Opcode Studio Vision

[memyselfandus]

Did Studio Vision 3.5 ever come out?

"In 1998 A version called VisionDSP was released just before Opcode was bought by Gibson Guitar Corporation. Development on Opcode products ceased in 1999."

here's a list of features for 3.5

General Sequencer Enhancements

OMS Timer support for tighter integration of OMS/Opcode products
Global solo indicator light in control bar, double click to open instrument window
User definable menu keys: Users can now define their own key equivalents for all menu items
Improved Select Duplicates (is less picky)
Some menu items have been moved around for easier use
More factory preset Names docs--less setup time
Many small improvements, fixes and enhancements
Move Time fields without resetting number to the right

Track Overview changes/enhancements:

Vertical zoom of track overview
Break phrases and tracks at markers option in Track Overview
Can grab SMPTE offset for a sequence by Command clicking the word Offset in TOV

New Sync Options dialog:

Consolidates all the menu items, checkmarks, etc.
Sync options can be remembered per file
Option for remote start allows other OMS applications to start and stop Vision

Integrated MIDI Machine Control:

MIDI Machine controls are now a separate window in the program
No AV Controls application, easier to use, works even better

List Editor Window changes:

Remember List Window view options and can be sticky for all open or all new windows
Scroll free editing in List Edit window
Can now show end time and durations of MIDI events in SMPTE
Now shows the length of sysex message in bytes

Graphic Window changes:

Select All command now selects only "viewed" data
Strip Chart now bolds out what areas have data in them
Option to show piano keyboard on left side of graphic window

TDM/DAE Enhancements for ProTools 3 and above

64 Audio Instruments to support all line ins, sends and outputs
Mono In/Stereo Out TDM support
Sample Cell TDM integration into TDM bussing, sends and inserts
Output routing directly from the console window to any Pro Tools output
4 audio sends to 16 stereo busses per channel-just like a mixing console-users can send audio instruments (from disk), line ins (external sources through a Pro Tools interface 882 or 888), Sample Cell TDM or busses to a single plug in Sends are either Pre or Post fader and the user can send an amount from 0 to 127 on the aux bus. All bussing is completely digital on TDM and introduces no noise.

Import & Export Additions

Creates a file(s) for use with other apps, especially multimedia apps such as Director, Web authoring or hardware sampler download. The user can create one file or many.

QuickTime read/write--see QuickTime section below
Export Audio Mix creates a mix for export to other audio formats
Export mono, stereo pair or interleaved file
Normalize, Normalize if necessary (clipping) or None
Sample rate convert to any Sample rate
Bit depth convert to 8 bit, 8 bit dithered or 16 bit
Export to AIFF, Sound Designer 2, WAVE, au
Compression if available for a particular format
Export Individual Audio Events*

*Great for creating audio snippets, works almost like a batch processor letting you create a bunch of files at once. For people that use samplers or multimedia apps where they want small individual files, this is a great tool. All the above options apply to it as well. It also a great ways to create single files of those huge appended files you might be using.

QuickTime Additions/Enhancements

Integrated Quick Time movie player window in the program
User can open movie from the Open command--view only or import the audio data.
Scrubbing will scrub movie, locating to times will locate the movie
Sequence file will remember last movie opened
Import/Export QuickTime movie audio and music tracks
Import WAV, AIFF, redbook (CD) audio, MIDI into a sequence
Replace, Add to or Create a New Movie with Audio and Music (MIDI)

Mixing Console Enhancements

Audio Sends (TDM only)

4 audio sends per channel
to 16 stereo busses
pre or post fader

Supports line ins on ProTools 3
Sample Cell TDM support
New line out feature per channel
New clear console command
Consoles are now growable and scrollable, number of channels submenu is removed
Color coded for various types, MIDI is one color, audio another

Fader grouping options

Shift clicking faders selects and moves them as a group, works on horizontal faders too
Command click selects/deselects discontiguous faders
Dragging the selected group keeps them at a constant offset from one another
Control dragging selected faders will snap them all to the same value
Option dragging proportionally moves them
Added new items to build console from
New clear console command

Audio Enhancements/Sound Manager Enhancements

Smart Sync--doubles the number of tracks from version 3.0 and tightens up the synchronization
Audio instruments increased from 16 to 64
Canceling a waveform drawing only cancels that waveform and not others

DSP Menu Additions/changes

New DSP menu--all the DSP you need for multimedia

TruTone Technology for improved pitch shifting (Formant preservation option)
New "Maintain Vocal Characteristics" checkbox

