
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@fetidus Having just made the leap from Cubase for similar reasons, I know what you are going through. I stopped updating Cubase at 7.5. It has taken me around 6 weeks to get my head around Reaper and setup a workflow similar to my Cubase one.
What I like about Reaper Devs and the community, is that they LISTEN AND HELP. A few times since switching I've asked inane questions, and always been steered to the correct solutions. Why Reaper slays Cubase for me, is the rate at which new features are added in Reaper, both by the devs and the scripting gurus. I was the one who asked for Set Timecode at Cursor which I missed from Cubase. It was scripted within 24 hours. Try that with Steinberg !! It took them 3 weeks to answer a support question.
Still learning, but really pleased with the switch.
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Old 02-22-2018, 05:12 AM   #37
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This !
Examples abound, lately at Cakewalk. But even a company like Apple killed a product like Aperture with no clear reason.
Yep, very true and sad. Back in the early days, I was a victim of Apple killing the Windows version of Logic when they acquired eMagic. And you're right, there are many examples. So I'm definitely seeing this point. Old perceptions die hard.
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Old 02-22-2018, 05:29 AM   #38
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Would you care do write down those reasons for completeness ?

A bit off-topic, I'd like to point out that I started to use Reaper not as a "normal" DAW but as an audio tool that allows me to create a versatile Live keyboard playing setup, I did not find any other software (including dedicated ones like "Forte") that were versatile enough for what I had in mind.

Of course after that decision I stopped trying to use other DAWs (I considered Cubase and Audacity) for multi-track recording, mixing and "production". Why take another blow with a learning curve and money shell out ?

I suppose similar thoughts are viable with other musicians that have Live playing by software in mind. That is why I'm trying to collect appropriate information and put together some documentation and useful tools for getting them started in an easy way.

Thanks,
-Michael
Hey Michael, as for my reasons for getting rid of Live, Reason, and Samplitude, it boils down to this:

For Live and Reason, I always loved having them around as creative sandboxes that took me out of the "normal" workflow of my main DAW. It kept my brain kind of fresh, and would help me think and create differently. I would limit Live to my laptop with a limited number of VSTi, instead of my sometimes overwhelming library on my main DAW. I also loved the sense of non-linear creativity in Live. Reason was a joy to use as well because it felt like I was in a different universe all together. Both DAWs are not really designed for post production sound for film/video though (although I know of some folks who do use it that way or at least try to use it that way). I even bought Ableton Push and took it out with my laptop -- loved it. Very, very creative.

However, when Bitwig came along and I eventually bought it, it completely replaced Live and Reason for the purposes I used them. I did not NEED Live or Reason, I just loved the sandbox mental/creative change of environment. However, Bitwig fills that exact same purpose, but for me, it's even better just because my brain works like Bitwig. I've been waiting for a DAW that went the modulation direction, and I love, love, love the way it's wired. The devices are a joy to use for me. That's the sandbox I wanted, and so I didn't feel the need for Live or Reason any more. However, it is also NOT designed as a post production kind of DAW for film/video. And thank goodness. I don't want it to become a general purpose DAW, etc... There are plenty of those. Bitwig is the kind of environment I can go into to get a break from the typical paradigm. Nothing against Live and Reason, which are both brilliant in their own ways.

As for Samplitude, I upgraded an ancient license of mine to really see what they were up to as I was moving out of Cubase, and I did a head-to-head battle with Studio One. Long story short, while I think Samplitude is incredibly powerful, and it deserves a lot of respect (and I still love the object model of its workflow), I honestly found the workflow of Studio One to be significantly better, and any extra benefits of Samplitude were superseded by the workflow benefits of Studio One.

So I could also say goodbye to Samplitude, and I proceeded to really dive into Studio One, finally freeing myself of the Cubase frustrations. Or so I thought. That's when I ran into trouble during production of a client project, which opened Pandora's box again and I (fortunately) discovered how powerful Reaper had become right under my nose.

That's the story in a nutshell!
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Old 02-22-2018, 05:31 AM   #39
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In fact there are at least two very distinct areas you can do scripting: You can enhance the functionality of Reaper itself by ReaScripts (programmed in EEL, LUA or Python), and you can do "JS" effect plugins (usable completely like VST(i) plugins) in EEL....
Thank you, Michael. Yes, this is very exciting to me. Reaper is insanely extensible, so I look forward to seeing what can be done! Will have to really dive into the various approaches. It's daunting, but also really inspiring that so many folks have gotten into it... makes me optimistic about Reaper.
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Old 02-22-2018, 06:59 AM   #40
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We shall be using Reaper, together with DaVinci-Resolve for colouring and audio in our new post room. We have yet to decide on a video system. (Maybe Hit-Film with DaVinci-Resolve.)

Unfortunately, although Reaper is ideal for sync'ing ADR and lining up FX and Foleys, (stretch markers on mouse pointer and on one button!) it still does not have a 5.1 or 7.1 panner on the channel strip. Also, there do not seem to be any plans to make 3D sound (Atmos and/or DTS-X) run in Reaper.

If the OP has a deep involvement with MIDI and is making film scores, CuBase is really the system to go for, but just for the MIDI. Parent company Yamaha has always had a deep and long-lasting commitment to the music and audio industry.

Avid-ProTools? I dislike the company and I dislike the software even more, so AA-Translator to the rescue, if a PT project is insisted upon. Also, Avid remains on life-support and if certain figures in the industry did not demand its use, Avid would be gone in a heart-beat! I would be very reluctant to commit to a system from a company that is so deeply in debt that every piece of code, patent and IP has had to be handed over to its creditors! Q4 and annual results come out in about one month's time.
DaVinci is definitely one viable pathway, I wish them luck! I haven't yet played with it, but a couple people I trust have used it, and one loves it. As for surround in Reaper (or any stereo DAW), that's one reason why I keep PTHD around, but more for ingest and delivery, etc.

As for Cubase, as I mentioned, I'm very, very tired of Steinberg, after many years. They are right next to Avid in my list of least favorite companies. I do not trust them and they've burned me out. It would be a lot to swallow for me to go back. Doesn't matter to me about Yamaha's deep pockets. When they keep breaking things or releasing half-a$$ features, or flat out break promises, while adding more useless bloat to Cubase, I'd really rather give my money to another company. And Cubase never achieved "industry standard" level of acceptance like Pro Tools, so I can definitely live without it. The best they achieved was some big (and respected and honestly talented) composers/producers using it. And I do agree it is very powerful. But all that can be said about several other DAWs.

As for Avid, I agree that they are a terrible company, but Pro Tools will likely never disappear IMO. It's just too embedded in the industry, far too important for workflows for so many big budget kinds of projects, I just can't see it die. It may hit some big bumps in the road (and it already has), but it won't disappear. If Avid goes under, Pro Tools will become the crown jewel of some other company that comes in and buys up Avid's pieces. Or some Hollywood studio or production firm might buy it and just keep it running as a pet/boutique project for their own deeply embedded workflows and sell expensive upgrades/support. The IP is just too valuable. Pro Tools has grown beyond the scope of one stupid company (Avid) from being able to destroy it entirely. It's just too important to too many people, unfortunately. The only way Pro Tools dies is by slow attrition IMO, by pro users -- whole sub-markets -- migrating to another platform over years and years. And that will be very hard for them to do. And frankly, what's the REAL alternative for the big budgets? I will likely never escape it. So that's why I'll at least have it around for ingest and delivery for those clients that require it.
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