Live 12 or Bitwig 5.1

[SLiC]

What a joke of the post.
It is nothing else but fueling hatred comments on both sides of the fence.

Actually this has been one of the better threads for Bitwig vs Live with the vast majority of posts saying both are great ( many of us use both ) and different enough that users can pick the one where the features fit them better. Live used to be the only show in town for non linear and live composition, I think everyone will agree it’s great that we now have choices.

[miloszz]

-the GUI is butt ugly, expanding on the whole boxy Max aesthetic.

I understand this criticism of Live in a way but I strongly disagree. Live has the perfect amount of contrast (dark/light and lines creating borders for different things) for me to use without making my eyes bleed with different colors - even when you change track colors the palette is a little soft.

Bitwig is very... brash. I found Cubase similarly offputting on the color front, where the default Reaper is a little too low-contrast.

[Hanz Meyzer]

I also find the ableton gui impressive, coding wise. It used to be a bit laggy 4 years ago, but now the gui is blazingly fast even on 5k, then upscaled and multiple monitors. Only the fft grapher still feels outdated. So everything in abletons gui obviously is gpu accelerated. Bitwigs gui quickly starts to lag as soon as you open multiple automation lanes, and it starts to stutter, if you try to use it on multiple retina screens. So Ableton seems to be way more optimized here. Bitwig seems to even use a lot of cpu for gui drawing, which you then cannot use anymore for dsp.

[Dionysos]

Bitwig seems to even use a lot of cpu for gui drawing, which you then cannot use anymore for dsp.

As far as I understand, it's the other way around, that's why the GUI gets laggy as the DSP load increases (which probably contributes to your perception that it's the UI drawing that's CPU intensive). But it shouldn't limit audio processing significantly.

[Dionysos]

What a joke of the post.
It is nothing else but fueling hatred comments on both sides of the fence.

I find these threads useful as long as they're about helping a user make a personal decision based on certain preferences.

As soon as the threads devolve into people trying to make a general point about one DAW being "objectively" superior to another (and I think we're reaching that point), they stop being interesting.

[syntonica]

-the GUI is butt ugly, expanding on the whole boxy Max aesthetic.

I understand this criticism of Live in a way but I strongly disagree. Live has the perfect amount of contrast (dark/light and lines creating borders for different things) for me to use without making my eyes bleed with different colors - even when you change track colors the palette is a little soft.

Bitwig is very... brash. I found Cubase similarly offputting on the color front, where the default Reaper is a little too low-contrast.

In theory, I prefer simplicity and good contrast in a GUI, helping the eyes to find what's being looked for. However, the way Live does it just isn't for me. The boxes just make it look fiddly and overly busy to me.

While Bitwig is definitely not the ne plus ultra of GUI design, I do find it a definite improvement over Live. As a side note, I do understand using Java for underpinning the GUI (pretty much giving instant cross-platform), I'm just not sure it was the right choice versus using the GPU instead. Live using text and lines only makes for very easy GUI drawing and scaling is a good (if not ugly ) choice.

[Hanz Meyzer]

As far as I understand, it's the other way around, that's why the GUI gets laggy as the DSP load increases (which probably contributes to your perception that it's the UI drawing that's CPU intensive). But it shouldn't limit audio processing significantly.

Good point, makes sense that audio processing always gets priority. On the other hand, a laggy gui doesn't help usability...

[pdxindy]

Bitwig has easier to use modulation baked in, Live has separate rack tools for modulation (100's of different types but you are often opening new max devices, its not baked in).

Yeah, there are an endless array of M4L modulators and also some full blown modulation systems. But they are not able to be per voice. They are global only. This greatly limits the usefulness for polyphonic patches.

Bitwig's modulators can be per voice for Bitwig Instruments and for CLAP synths that support PolyMod.

[xbitz]

^^^ MPE generators like



"...MPE allows different notes played to have independent MIDI CC and Pitch Bend controls.  AutoSlide makes MPE magic quickly accessible to all Live 11 users, even without pricey hardware..."

are fun in Live too https://zoftloud.gumroad.com/l/autoslide although it's not the same but something similar.

[pdxindy]

Live has better automation in my opinion, insert automation shapes etc...I often go automation rather than modulation as it seems more controllable/precise to line up with musical events and the shapes (and then the ability to move them around and reshape them) are a great help.

