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Old 10-03-2023, 01:32 PM   #1
MartinTL
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Default Wishes for a more pedagogical interface

I am a composer and teach composition and music technology at a music high school. I mostly use Ableton Live for teaching the students sampling, sound synthesis, modulation, mixing etc., for composition projects and live applications, but the students have to work on school computers because of the expensive licenses. Ideally, I would like to use a cheaper (but equally powerful) and tweakable program that they can afford to have on their own computers. My eyes are definitely on Reaper!

However. I have quite a few concerns about the default theme in the current pre-realeases, that have to do with visual aesthetics but first and foremost pedagogy and common functionalities - wanting the user interface of Reaper to be intuitive and understandable for newcomers, and for people migrating from other platforms. So here it goes, and I am sorry for not including everything I like (which is a lot!):

The track panel view
• ‘Input’ shouldn’t be hidden by default. If hidden, you either have to a) record arm or b) open the routing matrix to be able to set the appropriate input source. It introduces an unnecessary step, and can also cause feedback for unexperienced users when monitoring with speakers. It is a visible feature in most DAWs for a very good reason.
• ‘Trim’ shouldn’t be hidden by default. It should also have a hotkey, like “A” in most DAWs. It’s nice with hotkeys for volume and pan, but it makes more sense to have a hotkey for ‘show automation lane’. Then you could define the default parameter to be visible; volume or last touched parameter would be my choices, depending on the project).
• I think the ‘Record Monitoring’ button should be visible by default also when the track is unarmed, so you can set the monitoring option before arming the track.
• The lines on the pan- and volume pots look confusing; it almost looks like a curved arrow (line connecting with the dot). It should just be a (properly visible) dot, as it was before.
• The volume pot should be removeable in the theme adjuster (not integrated with the name slot). It also looks a bit weird having the record arm-button and the volume pot in each curved corner of the name slot.
• The “holes” next to the track number confuse me, and they introduce visual noise - especially when a track is unselected. Highlight color should be enough to indicate the selected track(s).
• The name slot should not be white on selected tracks, it takes a lot of visual attention. Should maybe just be a bit lighter shade of black.
• The flat, armed rec-icon looks ok; the unarmed icon doesn’t look very good. I don’t know exactly what it is – it looks bulky / bulging, the white circle is too thick, and there is too much shading in it. The main rec-button looks a lot better in comparison.
• When removing nested folder tracks, tracks are often labeled “track is last track in folder”. If a folder is empty, it should no longer be a folder - especially on folder ‘layer 0’.

Track panel view, automation lane:
• ‘Automation mode’ (read, latch, touch write etc.) should have its own menu, for example next to the hide/clear menu.
• It’s not very easy to see the difference between armed / unarmed automation lanes (and same problem here: the unarm button doesn't look great; bulging and over-shaded).
• The hide/clear menu should include “show all active track envelopes”, “hide all track envelopes”, “arm all visible track envelopes”, “disarm all track envelopes”, “show all visible track envelopes in envelope lanes (or media lane)” and “remove envelope”.
• “Clear envelope” / “remove envelope” does the same thing, one should be removed.
• When an active automation lane is visible (e.g. Volume) and you click the parameter name, the other track parameters and the FX and Send parameter submenus should be at the top of the dropdown menu.
• There should be “add / remove automation lane” buttons on each lane (e.g. plus and minus symbols). If you add lanes until there are no more available parameters, the plus-symbol could be grayed out.
• In the ‘Send Envelopes’ submenu, I’d rather see ‘Send Volume’ for all tracks at the top and other send parameters lower in the list, or another submenu per track send. I think ‘Send mute’ is unnecessary.
• On some effects, a few essential parameters should be available for automation (especially enabling / disabling a LPF and HPF in ReaEQ, or changing their type to a “Band”). That way, if you are done filtering a signal you could turn it completely off during a mix, instead of bypassing the effect or using a different ReaEQ instance.
• Parameter modulation parameters (LFO rate, strength, offset etc.) should be automatable (and one instance of parameter modulation should be able to modulate parameters in another instance, even across different tracks - but that is a topic for another day).

Mixer panel view
• Visible meter values (inf <-> 12 dBFS) and lines should always be the default setting; monitoring your levels is crucial even for experienced users.
• Placing the ‘Record arm’ button below the fader is a bit odd. The ‘Record Monitor’ icon should also be moved. I’d like to have them on the side with the trim and phase icons. This would allow the fader and the meter to be extended further down towards the track name. Default theme 5 and 6 are a lot more intuitive and functional here.
• Selecting a track makes the name field at the bottom white. It doesn't look good, and steals too much focus.
• The FX- and route-buttons should be placed below ‘Input’ and ‘In FX’, or between Input and Sends, so that all routing related options are gathered in the same area. This would allow the route-button to be labeled like in the track panel view (like in previous themes).
• Same comments as in the track panel view regarding the small dots / holes at the bottom.
• I think the fader transparency (that you can see the line through it) has always looked bad. The “depth” of the graphics, and the red and green reflections on the fader looks artificial.