Works on monophonic and polyphonic audio
No more munchkenizing

New Formant Shift-lets you change the timbre of sounds (i.e. gender change)
Support for Adobe Premiere plug ins including such popular plugs as Hyperprism from Arboretum and Audiotrack from Waves Free with Studio Vision Pro 3.5 Deluxe CD Edition

Software included on CD ROM:

Waves

EZVerb: A special Opcode version with room-style Reverb presets based on the incredible TrueVerb plug-in algorithms!
Audiotrack:
4 band paragraphic EQ
Compressor/Expander
Noise gate

Arboretum Hyperprism plug ins

Echo--great effect, even have a negative delay time
Low Pass Resonant Filter--great for wah wah

Beatboy Drum Sequences

8 Vision files of live recorded drummers
Sampler of Beat Boy disks

Protolab Techno Tool Kit

MIDI drum files and audio loops of modern dance beats
75 MIDI grooves-techno, jungle, ambient, house
50 Audio loops

Cyburban OMS applications

Work standalone or with Studio Vision Pro
Boink Arpeggiator
LSD: Large SMPTE counter

Galaxy Librarian-latest version 2.1

Over 200 supported librarians

OMS Interactive guide

Multiple level tutorial with QuickTime movies and animations
Complete in depth explanation of "hows" and "whys" of OMS

Other stuff

Belief Systems audio samples and loops
100 MIDI files
New Tutorials with example files
Interactive Studio Vision Pro tour
Adobe Acrobat reader
Soft copy tutorials and example files
International Language soft copy documentation for Studio Vision Pro
Third Party demos




"In 1998 A version called VisionDSP was released just before Opcode was bought by Gibson Guitar Corporation. Development on Opcode products ceased in 1999."

[machinesworking]

You Forget that you could have complete sequences running nested inside other sequences. This way, you can have, for exemple, a sequence, written in 3/8 running inside anotjher sequence that has a base tempo, and tracks, in 4/4. It plays inside the 4/4 but stil in 3/8.

This is the one thing where Studio Vision beats the rest. Sure, not many EDM and Rock people are going to need this, but I can't think of another DAW that could do this.

[Robert Randolph]

You Forget that you could have complete sequences running nested inside other sequences. This way, you can have, for exemple, a sequence, written in 3/8 running inside anotjher sequence that has a base tempo, and tracks, in 4/4. It plays inside the 4/4 but stil in 3/8.

This is the one thing where Studio Vision beats the rest. Sure, not many EDM and Rock people are going to need this, but I can't think of another DAW that could do this.

You can do this in DP with sequence arrangement in the song view.

[fmr]

The beauty of the nested sequences in SVP was being able to 'expand' them (forget the word they used) into a linear sequence and then you could edit, re-nest, etc.... Was a lot of fun to experiment this way with arrangements and then regain total control over a linear sequence.

Sounds a bit like Tracktion's Edit Clips?

This is very different. What Tracktion does is "bouncing" the sequence into a new stereo audio file. In SVP, you had the sequence untouched, running complete, in glorious multitrack. If you wanted to edit it, you just would have to double click the block, and a new arrangement window opened up (they called it Sequence window, if I remember well) with the Track Overview, and you could edit any note in any track, in any editing window you like. After editing, you save, close the window, and the edited version is there, playing with all your changes.

Besides this, Vision was also the first to include a piano roll miniature in the Track Overview. Before that, the only thing we had was small rectangles (in Performer and Master Tracks Pro) and blocks (in Cubase). Logic came later, but the piano roll mimick in Logic wasn't accurate (and remained inaccurate until Logic Pro v8 or even v9). Cubase and Performer also adopted later this approach (and Cakewalk too), but the original idea belongs to Opcode. Even today, this is the standard for the track overview windows.

And OMS. In a time where choosing a patch was checking individually each synth and sound module, we had a system that allowed us to define our entire studio, and create patch lists the allowed us to address the patches by name (even when the modules had no names, like in MKS-80 or MKS-30), and if we had Galaxy Plus, we could even create our won sound banks, and when we exported them to the sound module, the program automatically "published" the names in OMS. Clever and elegant as nothing we had before.

No wonder Opcode was able to do all this. A company that was fortunate enough to have people like Dave Oppenheim, Doug Wyatt and David Zicarelli among others working together, was like a "dream team".

