Let‘s speculate about 6.0

[coroknight]

Blender is an artist tool which means most of the community can’t code, yet it supports python scripting and that capability has proven invaluable for both users and the community.

Why? Because it allows extending the features of the application itself. Users can even share their code with others and bundle it up as a plugin. Entire workflows like retopology become so much more powerful compared to what comes out of the box.

The DAW community is so accustomed to a rigid idea of plugins that many don’t even realize what could be possible if you could extend the DAW beyond audio processing plugins like VSTs and CLAP.

Personally I’d love to be able to download new, community driven features for Bitwig and I think those arguing against it are getting too caught up in the coding part.

[tumface]

I actually really agree with that.

[slackhead]

By the time I make such a script ....

By the time I make such a script I've forgotten why I started it.

[monolithx]

If the Grid aims to compete directly with MaxForLive it badly needs scripting and UI customisation capabilities. Without these features it would feel like a bit of an incomplete project imo.

Also an API to automate the arranger, devices, mixer etc would be my personal dream, but that's never gonna happen I'm afraid.

I would add powerful MIDI and VST parameters management.
Unfortunately as said, defintely, " an incomplete project", as vast majority doesn't seriously cares about live performance...

[xbitz]

nah, Ableton Live 12.2 to be released June 11 so...

[monolithx]

Unfortunately, I was hyped by the "better than Live" next generation DAW marketing, as I didn't like MAX integration in Live in past versions.

[id4kvr]

"better than live" is a good one.

[Dionysos]

Looks like the Summer Sale is next on the Bitwig marketing plan: https://www.bitwig.com

How likely is it that the v6 announcement will coincide with the sale?

[Chameleonman]

Looks like the Summer Sale is next on the Bitwig marketing plan: https://www.bitwig.com

How likely is it that the v6 announcement will coincide with the sale?

It's actually possible, because there will be a long lasting beta period and many might want to wait until it's ready, unless there's a sale going on.

[SamDi]

What do you exactly mean with smarter? What can you do quicker or more elegant, what doesn‘t work in AL?

For example, you can draw a pitch envelope directly onto the audio events,

That's the same in AL too

change the stretch mode per event,

I see, that's a feature not possible in AL. You would need it to do in AL in seperate clips. Though I have problems understanding the big benefit. Do you really use that so often. And once I've stretched a clip to my needs, why would I want to keep it open, beeing able to change it for forever, instead of comitting and bouncing it?
But OK, point for BW

quantize audio events w/ swing (!), etc.,

I find that swing system rather limited. To have the grooves in AL is one of the most advanced system for groove patterns IMHO.

You can also edit audio events across multiple disparate tracks side-by-side in the detail editor, without having to move tracks around in the arrangement view.

Yeah that's nice

The onset system is fast once you get used to it. The tools let you add and remove the markers easily and quickly, much faster than Live, once you spend a few minutes to figure it out.

Why should it be faster to add or remove markers? It's pretty much the same.

In Live, once you add stretch markers, they are always on and engaged, and manipulating them affects the rest of the clip. So, you have to keep slicing the clip up into more and more pieces when you need unstretched areas or to change the stretch mode in certain parts. Bitwig lets you have onset markers and not do anything with them until they're needed.

Sorry I am not aware. How can you keep markers and kind od deactivate them?

Also, in Bitwig, the onset markers can snap to events and stuff in tracks, can be quantized/grooved, and probably more stuff I can't think of.

I kind of tried that out, but didn't work (snapping markers to grid of arrangement window). What's the precondition?

More interoperability with Ableton is not possible except as a collaboration between companies. That is not something Bitwig can do by itself. Ableton would have to want to do it too. I would rather Bitwig not spend time catering to Live users and would rather Bitwig focus on improving Bitwig.

Not sure. I mean BW can load already AL projects, so why not the other way around and save them? At least the track structure with rendered audio and external plugins loaded with the right parameters.

Bitwig cannot work as well with Push as Ableton can. Moss has done about as good a job as possible and Bitwig isn't going to be doing significantly better than Moss did. Ableton has shaped their software to fit the Push hardware.

Why should a fulltime-team of engineers not beeing able todo a better job, than a freetime-project one-man-show? The limitation of features of Push with BW is limited because of BW, not because of Push being closed or bad documented. It would be possible to draw waveforms of e.g. Sampler also in BW.
You could argue, that BW should make their own HW, but I think BW is too nichy to sell HW as a banger. NOt many wold buy that, I guess. But with full (or even better than AL) Push support, making BW even more an instrument than a DAW could increase selling numbers (I guess).