I could of course make a template for my students, but I think a lot of these changes could make the default user interface better for a lot of users.

Thank you for reading, warm regards from Norway!
M.
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Old 10-04-2023, 12:16 AM   #2
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Welcome to the Reaper Forums !

A "pedagogical interface" seems to mean to suggest a dedicated workflow optimized for the specific kind of students and learning goals.
This is very viable, but Reaper is all about not to force/suggest any dedicated workflow, but have the user decide how to proceed.
But Reaper allows for extreme customization. That is why I suppose you can create a theme and some scripts that make Reaper more suitable for your goals than any other DAW.
You might want to post some of your "button placement", etc suggestions for the v7 default Theme in the "pre-relases" forum. I am sure White Tie will be listening. Anyway, there is no "optimum" layout (to be used as a default), but each user features his/her own preferences.

Last edited by mschnell; 10-04-2023 at 03:55 AM.
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Old 10-04-2023, 03:41 AM   #3
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Quote:
Originally Posted by MartinTL View Post
Modulation....
- but that is a topic for another day).
Yep !
In fact, IMHO, a DAW should not try to be a synthesizer. It should be able to host synthesizer plugins.

And here, Reaper really shines, as you can do JSFX plugins that can create and/or modulate audio in realtime.

There are many of those available in the stock distribution and in ReaPack (and "unorganized" elsewhere), some using the simple "jsfx stock" GUI and some featuring sophisticatedly designed GUIs.

Last edited by mschnell; 10-04-2023 at 03:57 AM.
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Old 10-04-2023, 03:51 AM   #4
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Quote:
Originally Posted by MartinTL View Post
I am a composer and teach composition and music technology at a music high school. I mostly use Ableton Live for teaching the students sampling, sound synthesis, modulation, mixing etc., for composition projects and live applications, but the students have to work on school computers because of the expensive licenses. Ideally, I would like to use a cheaper (but equally powerful) and tweakable program that they can afford to have on their own computers. My eyes are definitely on Reaper!

However. I have quite a few concerns about the default theme in the current pre-realeases, that have to do with visual aesthetics but first and foremost pedagogy and common functionalities - wanting the user interface of Reaper to be intuitive and understandable for newcomers, and for people migrating from other platforms. So here it goes, and I am sorry for not including everything I like (which is a lot!):

The track panel view
• ‘Input’ shouldn’t be hidden by default. If hidden, you either have to a) record arm or b) open the routing matrix to be able to set the appropriate input source. It introduces an unnecessary step, and can also cause feedback for unexperienced users when monitoring with speakers. It is a visible feature in most DAWs for a very good reason.
• ‘Trim’ shouldn’t be hidden by default. It should also have a hotkey, like “A” in most DAWs. It’s nice with hotkeys for volume and pan, but it makes more sense to have a hotkey for ‘show automation lane’. Then you could define the default parameter to be visible; volume or last touched parameter would be my choices, depending on the project).
• I think the ‘Record Monitoring’ button should be visible by default also when the track is unarmed, so you can set the monitoring option before arming the track.
• The lines on the pan- and volume pots look confusing; it almost looks like a curved arrow (line connecting with the dot). It should just be a (properly visible) dot, as it was before.
• The volume pot should be removeable in the theme adjuster (not integrated with the name slot). It also looks a bit weird having the record arm-button and the volume pot in each curved corner of the name slot.
• The “holes” next to the track number confuse me, and they introduce visual noise - especially when a track is unselected. Highlight color should be enough to indicate the selected track(s).
• The name slot should not be white on selected tracks, it takes a lot of visual attention. Should maybe just be a bit lighter shade of black.
• The flat, armed rec-icon looks ok; the unarmed icon doesn’t look very good. I don’t know exactly what it is – it looks bulky / bulging, the white circle is too thick, and there is too much shading in it. The main rec-button looks a lot better in comparison.
• When removing nested folder tracks, tracks are often labeled “track is last track in folder”. If a folder is empty, it should no longer be a folder - especially on folder ‘layer 0’.