[fmr]

You Forget that you could have complete sequences running nested inside other sequences. This way, you can have, for exemple, a sequence, written in 3/8 running inside anotjher sequence that has a base tempo, and tracks, in 4/4. It plays inside the 4/4 but stil in 3/8.

This is the one thing where Studio Vision beats the rest. Sure, not many EDM and Rock people are going to need this, but I can't think of another DAW that could do this.

You can do this in DP with sequence arrangement in the song view.

Yes, as I said, Digital Performer is the closest we currently have to Studio Vision in that aspect. But you can't layer sequences, so, no poly-rhythm nor poly-metrics.

[machinesworking]

You Forget that you could have complete sequences running nested inside other sequences. This way, you can have, for exemple, a sequence, written in 3/8 running inside anotjher sequence that has a base tempo, and tracks, in 4/4. It plays inside the 4/4 but stil in 3/8.

This is the one thing where Studio Vision beats the rest. Sure, not many EDM and Rock people are going to need this, but I can't think of another DAW that could do this.

You can do this in DP with sequence arrangement in the song view.

Yes, as I said, Digital Performer is the closest we currently have to Studio Vision in that aspect. But you can't layer sequences, so, no poly-rhythm nor poly-metrics.

The main drawback here is to render the track you're still forced into a single meter,
and you're forced to work in Song mode; I generally use it only to sketch out ideas, and even then loading Chunks into a Sequence can be lot easier to work with. Would be nice of DP had at least the ability to have one additional Conductor track,that would solve this nicely, but it's a niche concern for most people.

[zerocrossing]

Not exactly on point but Metro had (still has) some interesting algorithmic tools for doing pattern based music. I used it along with Deck. I was amazed at how solid Deck and Metro were in terms of stability. They made a powerful combination in the day. Interesting point, ontrackp, I didn't know that Deck was taken up by digi for Pro Tools.

I used Deck and Metro too. I still use Metro from time to time... Though recently I've not been able to get it to launch on Windows 10... Not sure why. I meant to contact Jeremy about it but got evolved with other things (the issue was getting an XITE-1 to work as an ASIO device, so that might have been the problem) Anyway, Metro's dual platform not and I highly recommend it. It's light on resources yet very rich in functionality. There were some UI/usability aspects of it that bugged me, but it seems like they've been giving it a nice once over lately.

I did use Studio Vision Pro a bit later. I got an NDA version when I worked in a music store that had no Mac. They let me install it on my personal machine as long as I was OK with letting prospective customers come over to my studio to check it out. I think that did actually happen a number of times. Studio Vision Pro was pretty amazing for it's time.

[deastman]

I still have an old PowerPC Mac with Studio Vision and a couple of Studio 4 interfaces in my garage. Theoretically I could get it all working again, assuming the hard drives still function. But nah, not worth the effort.

[fmr]

I still have an old PowerPC Mac with Studio Vision and a couple of Studio 4 interfaces in my garage. Theoretically I could get it all working again, assuming the hard drives still function. But nah, not worth the effort.

I still have one Power Mac (actually, I have two Power Macs with Studio Vision installed, one is the old Power Macintosh 7100/80) that boots in OS 9, the latest Mac that was able to boot OS 9 (I think it was a Power Mac G4 1.25 or something like that), so, I still can run it for Studio Vision, but it has nothing connected to it anymore. Every now and then I still power up that computer, just to remind me of old applications that no longer exist: Studio Vision, Galaxy Plus, Alchemy, Sound Designer II, Arboretum plug-ins, Prosoniq SonicWORX Studio, Peak (this one existed still in Intel until a couple of years ago, but is gone now too), Infinity, etc.

[whyterabbyt]

This is very different. What Tracktion does is "bouncing" the sequence into a new stereo audio file.

Well, the clip is like a frozen instance of the Edit, so it acts like a clip of audio, but that's not all that it entails.

If you wanted to edit it, you just would have to double click the block

If you want to edit a Tracktion Edit Clip, it takes just two clicks you can open up the full original contents...

and a new arrangement window opened up (they called it Sequence window, if I remember well) with the Track Overview, and you could edit any note in any track, in any editing window you like.

...where you can edit any note or audio you like...

After editing, you save, close the window, and the edited version is there, playing with all your changes.

...and after editing, you save the Edit, and return to the Edit that contains it, and the edited version is updated there with all your changes....

So, no, not 'very different. In fact, a bit like each other.