It is also not in Bitwig's control how well Bitwig is supported by 3rd party manufacturers. Those companies automatically support Live because it is by far the most used DAW. Bitwig can put effort in that direction, which they do, but again, that is a decision that is up to the manufacturers, not Bitwig.

Not exact control, but maybe influence. I think that's a matter of promotion and agreements with 3rd party suppliers. Or they can offer to support with dev capacity.

Ableton Live has advantages simply because it is the industry standard.

No not simply that. It is a really great DAW and there are things, I rate higher or better implpented than in BW. I would not say one is better over the other. Bitwig has many things, improved better over AL. But there are also many things, where BW can't reach.

One of those advantages is that lots of users have developed expectations/workflows of how things are done based on Live. IMO, Bitwig should not spend time trying to be more like Live because Live will always be better at being Live than another DAW can be.

Yes, this is somehow true. But you may not forget, that BW cloned AL for 80%, so the perception is, that it tries to be the better AL.

And as I mentioned before, you can bundle all of this inside of clips that go in the arrangement view and are easier to arrange, instead of tons of micro-edits that sit directly in the arrangement and are difficult to move around, loop, and that sort of thing. You can also crossfade the audio events within a clip without fading the clip itself, you can have crossfades extend outside of an audio event, nondestructive audio reversing, snapping anchors on both sides of events and clips... tons of useful stuff. It's so, so much better to work with, in my opinion.

and

When it comes to audio editing, Ableton and Bitwig have a fundamental difference. Bitwig audio clips are containers which can contain multiple audio events. This has some advantages and some disadvantages compared to Live. For me, the advantages outweigh the disadvantages.

Personally, I think audio editing in Bitwig is much better than Live. In Live it is not even possible to edit an audio clip in Session view. You have to drag a copy of the clip to arrange, make some edits, consolidate that into a single clip (losing your edits) and drag it back into Session view. In Bitwig, I can edit the audio clip right in the Clip Launcher and my edits can still be changed anytime.

I didn't use BW for months. I made a short comparison some days ago and I think it's relatively on par:
1.) I like in AL better, that you can directly shape the envelopes on the clips and have not to go to the inspector for that
2.) I like in BW better, that you can directly set the gain on the clips and have not to go to the clip parameters
3.) BW shows an updated audio curve after changin volume curve. AL does not
4.) The additional layer of having audio events in the clip, could be an advantage. But I still think it's not completely good implemented. E.g. you cannot drag&drop an BW clip directly to e.g. a sampler or synth - you need to drag the audio event itself. Or what I miss also, that you can drag an audio event to the library and save it as sample-file directly there.
5.) I didn't test, but as far as I remember AL was much better to load complete tracks and recognizing tempo, beats and upbeats directly. It was also much easier to adjust, if there were errors.

But I have to admit, as I stated, that it is messy implemented, that this isn't true, maybe they have changed some things to the better or I was in a strange mood. Anyway, I wish personally that they improve the DAW in the next version and not just adding further instruments and Fx. I personally would wish to hide tracks and save different sets for that. Also better marker support would be appreciated from my side. And not to forget to have predefined automation shapes as in AL.

[pdxindy]

Bitwig cannot work as well with Push as Ableton can. Moss has done about as good a job as possible and Bitwig isn't going to be doing significantly better than Moss did. Ableton has shaped their software to fit the Push hardware.

Why should a fulltime-team of engineers not beeing able todo a better job, than a freetime-project one-man-show? The limitation of features of Push with BW is limited because of BW, not because of Push being closed or bad documented. It would be possible to draw waveforms of e.g. Sampler also in BW.
You could argue, that BW should make their own HW, but I think BW is too nichy to sell HW as a banger. NOt many wold buy that, I guess. But with full (or even better than AL) Push support, making BW even more an instrument than a DAW could increase selling numbers (I guess).

First of all, I have my own biased view. I bought Push and it wasn't long before it was in the closet collecting dust. Doesn't suit me. If I still used Live, I still wouldn't use Push.

Ableton spent a decade+ shaping Live to fit Push. That contributed to me no longer using Live. I'm less likely to use a DAW that makes design decisions to fit a controller I'm not interested to use. Ableton designs its instruments to fit Push. I'll guess that's why none of them have an MSEG for example.

I'm glad Bitwig is free to develop their DAW without having to constrain it to a company made controller. It's great that Bitwig doesn't have an anchor like Push holding it down. It's a big reason why I like Bitwig more than Live.