Track panel view, automation lane:
• ‘Automation mode’ (read, latch, touch write etc.) should have its own menu, for example next to the hide/clear menu.
• It’s not very easy to see the difference between armed / unarmed automation lanes (and same problem here: the unarm button doesn't look great; bulging and over-shaded).
• The hide/clear menu should include “show all active track envelopes”, “hide all track envelopes”, “arm all visible track envelopes”, “disarm all track envelopes”, “show all visible track envelopes in envelope lanes (or media lane)” and “remove envelope”.
• “Clear envelope” / “remove envelope” does the same thing, one should be removed.
• When an active automation lane is visible (e.g. Volume) and you click the parameter name, the other track parameters and the FX and Send parameter submenus should be at the top of the dropdown menu.
• There should be “add / remove automation lane” buttons on each lane (e.g. plus and minus symbols). If you add lanes until there are no more available parameters, the plus-symbol could be grayed out.
• In the ‘Send Envelopes’ submenu, I’d rather see ‘Send Volume’ for all tracks at the top and other send parameters lower in the list, or another submenu per track send. I think ‘Send mute’ is unnecessary.
• On some effects, a few essential parameters should be available for automation (especially enabling / disabling a LPF and HPF in ReaEQ, or changing their type to a “Band”). That way, if you are done filtering a signal you could turn it completely off during a mix, instead of bypassing the effect or using a different ReaEQ instance.
• Parameter modulation parameters (LFO rate, strength, offset etc.) should be automatable (and one instance of parameter modulation should be able to modulate parameters in another instance, even across different tracks - but that is a topic for another day).

Mixer panel view
• Visible meter values (inf <-> 12 dBFS) and lines should always be the default setting; monitoring your levels is crucial even for experienced users.
• Placing the ‘Record arm’ button below the fader is a bit odd. The ‘Record Monitor’ icon should also be moved. I’d like to have them on the side with the trim and phase icons. This would allow the fader and the meter to be extended further down towards the track name. Default theme 5 and 6 are a lot more intuitive and functional here.
• Selecting a track makes the name field at the bottom white. It doesn't look good, and steals too much focus.
• The FX- and route-buttons should be placed below ‘Input’ and ‘In FX’, or between Input and Sends, so that all routing related options are gathered in the same area. This would allow the route-button to be labeled like in the track panel view (like in previous themes).
• Same comments as in the track panel view regarding the small dots / holes at the bottom.
• I think the fader transparency (that you can see the line through it) has always looked bad. The “depth” of the graphics, and the red and green reflections on the fader looks artificial.

I could of course make a template for my students, but I think a lot of these changes could make the default user interface better for a lot of users.

Thank you for reading, warm regards from Norway!
M.
Interesting points to which I really have nothing to add since it's a FR but you do know that Reaper comes with Theme Adjuster (Options->Themes->Theme Adjuster) that will help some of the issues you mention - mostly what is visible and what is not? You may have to pre-set things for your student but I guess that's better than waiting for them to implement anything.


Yours,
PW
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Old 10-04-2023, 05:10 AM   #5
MartinTL
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Quote:
Originally Posted by mschnell View Post
Welcome to the Reaper Forums !

A "pedagogical interface" seems to mean to suggest a dedicated workflow optimized for the specific kind of students and learning goals.
This is very viable, but Reaper is all about not to force/suggest any dedicated workflow, but have the user decide how to proceed.
But Reaper allows for extreme customization. That is why I suppose you can create a theme and some scripts that make Reaper more suitable for your goals than any other DAW.
You might want to post some of your "button placement", etc suggestions for the v7 default Theme in the "pre-relases" forum. I am sure White Tie will be listening. Anyway, there is no "optimum" layout (to be used as a default), but each user features his/her own preferences.
Thank you!

I get your point about not forcing or steering the workflow towards how a newcomer or student might approach or understand the program, and that is not my wish either - Ableton is horrible in this regard, I think. I guess some of my remarks are about what makes 'common sense': e.g. that everything that has to do with routing is located in the same place both in the mixer and the track view, that you are able to set the input source before arming a track input, that track parameters available for automation are located at the top of the menu to avoid menu diving, that setting the arming mode for automation has its own button / menu, having a hotkey for showing the automation lane instead of just volume / pan, that the level markers beside the VU meter are visible by default, and so on. It's more about what features and functionalities you would expect in any other DAW or on any old or new audio mixer.

Some of my comments on the visual aesthetics are admittedly more subjective, like how the arm button and fader looks, regarding the 'hole'/dot on the selected track etc.


Quote:
Originally Posted by mschnell View Post
Yep !
In fact, IMHO, a DAW should not try to be a synthesizer. It should be able to host synthesizer plugins.

And here, Reaper really shines, as you can do JSFX plugins that can create and/or modulate audio in realtime.