[mothballs]

As other posters have mentioned, Vision's sequence triggering (and layering, nesting, chaining, transposing etc) was probably the single feature that's still very hard to beat today. Add the ability to have 20 or more complete sequences available in one file and you had a degree of power and flexibility that has yet to be equaled . DP's chunks are similar in some ways but nowhere near as powerful and I can't think of any other system I know of that comes anywhere close.

These days I'm happy enough with Reaper but I can't help thinking what it would be like with Vision's sub-sequence system and all that goes with it. Reaper's sub projects are a good step in the right direction but still have a very long way to go to get anywhere near what Vision was capable of. In my opinion, a cross between the current version of Reaper and the last version of SVP would be the ultimate DAW.

On top of that, there was a whole lot of other stuff to like about SVP. Midi editing was a breeze and the piano roll was a joy to use. Shape tools for drawing and editing CC info, OMS, Galaxy for patch names and synth programming, multiple mixers, the ability to shift, transpose, assign instrument and patch and set independent loop length for each track from the main track view window, primitive but useful generative tools and on and on. Today most of these features can be found in various other DAWs but few DAWs can boast of all of them and when you add them all together you come to Vision's ultimate strength - it was an incredibly well thought out, well designed and well constructed system for creating music and audio. Vision's greatest feature was ... well ... vision.

When SVP bit the dust I decided to move to PCs for recording, foolishly assuming that they'd have caught up with Macs by then. I'd heard a lot of talk about Cubase so that's where I started. God what a shock! I couldn't believe how primitive it was. Going from SVP on a Mac to Cubase on Windows was like going from a Ferrari to a rusty roller skate. I couldn't believe anyone could actually make any kind of music on such a rustic stone-age system.

I had a big complicated project coming up ... blind panic. There is no way that project could have been completed on a PC at the time, at least not using Cubase or anything else I'd looked at. Luckily I was able to borrow a Mac and some Digi hardware. Things are different now of course but back then the chasm between SVP (and DP to a lesser extent) and everything else was truly vast.

[memyselfandus]

As other posters have mentioned, Vision's sequence triggering (and layering, nesting, chaining, transposing etc) was probably the single feature that's still very hard to beat today. Add the ability to have 20 or more complete sequences available in one file and you had a degree of power and flexibility that has yet to be equaled . DP's chunks are similar in some ways but nowhere near as powerful and I can't think of any other system I know of that comes anywhere close.

These days I'm happy enough with Reaper but I can't help thinking what it would be like with Vision's sub-sequence system and all that goes with it. Reaper's sub projects are a good step in the right direction but still have a very long way to go to get anywhere near what Vision was capable of. In my opinion, a cross between the current version of Reaper and the last version of SVP would be the ultimate DAW.

On top of that, there was a whole lot of other stuff to like about SVP. Midi editing was a breeze and the piano roll was a joy to use. Shape tools for drawing and editing CC info, OMS, Galaxy for patch names and synth programming, multiple mixers, the ability to shift, transpose, assign instrument and patch and set independent loop length for each track from the main track view window, primitive but useful generative tools and on and on. Today most of these features can be found in various other DAWs but few DAWs can boast of all of them and when you add them all together you come to Vision's ultimate strength - it was an incredibly well thought out, well designed and well constructed system for creating music and audio. Vision's greatest feature was ... well ... vision.

When SVP bit the dust I decided to move to PCs for recording, foolishly assuming that they'd have caught up with Macs by then. I'd heard a lot of talk about Cubase so that's where I started. God what a shock! I couldn't believe how primitive it was. Going from SVP on a Mac to Cubase on Windows was like going from a Ferrari to a rusty roller skate. I couldn't believe anyone could actually make any kind of music on such a rustic stone-age system.

I had a big complicated project coming up ... blind panic. There is no way that project could have been completed on a PC at the time, at least not using Cubase or anything else I'd looked at. Luckily I was able to borrow a Mac and some Digi hardware. Things are different now of course but back then the chasm between SVP (and DP to a lesser extent) and everything else was truly vast.

So awesome! Vision was on Windows as well right?

[memyselfandus]

Can someone put together a detailed list of these specific features so we can put in detailed feature requests for reaper or other daws? Please

[memyselfandus]

http://www.soundonsound.com/sos/jan99/a ... ode477.htm

[zvenx]

Can someone put together a detailed list of these specific features so we can put in detailed feature requests for reaper or other daws? Please

I would gladly send you a copy of the manual if you want undertake this task.


rsp