DAWBench Radio Show interview with Claes Johanson of Bitwig

[T71]

https://youtu.be/houpsukl6P8

[carlca]

I'm surprised that Antic604 hasn't commented on this yet; I know he was eagerly awaiting the broadcast! I listened to the entire hour and a half last night and it was quite entertaining in parts, although the interview did drag in places when the topic of conversation became just a tad too much to do with 64 and 128 thread limits on types of processors! I'm sure that Claes was showing signs of struggling at some points!

Ultimately, it was a worthwhile exercise, and I don't think we need to worry about MS taking control of Bitwig in any way (I hope those words don't come back to haunt me ).

[antic604]

I'm surprised that Antic604 hasn't commented on this yet...

I did: viewtopic.php?p=8066178#p8066178

[SLiC]

I also listened to it all but found it a bit dull TBH, I was hoping for some info on the update!
The only thing I found interesting was that Bitwig were on with Microsoft!

[carlca]

I'm surprised that Antic604 hasn't commented on this yet...

I did: viewtopic.php?p=8066178#p8066178

I spotted that as soon as I had posted the above message. To be fair, I think you posted that while I was composing my message

[antic604]

I spotted that as soon as I had posted the above message. To be fair, I think you posted that while I was composing my message

Could be

[carlca]

I spotted that as soon as I had posted the above message. To be fair, I think you posted that while I was composing my message

Could be

No harm done, hey?

[antic604]

One unintended consequence of Claes giving that interview was that I also listened to the one with Justin Frankel and I decided to give a fair & honest try to Reaper. Perhaps it'll "click" with me this time

[SLiC]

One unintended consequence of Claes giving that interview was that I also listened to the one with Justin Frankel and I decided to give a fair & honest try to Reaper. Perhaps it'll "click" with me this time

As long as you like lots of windows, check boxes and drop down menus

I like they have no track types, Its cool its fully customisable, but ultimately its a lean and functional DAW....I don't use it as its doesn't add any thing and other DAWS I already own have, and other DAWS do things Reaper doesn't do...so it just doesn't ever get opened...it really reminds me of Cubase at about V6.

[Dionysos]

Perhaps it'll "click" with me this time

The crazy thing about Reaper is that if it doesn't, you can almost make it click with you. It's easy to fall into that rabbit hole and spend more time trying to tweak it to optimise your workflow than actually using it.

I was doing a lot of audio recording years ago, and had it set up with custom keyboard shortcuts and macros to make my specific recording workflow an absolute joy. I love the way that clips on a single track can overlap in Reaper, the "single item at a time per track" model of Bitwig can feel really limiting in comparison.

Reaper doesn't do much for me as a creative tool, though, which is what I'm more interested in these days, so I haven't used it for quite a while now. But if I needed a recording workhorse again, I wouldn't hesitate to go back to it. I'd just schedule in a few weeks beforehand for customisation.

[backtomusic]

Perhaps it'll "click" with me this time

The crazy thing about Reaper is that if it doesn't, you can almost make it click with you. It's easy to fall into that rabbit hole and spend more time trying to tweak it to optimise your workflow than actually using it.

....
Reaper doesn't do much for me as a creative tool

But it can be set up as a creative tool too, but again this is a lot of work

Like you say, it won't click with anyone per defaul since it's pretty mucg setup for audio-work only.. not midi. But if you work with midi then you have a lot of time to invest in setting up mouse modifiers in differnt context, reading up om actions and wiring them to shortcuts, toolbars and contextual toolbars.

Then you have to research non native scripts and actions, because there you will find things for dealing with cc/velocity in a more intuitive way.

And you have to set up at least one screenset with the "track inspector" view which makes it more efficient. Thats the trick where you dock a mixer to the left and only displays one track at a time.. the one you have selected in arranger. That way you have access to sends and "macros" without having a large zoom in on track panels in the arranger.

And for midi you really have too tweak the preferences in several aspects. For example "Add virtual instrument track" is super annoying if you use multi-out vsti:s a lot. Regular tracks can be set up to auto-arm on select and monitor midi, which they don't do in the default install.

There is much that isn't wired up in shortcuts or toolbars or mouse modifiers by default. For example the new feature Razor Edit ins't wired at all, so to use it you have to wire it up yourself.

If you go down this rabbit hole, remember to install Reaper as a Portable install. That way you copy the install folder, experiment with preferences, shortcut etc.. and if you don't want to commit to the changes, just delete the folder and go back to the old one. There isn't actually any benefit of not installing portable that I know of. But a portable install can make you have different tailored installations for working with midi or audio if you want to.

[pdxindy]

The crazy thing about Reaper is that if it doesn't, you can almost make it click with you.

Anything I have to make click with me, is never gonna click with me.

I like Reaper, think it is a valuable addition to the DAW world and glad we have it as a choice... and it is not for me.