Beta testers for DAW/tracker software (Precyne V1.2)

[El°HYM]

*subscribed*

[Andrei Marchenko]

What can it do that Renoise can't?

Probably the biggest differences to Renoise are:
1. Proper linear arrangement view of your clips, just like a real modern DAW should have.
2. A good clip launcher view.
3. Clear, uncluttered and intuitive UI.

Then there are lots of small details which were designed and developed with hardware/hybrid studio setup users in mind who are the core demography this software is aimed at.

In my personal opinion Renoise's UI is very intuitive and convenient. But! I have only one thing with this DAW – automation still attached to a pattern. You can't create automation line of any parameter across two or more patterns C'mon... 2023.

[Kraku]

What can it do that Renoise can't?

Probably the biggest differences to Renoise are:
1. Proper linear arrangement view of your clips, just like a real modern DAW should have.
2. A good clip launcher view.
3. Clear, uncluttered and intuitive UI.

Then there are lots of small details which were designed and developed with hardware/hybrid studio setup users in mind who are the core demography this software is aimed at.

In my personal opinion Renoise's UI is very intuitive and convenient. But! I have only one thing with this DAW – automation still attached to a pattern. You can't create automation line of any parameter across two or more patterns C'mon... 2023.

Such automations are a planned feature of Precyne for future updates.

[skyscape]

Great to see a new tracker in development, especially one that is forward thinking - a lot of cool trackers out there but many of them seem to be aiming for retro/nostalgic sensibilities. I adore Renoise (warts and all) def good to have alternatives though.

[Kraku]

I added a short tutorial video in the original post. It's the same video as below:

[? ? ?]

A couple of features that would compete with Renoise:
1. The ability to set exclusive BPM and line steps to individual tracks.
2. Along with the standard forward playback, allow reverse and random playback of a track (also with the option to have exclusive playback selection per track).

[wasi]

Bought before testing even, very nice.

I realize you're focused on midi hardware, but any chance of CLAP or VST? I know it's probably a can of worms but it's still a pretty big limitation. Just being able to use a VST instrument instead of a hardware (with the same restrictions) would be huge.

[Kraku]

A couple of features that would compete with Renoise:
1. The ability to set exclusive BPM and line steps to individual tracks.
2. Along with the standard forward playback, allow reverse and random playback of a track (also with the option to have exclusive playback selection per track).

1. You can set rows per beat for each clip separately. As you can play as many clips in parallel as you want (one per track), that should enable you to achieve what you're looking for, at least in musically most relevant contexts. Also each clip can have 1-512 steps. The step counts aren't limited to 2^n sizes. So that also enables you to create all sorts of wild polyrhythms.

2. Could you elaborate what you'd like to achieve with this feature? Is it smaller part of some workflow to achieve something else or in general more of a randomizer to the song so you can record and/or jam with it without knowing exactly what comes next? I'm interested in learning about the use cases for this feature so I can decide better if it fits this software and if it does, if there would be some other feature (or combination of features) which would allow the same thing more easily / usefully.

As Precyne has traditional tracker style tracks inside the patterns AND also has DAW style tracks, where the MIDI clips themselves are located, I should come up with a different word for those two types of tracks to be able to more easily talk about them. Any ideas what they could be called to make them clear which "tracks" are being discussed at any given time?

[Kraku]

Bought before testing even, very nice.

I realize you're focused on midi hardware, but any chance of CLAP or VST? I know it's probably a can of worms but it's still a pretty big limitation. Just being able to use a VST instrument instead of a hardware (with the same restrictions) would be huge.

I've thought about adding VST, but now that you mentioned CLAP, that might be a much better idea. I'm fairly sure I will at some point add VST effect support, not sure when. Could be soon, could be at later time. I'm not 100% sure yet about the third party instrument plugin side. That being said, there is probably a reason why Reason (heh) added VSTi support on top of their own native plugin system. Before I make the decision to support third party instruments (and not just effects), I need to first think through what exactly I'd like my own instrument system to be able to do if I added more of them into the software, instead of just having couple of sample manglers.

I want the instruments to take full advantage of what programming and modulation capabilities trackers are able to do. In addition to that I'd like to explore if there are some unused but very useful and powerful music production methods/ideas that could be implemented with my own instrument system, which are not at all possible with existing ones. I.e. "tightly integrated systems", instead of regular separate instruments.

My advantage in this is that I don't have any legacy baggage in this area in my DAW, so I can go as wild and creative in this area as I want at this point. All the other DAWs on the market rely on older technology and thus their designs are forced to stay in the old school land. I want to see what could be possible and very useful to have in a modern DAW. If there is nothing too useful which would warrant my own instrument system, then I can just decide to use VSTi/CLAP instead. But before that, I can't make the decision one way or another.

