Skinning the colour of level meters and the bar indicator strip.

[Simon Posford]

Hi,
Mulab look very good especially with the skins made by users , i have modified some of them but the only things that we cannot change is the colour of the level meter and the white strip at the top.
It would be good to have skinning facilities on these parts.
it seems that is hard coded like ableton live, Tracktion or EXT XD.
If you do this Mulab 'll be 100% skinnable!
Thx.

(I plan to buyt it soon even without thes skinning feature great job for this fantastic DAW.)

Edit: maybe ability to remove the 3d ish effect on the audio/midi parts and midi notes and why not a skinning feature so the part can be rounded like some other daws.

[pljones]

Edit: maybe ability to remove the 3d ish effect on the audio/midi parts and midi notes and why not a skinning feature so the part can be rounded like some other daws.

There needs to be some indication as to whether a part's content has only one reference or many references. The "3d-ish effect" is there as a fairly subtle way of doing this without extra UI clutter. I can't imagine how you could put something like that into the skinning system but I'd be happily proved wrong - this was more to explain what it's doing, in case you weren't aware!

[liquidsound]

The only reason I like the ability to change the Parts shape is for Shared vs Unique parts. Having the corners Rounded or Squared gives an immediate feedback on the Part's type.

That much is not really going to give extra UI clutter but a better snapshot of the parts.

[pljones]

Having the corners Rounded or Squared gives an immediate feedback on the Part's type.

...And some skins would stick with the existing settings, some would invert the meanings, some would use different 3d curved settings, some would switch between curved and square but you'd never remember which meant what! (But I know what you mean -- just I can see it being even more confusing than now for users unfamiliar with what's being indicated.)

[liquidsound]

Well...
You've forgot Free Will and Personal Use of those features.

Where do you draw the line....?
I understand beginners but I also understand IQ, unless it's undetectable in a Newcomer which a doubt it very much.

I agree that a GUI it's a real challenge in order to keep it easy and clear, but confusion is too personal.

I get confused with a VCR programming but I can write giant CAD system and databases protocols. Go figure!

[pljones]

True, true - and whilst I'm imagining I'd get confused, I often get that wrong! I'm more thinking about trying to explain something to someone and having to think through all the possibilities of what they're seeing vs what you're seeing. As it is such a subtle effect, the description needs to be clear. I suppose you could say "Set the skin to LooxPhat; "shared parts" are indented, "unique parts" aren't" (is that the right way around?) then leave the user to go figure how their chosen skin displays the same information.

[liquidsound]

Or maybe end up like Apple Computers. They set up guide lines and that's it!

No bad the idea of Skin Details upon choosing though.

BTW, Me too I get lost explaining things until someone gets it and by then I lost it!

[TheGuysanIdiot]

Hi All,

The new skins are indeed excellent alternatives to the default LooxPhat which is also an excellent skin.

We currently have a number of them to toggle between. Some users like dark skins and some like light skins and yes as we age our eyes loose the ability to focus correctly and font size etc can be an issue for some.

When I need to post a screen shot I always quickly set my skin back to LooxPhat if I am currently using an alternative skin. This way I know that ALL users have LooxPhat and can then see what I am describing. So I am basically doing what pljones was saying earlier.

I am sure the skin numbers will grow and we will see more hybrid type skins. So when explaining issues it is easy to flip back to the default LooxPhat on both your MU.LAB and that of the newbie etc when discussing complex issues.

While I am here I also would like to applaud the work of ALL the skin designers also.

OZ

[Simon Posford]

Hi,
I don' t understood all of you're answers but i think 3d ish can be easyly droped without interrupt workflow (see samplitude per eg).
But i was asking too for colour of level meter and strip bar at the top...

[mutools]

I don' t understood all of you're answers but i think 3d ish can be easyly droped without interrupt workflow (see samplitude per eg).

Can you please post a screenshot demonstrating what you mean. Thanks.

But i was asking too for colour of level meter

The level meters will be even more skinnable in MU.LAB 3.x.
Can't give more details about versioning and timing at this point, besides it will be at latest in version 3.5.

and strip bar at the top...

Which strip bar do you mean?

[Simon Posford]

Thx for the answer!
Sure here a screenshot:

Good to hear that the level meter 'll be skinnable.

[mutools]

Ok, i see what you mean. Added to the whishlist.

[Eggu]

an add. proposal regarding design
(which might no be directly a matter of skin):

When selecting a part, this selection is shown by getting rather dark.
I do not like, that then is is difficult to see e.g. the midi notes.
Is there an alternative making a part selection visible ?

[Simon Posford]

Ok, i see what you mean. Added to the whishlist.

Thank You very much!

[liquidsound]

an add. proposal regarding design
(which might no be directly a matter of skin):

When selecting a part, this selection is shown by getting rather dark.
I do not like, that then is is difficult to see e.g. the midi notes.
Is there an alternative making a part selection visible ?

That's true sometime. But to have a choosen color for "Selection" could make it more difficult if too close to the random color chosen by MuLab.
Maybe a better idea is to have the user pick the Selected color as well the note's color without keeping adding a new random color each time.
Color tones are very important in the sequencer for organization but note's color variations is not relevant because:

1 the background is always the same

2 you can not organize notes as you do with the Parts, hence different colors are not an advantage and one color for all notes in all the Parts is better and it gives the user the choice of contrast between Unselected and select notes.

3 and if you really want to be "colorful" you can always change them as you like.... later