FL Studio 12.9 Beta 2.

[Z3R0T0N1N]

great vids, @xbitz
tnx for that!

[trancema]

I am afraid I tend to agree with other guys who are saying FL Studio is somewhat un-intuitive to work with.
I am using Logic since Emagic days and Ableton Live since v4.
(Now I am switching to Studio One instead of Logic and considering Bitwig instead of Live).
My studio partner is a FL studio user since early Fruity Loops days and I was always intrigued by FL and I always wanted to switch from Live to FL as it seemed way quicker to work with samples and construct simple beats at the beginning of making a track, but, unfortunately, that's where FL studio's advantage of faster workflow ends. FL has a great starting point canvas for quickly laying down beats, melodies and chords in loops, but when you need to pass that stage it was always a show-stopper for me as it required a lot of workarounds for patching individual channels to its mixer tracks and organizing channels into Playlist.
Also, working with sample loops and overall audio manipulating directly in Playlist view is really slow and time consuming, compared to "traditional"-style of DAW IMHO.
So when I am writing all this, it seems that, for me, the biggest downside is the Playlist window workflow where I would expect to act more like traditional daw approach and to be more "limited/constrained" (hardwired) with channels and audio clips.
I also found easier a traditional way of working with clips on timeline with resizing, creating fades, stretching and slicing clips directly with "smart-tool" aproach like Pro Tools, S1, Cubase and Logic has - depending where you grab your clip with standard mouse cursor, it switched to different tool automatically.
I also miss time selection "range" tool and while speaking of tools I find shortcuts for them very un-logical and it's a shame you can't customize it.
Overall, I am keeping my eyes on FL Studio and future updates and I think it is getting there, in right direction, but I would like to see more improvements for playlist workflow, especially with bigger projects when it starts to get messy and unorganized clutter as it has no boundaries where you are putting which clips, automation clips and patterns all over the place. It just takes too much time and clicks to organize everything logically and properly.
Sometimes limitations (hardwiring clips, mixer and playlist) are good to streamline your workflow and focus on music, not on workarounds.
In my opinion it's all about music creation process workflow, and DAW should be as transparent in that process as possible, not to be on the way and show-stopper in that creation, and so far I think S1 is the closest to that ideal, although not perfect as it has it's own problems and downsides but it relies more on traditional method of workflow, meanwhile Ableton and Bitwig are way more intutitive and straightforward to use of other non-linear approach of DAWs.
I would love to see FL Studio upgraded with some fresh new ideas for workflow and get more strict with workflow and more "opened" with customization of shortcuts and clip manipulation.
Thanks for reading this.

[pdxindy]

Sometimes limitations (hardwiring clips, mixer and playlist) are good to streamline your workflow and focus on music, not on workarounds.

Yeah... more modular hosts sound great in theory... in practice, an open ended architecture tends to have less smooth workflow. I prefer workflow over ultimate flexibility.

[xbitz]

Sometimes limitations (hardwiring clips, mixer and playlist) are good to streamline your workflow and focus on music, not on workarounds.

Yeah... more modular hosts sound great in theory... in practice, an open ended architecture tends to have less smooth workflow. I prefer workflow over ultimate flexibility.

ok ... hope it helps: let's create a very basic just for demonstration "song", this is the workflow of the latest beta (with modified preset files)



quite close to Bitwig/Ableton Live with the "Session view", btw picker grouping(auto/audio) also creates "Channel display filters" in the Channel-Rack, hope it helps to understand the logic behind the "FL pattern magic"

[Trancit]

...
Sometimes limitations (hardwiring clips, mixer and playlist) are good to streamline your workflow and focus on music, not on workarounds.
...

Amen brother...

The idea of FLS is great... but in practice, if your are working on a more complex project, it is near to impossible to get the job done without getting crazy... this is where FLS fails completely...
This is a quote from what I wrote in the IL forum and a good example:

Just a little example:

In a linear DAW, if you want to delete an automated instrument track with all it´s connections, you select the track and hit delete... done... in 2 steps...
Now counting in FLS:

Channelrack: searching and selecting the generator and delete = I count 3 steps for the search
Playlist: rightclick the track and choose delete = 2 steps (Only if you work in a more linear workflow and have one track reserved for one instrument ... if not there will follow numerous steps...)
rightclick all the automation tracks (let´s say 3) and choose delete = for 3 automation tracks = 6 steps

Pattern selector: find the corresponding pattern, select the and delete... = 3 steps (1 step for the search)
Pattern selector: click on the automation tab, this time let´s do "Select unused" and delete = 3 steps

Mixer: rightclick the corresponding mixer insert and go to "file" > "open mixer track state" > "Default" > "Open" , shift + mousewheel to bring the insert out of the used mixer inserts (if it´s in the middle, which often is )... = minimum 6 steps


These are 25 !!!!!!!!!!! steps compared to 2 steps in the linear DAW... at least....