[wasi]

I totally see that, that's why I'd envision the CLAP instruments basically being treated like the hardware midi devices, i.e. you can just send midi their way. But I see you have a lot in mind and you definitely have to be careful adding something like VSTi because then you suddenly need to support it going forward. For that reason alone I'd consider just using CLAP. It's a smaller universe in a completely open system and you have a niche product anyway, so it's not like you're losing very many customers by not carrying the entire VST/VSTi universe.

Is the sampler instrument seen in the video available in the beta or just a placeholder? v1.0.0.0 only has midi I guess.

[? ? ?]

2. Could you elaborate what you'd like to achieve with this feature?

It adds another ability to experiment and hear what the outcome is. Small abilities like these can possibly alter the song's structure in a whole new direction.

Any ideas what they could be called to make them clear which "tracks" are being discussed at any given time?

How about:
1. Clip tracks refer to the MIDI clips
2. TP tracks refer to "Tracker Pattern" tracks.

I.e. "tightly integrated systems", instead of regular separate instruments

This is the way to go. One integrated app where one has no need to involve their time with separate installations and keeping files in order with customized user presets etc etc. Propellerheads had the right idea with Reason it's just IMHO their instruments sound like crap.
With Renoise, the sampler is dynamite gold. It allows one to load a VST and resample created presets as a Renoise instrument. I never have to worry about using the VST while writing/performing and all the work gets saved under one app. So if for any reason the VST goes straight to hell, i'm all good since the sounds were saved under Renoise.
If you go this integrated route, the big key is to make sure the instruments and effects are worth ditching third party plug-ins. Reason Studios cannot compete with what third party VSTs produce hence why I believe they added VST support; to stay alive.

[Kraku]

Is the sampler instrument seen in the video available in the beta or just a placeholder? v1.0.0.0 only has midi I guess.

The video was made using V1.2 beta version which has the sampler in it. So no placeholders were used. Everything you saw was the real deal

[Kraku]

2. Could you elaborate what you'd like to achieve with this feature?

It adds another ability to experiment and hear what the outcome is. Small abilities like these can possibly alter the song's structure in a whole new direction.

Hmm, I need to do some research/testing in actual music production project before I can say if that's something that would fit this software or not.

How about:
1. Clip tracks refer to the MIDI clips
2. TP tracks refer to "Tracker Pattern" tracks.

Or maybe "song tracks" and "clip tracks"?
Those would be in line with rest of the terminology I've been using in the manuals etc. I Have intentionally avoided using the word "pattern" as that's kind of a legacy term from the past. Even though trackers technically use patterns, what first timers see on the screen are the "MIDI clips". So it's easier to just tell them that those are MIDI clips instead of trying to explain that they're also patterns.

I.e. "tightly integrated systems", instead of regular separate instruments

This is the way to go. One integrated app where one has no need to involve their time with separate installations and keeping files in order with customized user presets etc etc. Propellerheads had the right idea with Reason it's just IMHO their instruments sound like crap.
With Renoise, the sampler is dynamite gold. It allows one to load a VST and resample created presets as a Renoise instrument. I never have to worry about using the VST while writing/performing and all the work gets saved under one app. So if for any reason the VST goes straight to hell, i'm all good since the sounds were saved under Renoise.
If you go this integrated route, the big key is to make sure the instruments and effects are worth ditching third party plug-ins. Reason Studios cannot compete with what third party VSTs produce hence why I believe they added VST support; to stay alive.

Open market plugins are in advantage for the sole reason that there is a huge number of developers actively doing research and development for all those products. If no third party plugins would be used, then it's essential to ensure that the few included plugins will be of very good quality and highly usable. Also it'll be important that other features in the software will support easy use of external HW effects units, as the core demography will be hybrid/HW studio setup users, i.e. super easy and fast sampling/resampling and routing of signals between HW gear is a high priority for the design. Precyne already does this, so the main question is: how to expand and enhance the design based on the same ideology?

[wasi]

Supporting plugins has the added advantage that you can run a setup with a suitable software instrument and then just swap it out for hardware. I don't feel it's a good idea to take on the task of offering extensive software instruments in the box. The trackers that did this typically have the very clear and limited scope of emulating classic devices or software.

SunVox is pretty much the only tracker in active development I can think of that has an extensive software instrument suite in the box and is not emulation-focused.

[mcbpete]

If this DAW allowed me to do this by dragging clips from the clip view to any other DAW I'd buy it immediately, maybe twice

(skip to 2min 20sec)