There are many of those available in the stock distribution and in ReaPack (and "unorganized" elsewhere), some using the simple "jsfx stock" GUI and some featuring sophisticatedly designed GUIs.
Interesting point about a DAW not being a synthesizer, I can agree. But there is a difference between not designing Reaper with this in mind, and actually not being able to use Reaper this way, which is the case today (I know you can use parameter modulation, but you can't modulate modulators, from one track to another or access other Reaper parameters (volume, pan, sends etc.). Cross-modulation (for example a flexible global parameter modulations matrix) is not just something you can use for synthesizers, you could use it for more modern, advanced and musical mixing techniques. Using a gate trigger signal to duck the VCA on another track, setting up a network of LFOs that modulate each others rates, depths, amplitudes, offsets, smoothness etc. between effects (maybe you want the rate of the chorus in one synth to affect the rate of the LFO adjusting the tremolo on the guitars, etc.). I think this functionality should at least exist in Reaper, even if you have to activate it yourself.


Quote:
Originally Posted by Pink Wool View Post
Interesting points to which I really have nothing to add since it's a FR but you do know that Reaper comes with Theme Adjuster (Options->Themes->Theme Adjuster) that will help some of the issues you mention - mostly what is visible and what is not? You may have to pre-set things for your student but I guess that's better than waiting for them to implement anything.
Yes, I am starting to realize that the best way is probably to choose a different theme, tweak it, make toolbars with scripts (like normalization etc.) and make a template that I can distribute. However, it would be really nice that some of the features I describe was in the default theme, like the ones I mentioned in my first reply to mschnell above.
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Old 10-04-2023, 05:34 AM   #6
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Quote:
Originally Posted by MartinTL View Post
'common sense': everything that has to do with [........] is located in the same place
That's an important aspect for all software and that's why UI/UX designers exist. The Reaper devs are notorious for not considering this, hence why there are so many complaints about the Reaper interface and difficulties for new users trying to make sense of Reaper (unless the defaults happen to match their workflow). A comprehensive redesign of the Reaper UI that makes it easier to navigate, find and configure things, as well as look more polished and less intimidating, is likely in some shape or another the most common feature request, yet one of the least likely to ever be done. We get one of the (if not the) most flexible and powerful DAWs in existence for basically the price of a hamburger a year (divide 60$/ approx. 8 years of license coverage), so a catch must be there and that's simply the interface. Sometimes I feel almost like the need for a well laid out interface is ignored on purpose to give Reaper an achilles heel and allow other DAWs to exist.

Just a little example of what would be possible by even just aligning elements in Reaper's windows:

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Old 10-04-2023, 07:00 AM   #7
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There are many options in Reaper that require hands-on optimization.
Custom actions, custom themes, SWS extensions, scripts, and more.
Newcomers only need to use optimized configurations instead of starting from scratch.
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Old 10-04-2023, 07:15 AM   #8
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I'll said it again; that's the way to do it!
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Old 10-04-2023, 07:40 AM   #9
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I know you can use parameter modulation, but you can't modulate modulators, from one track to another or access other Reaper parameters (volume, pan, sends etc.).
... I think this functionality should at least exist in Reaper, even if you have to activate it yourself.
You can modulate parameters from Midi CCs (including 14 bit high resolution and there are many ways to create and route such midi streams (including using plugins <e.g. JSFX> to create / moduate such midi information).

As an example I did a "humanizing" plugin that creates a random (but sophistically tweakable) stream of Midi CCs that can be used for complex parameter modulation. I. e. a CC "synthesizer". Nice to create fake voice doubling .

Another source of fun is ReaPack->ReaRack: a modular synthesizer that provides complex LFO features that can generate CCs. (I did not try this myself.)

Of course simple CC LFO JSFX plugins are standard in Reaper stock.

In fact, Midi CC is the ways to go with complex modulation and this is very well supported in Reaper.

Last edited by mschnell; 10-05-2023 at 12:17 AM.
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Old 10-04-2023, 02:23 PM   #10
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Additional thoughts regarding parameter modulation:

For parameter modulation in appropriate application same needs to feature the same timing specification as the audio stream. This is called "sample accurate".

With VST2 plugins parameter modulation is not sample accurate by design.

VST3 can (but by far not all plugins do) work sample accurate with the plugin DAW parameters.

JSFXes can (but by far most don't) work sample accurate with the plugin DAW parameters.

In some tests I found that Reaper does not seem to work sample accurate with (correctly designed) JSFXes when parameter modulation is driven by Midi CCs (but seemingly this works correctly when the parameter modulation is driven by a stored envelope).

I could not yet test if VST3s work sample accurate with Midi driven parameter modulation (as I don't have an appropriate SDK - JUCE does not do this - and I want to convert to Rust, anyway).

So this is still a moving target.... Hence using plugins with direct Midi input (e.g. for volume control) is a more safe method.

Last edited by mschnell; 10-05-2023 at 12:19 AM.
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