[pdxindy]

One of those advantages is that lots of users have developed expectations/workflows of how things are done based on Live. IMO, Bitwig should not spend time trying to be more like Live because Live will always be better at being Live than another DAW can be.

Yes, this is somehow true. But you may not forget, that BW cloned AL for 80%, so the perception is, that it tries to be the better AL.

It may have started that way, but Bitwig has been going its own way ever since. Bitwig is unique and the Devs are doing their own thing, unrelated to Live and it doesn't matter if some users cling to an outdated perception.

[SamDi]

First of all, I have my own biased view. I bought Push and it wasn't long before it was in the closet collecting dust. Doesn't suit me. If I still used Live, I still wouldn't use Push.

Ableton spent a decade+ shaping Live to fit Push. That contributed to me no longer using Live. I'm less likely to use a DAW that makes design decisions to fit a controller I'm not interested to use. Ableton designs its instruments to fit Push. I'll guess that's why none of them have an MSEG for example.

I'm glad Bitwig is free to develop their DAW without having to constrain it to a company made controller. It's great that Bitwig doesn't have an anchor like Push holding it down. It's a big reason why I like Bitwig more than Live.

I do fully understand that, because my Push 2 laid in the shelf also for months nad years. But I rediscovered it, when I started to use it in a jamming context. I think Ableton + Push is a dream combination in terms of sequencing. When programming beats, you have 4 rows (whith 16th and 2 bars) you can put in a basic beat in seconds when using 4 fingers at the same time. So it's really fast, while pretty powerful and I would prefer this over all HW-sequencers in the market.

My perception isn't that Push is holding down AL, since there weren't so much features implemented, exclusive to Push. I would estimate, that extending the internal API and M4L capabilities need much more resources.

It may have started that way, but Bitwig has been going its own way ever since. Bitwig is unique and the Devs are doing their own thing, unrelated to Live and it doesn't matter if some users cling to an outdated perception.

So you wanna tell me, that my perception is outdated? I don't understand, why this "devs are doing their own thing" is so often used in BW context. It's good when devs are doing their own thing, when they meet by incident, what the market wants/needs. But if it tends to get on an authistic way by ignoring user requests on the one side and taking their subscription money for developing HW or other stuff no one requested, this is not going to pay off for them. I mean, I might be wrong, but most users open their wallets, if they see new features, which give them a practical advantage. For me personally (I am on 5.1.9), there didn't come anything new, which makes me willing to pay ATM. Let's see, what happens with 6. I bought a 12 month plan in May last year and am waiting since then, when it's worth to redeem it. So let's see what 6 brings, but if it doesn't convince me, I have no problem to wait till 7.

[pdxindy]

So you wanna tell me, that my perception is outdated? I don't understand, why this "devs are doing their own thing" is so often used in BW context.

If your perception is that Bitwig is a Live clone, then yes, your perception is outdated. There was a lot of similarity on initial release. Since then, Bitwig has gone in different directions that have nothing to do with Live. Bitwig is its own DAW.

It's good when devs are doing their own thing, when they meet by incident, what the market wants/needs. But if it tends to get on an authistic way by ignoring user requests on the one side and taking their subscription money for developing HW or other stuff no one requested, this is not going to pay off for them.

Every DAW has users that are not satisfied with the direction of that DAW or are frustrated that certain features they want are "still not added". But beyond that, in online forums like this, there are plenty of posters who spend more time comparing DAW's, giving advice to companies about what they should do and complaining about what isn't there than they do making music. IMO, online forums are not an accurate representation of real life.

I bought a 12 month plan in May last year and am waiting since then, when it's worth to redeem it. So let's see what 6 brings, but if it doesn't convince me, I have no problem to wait till 7.

Exactly as it should be. There's no problem.

[pdxindy]

It is also not in Bitwig's control how well Bitwig is supported by 3rd party manufacturers. Those companies automatically support Live because it is by far the most used DAW. Bitwig can put effort in that direction, which they do, but again, that is a decision that is up to the manufacturers, not Bitwig.

Not exact control, but maybe influence. I think that's a matter of promotion and agreements with 3rd party suppliers. Or they can offer to support with dev capacity.

And Bitwig does those things. More manufacturers are adding support for Bitwig. It takes time.

Go to the Melbourne Instruments Roto Control page and it says right at the top "Now with Bitwig Studio integration"

I have a Reliq on order. One of the reasons I pre-ordered it, was because the developers like Bitwig and are committed to a well supported DAW mode for Bitwig.