We are talking about 2 seconds work in a linear DAW vs 3- 4 minutes work in FLS... and this is just one example...

The problems of FLS are too loose connections between the single parts...
The Mixer doesn´t know what the Channel Rack does, the Playlist doesn´t know what the Mixer does and the Channel Rack doesn´t know what any of them do...
It´s like having a frame, where you work with 3 seperate programs at the same time and where you can copy and paste a bit between them...
And that´s a real shame... such a great tool, tons of very useable plugins and unique features included, but at the end of the day you fly into a frenzy....

[xbitz]

^^^ the magic keyword is the 'Channel Display Filter' , grouping in Picker Panel also creates 'Channel Display Filters' without using it everything will be messy in no time, deleting: I'm not fanboi : deleting things really problematic (delete all elements in a Channel Filter with the affected mixer inserts + playlist tracks would solve it)

[Trancit]

^^^ the magic keyword is the 'Channel Display Filter' , grouping in Picker Panel also creates 'Channel Display Filters' without using it everything will be messy in no time, deleting: I'm not fanboi : deleting things really problematic (delete all elements in a Channel Filter with the affected mixer inserts + playlist tracks would solve it)

We already had the discussion over there ...

[xbitz]

yeppp the only diff is the new beta with multi-arrangement (it enables a AbletonLive/Bitwig like 'Session view' workflow, the video above...)

[tooneba]

deleting: I'm not fanboi : deleting things really problematic

Another thing that makes deleting things problematic is committing critical task can't undo. So those task will demand full attention when you are trying to do. This is the hardest part for me and creates so many redundant saving files to not lose work.

[xbitz]

^^^ FL can do it automatically >>

[tooneba]

I was using 5min for fear of draining HDD bandwidth. I will try.

[The_Hidden_Goose]

I just need 1 more feature now to stop me shopping around.

MPE support.

The more I use the Seaboard, the more I want to use it, and I can't in FL. I'm using the newer version of Tracktion that comes free with the Seaboard just to record the 5D parts, but I'm not keen on it so I'm looking at the other DAWs that support it.

I fear it'll come too late and I'll have gotten comfortable with another DAW by then, but I'd prefer to stick with FL if I can in the long run. Always found it way quicker, easier, more intuitive to do what I want with it. Having said that, I've been exposed to the changes over time so maybe I can't see how it would be to an absolute beginnner now.

[THE INTRANCER]

FLStudio reminds me of this, only a way more over complicated version of Music 2000 which was incidently pretty great in it's day and intuitive. I find it really weird that as a producer of Trance music for over 2 decades that FLStudio in 2017 makes me want to run away from it....now that's weird.

Here's a bit of nostalgia...

[The_Hidden_Goose]

Haha...I remember playing with Music 2000 on my brother's playstation. Everything sounded pretty generic on it - not enough sound design. The basic concept was cool for a games console though. I remember my bro getting some not-absolutely-terrible stuff from it.

Conversely to making trance and not liking FLS - I don't generally use beats at all, and it's always been my "toy"!

Most of my music starts with an indefinitely held note. I've yet to figure out how to do that in any other DAW I've played with, without having to draw a note so long I'll never get to the end of it. Which I find a pain. With FLS I can just click the first note on, press play, turn that note off and it'll keep playing it forever while I get the sound how I want it.

Such a simple thing. Maybe someone can tell me how to do that as quickly and easily on any other DAW without having to draw a (10 min+) long note or hold a key down manually...?

[T-CM11]

Haha...I remember playing with Music 2000 on my brother's playstation. Everything sounded pretty generic on it - not enough sound design. The basic concept was cool for a games console though. I remember my bro getting some not-absolutely-terrible stuff from it.

Conversely to making trance and not liking FLS - I don't generally use beats at all, and it's always been my "toy"!

Most of my music starts with an indefinitely held note. I've yet to figure out how to do that in any other DAW I've played with, without having to draw a note so long I'll never get to the end of it. Which I find a pain. With FLS I can just click the first note on, press play, turn that note off and it'll keep playing it forever while I get the sound how I want it.

Such a simple thing. Maybe someone can tell me how to do that as quickly and easily on any other DAW without having to draw a (10 min+) long note or hold a key down manually...?

In Cubase, I play the note, press the sustain pedal, select another channel. = endless note

Most of my hardware synths have a "hold" button, that's even easier.