Yeah, Bitwig has nothing like Live's automation shapes. Overall, Live is more full featured than Bitwig.

I more often go with modulation rather than automation (or a combination of both). Especially since Bitwig 5 introduced the track/group/project level modulators. For example, I have a 16 bar section in a composition. I want a bunch of parameters across multiple tracks to change at the last bar as a transition to the next section. With only automation, I would need to create an automation lane for each parameter.

In Bitwig, I can add a Segments MSEG at the project level, assign all the parameters I want to modulate and set their depths, then draw in the MSEG curve. This is so tidy. No automation curves to edit. No need to find automation curves on different tracks. No matter which track is selected, the Project level is still visible. And with automation, the automated parameters are locked but with modulation, the original parameters are still freely editable.

Also, with modulation it is so easy to try things. If I want to have the changes happen over the last 2 bars and with a different MSEG curve, I can add a second Segments modulator, drag-n-drop all the mod assignments from the first Segments to the new one, create a different curve, adjust mod depths for different destinations. Now I can shift click to switch between the two MSEG's to A/B which of the complex set of modulations I prefer. Doing something like that with automation would be so time consuming.

I would estimate that with Bitwig, I use modulation in about 75% of the cases where I used to use automation cause in those cases, modulation is faster and far more flexible and adjustable. And of course modulation itself be modulated so I can create variations per loop that would never be possible with automation.

And like I mentioned, if I automate filter cutoff, I can no longer adjust the filter cutoff directly. With Bitwig modulation, I can modulate filter cutoff and still adjust the cutoff directly. This is a big workflow advantage.

[pdxindy]

I never bothered installing CLAP versions of anything but I went back and installed Diva CLAP and yeah gotta give big points to Bitwig for this with analog emulations that don't have a ton of modulation options.

Yeah, it's sweet to have MSEG's and complex randomizations in Diva. And it's not just that you can now add unlimited per voice modulators to Diva, but you can also add per voice modulators to modulate parameters in Diva that cannot be modulated in the synth itself. For example, Env Decay/Release, Mixer Levels and the Mod Depth of existing modulations.

And especially for me, cause Bazille is my favorite synth, the CLAP version in Bitwig is like having Bazille V2.

[SLiC]

… like I mentioned, if I automate filter cutoff, I can no longer adjust the filter cutoff directly. With Bitwig modulation, I can modulate filter cutoff and still adjust the cutoff directly. This is a big workflow advantage.

This is fixed in Live 12 thank God! You can modulate and still adjust directly.

[liquidsound]

… like I mentioned, if I automate filter cutoff, I can no longer adjust the filter cutoff directly. With Bitwig modulation, I can modulate filter cutoff and still adjust the cutoff directly. This is a big workflow advantage.

This is fixed in Live 12 thank God! You can modulate and still adjust directly.

Not to mention that the modulations in Live have been at the Project level from the very beginning without hierarchy.
Also, the structure of the DAW is exposed to the M4L control. Put the two things together and it’s obvious to see the amount of power residing in Live.

CLAP may very well be in the horizon which will provide the novelty of per voice modulation which seems not to have stopped musicians from making great music so far and who knows if will ever be a top tier used function.

I’m looking forward to more devices coming out to take advantage of the piano roll which seems to have being opened up to third party M4L.

And again, the ability to Record/Print the modulations gives the power to use them hands on, total control manner.

[vroteg]

Ablewig

Ablewig is crap. Bitleton forever.

Actually nether is as good as Maschitwig (Maschine in Bitwig)

Choose one wisely. Either shitwig or crapelton... No seriously they both have some some shaite inside. Caperton is very rigid and unstable when its pride and joy M4L used. Shitwig is a synthesizer with basic DAW functionality and community of blind fanboys.

[liquidsound]

Ablewig

Ablewig is crap. Bitleton forever.

Actually nether is as good as Maschitwig (Maschine in Bitwig)

Choose one wisely. Either shitwig or crapelton... No seriously they both have some some shaite inside. Caperton is very rigid and unstable when its pride and joy M4L used. Shitwig is a synthesizer with basic DAW functionality and community of blind fanboys.

You can improve M4L but you can’t improve the other ones