future of music software?

[wayoftheworld]

i realize this is probably pointless speculating about, but thought it may generate some interesting discussion nonetheless. probably not

in the near future it's possible we'll see more DAWs try and play catch-up with ableton and the whole live ting, especially now that ableton is in partnership with serato and cycling 74.

but then what?

[deadly_habit]

[abZ]

Well the next step I think is everything going touch screen. Lot's of possibilities there. Along with that everything gets more and more intuitive. When you make music acoustically you don't have to think about anything, you just pick up your instrument and play and I think that type of thing can be had with electronic music.

[nowaysj]

Like ableton to a certain extent, you'll be playing your daw as an instrument.

I'd really like to see true online collaboration/jamming. We're going to need much better infrastructure in the states for that though.

Agree with the multitouch screens, that's likely the next first step towards the new shit.

But we'd all have to admit- If technology just froze today, we all could make good toons with what we got till the day we died.

[nowaysj]

Oh one thing I always wanted was to beat box tracks out, and have some ai match legit samples to my beat, or synth up blines. Think if you could sing out everything you wanted, and have it all synthed up for you. That would be intuitive. For me at least.

[darigan]

The way you can manipulate audio in the new melodyne is amazing, I can see it working its way as a standard feature in sequencers not any time soon thou.

[yellowhighlighter]

those robots that can write classical music will be integrated into musical software just like arpeggiators.

[back2onett]

I'd like to see hardware play a bigger part, like dedicated controllers for softsynths with built in touch screens, basically just more techy midi controllers, I think that goes under the 'DAW will become an instrument' idea

[babylonjunkies]

man ive been dreaming about like a dual screen ipad which changes for every different synth/program for about 5 years. i reckon another 5 and it'll be good.

tap out beats, draw in envelopes, automation, pitch bend to hearts content. thats the future. fuck the mouse.

i think it should get more intuitive as opposed to 'easier'. i dont want the computer making shit up for me. whats the point.

[scraping micha]

my programmer is almost ready with my new brain-to-wav-vst!

[collige]

man ive been dreaming about like a dual screen ipad which changes for every different synth/program for about 5 years. i reckon another 5 and it'll be good.

tap out beats, draw in envelopes, automation, pitch bend to hearts content. thats the future. fuck the mouse.

i think it should get more intuitive as opposed to 'easier'. i dont want the computer making shit up for me. whats the point.

[abZ]

man ive been dreaming about like a dual screen ipad which changes for every different synth/program for about 5 years. i reckon another 5 and it'll be good.

tap out beats, draw in envelopes, automation, pitch bend to hearts content. thats the future. fuck the mouse.

i think it should get more intuitive as opposed to 'easier'. i dont want the computer making shit up for me. whats the point.

Like I said it is the next thing but these things here are about useless to me. Really looking to control Ableton + VST with a pair of touch screens. Not iPad's either. Win7 has touch compatibility built into it but it's still not there yet. Once people start buying the monitors and the developers start developing then the prices will get affordable quick. The way technology goes we will probably all have touch screens in a year or two.

[dynamat]

Someones gotta make a dubstep game for the Wii, you just throw wobbles about controlled by the wiimote.....like guitar hero.

[DZA]

Someones gotta make a dubstep game for the Wii, you just throw wobbles about controlled by the wiimote.....like guitar hero.

Unitz

[nowaysj]

Too sloppy. The wii needs to step up their wiiremote game.

[nowaysj]

Okay, officially the first moment I wanted an ipad.

[futures_untold]

The obvious one so far over looked is that we will see more and more powerful programs get easier to use through better gui design.

User experience is a crucial battleground for winning new customers in an age of powerful and often free computing applications. (Microsoft Office vs OpenOffice anyone?)

Look at how Apple has turned Logic from something ghastly in the emagic days to the holy grail of DAWs today.

Reaper is also popular amongst its users precisely because it does away with unneccessary workflow elements found in other DAWs.

On the synth front, NI Massive revolutionised modulation assignment doing away with mod matrixes and replacing them with their drag and drop system. This was copied later by FAW Circle, although FAW moved one step further by colour coding everything.

And on the FX front, companies like Fabfilter are making their systems complex yet visually comprehendable via exposed routing diagrams on the main gui itself. Imageline have also made some sexy looking fx plugins which give users a visual cue as to the audio proceessing going on under the hood.

In more and more cases, we'll see plugins developed that meet a specific purpose instead being a general fx unit. For instance, a compressor that does sidechaining by default, with no external routing neccessary. A great example of this combined functionality is Apqualizer which combines a parameteric EQ with a spectrum analyser.

--------------------------------------------

Another area of innovation that will see more development is multi-user music creation systems. At the moment, people can use things like OSC on the geek end of the spectrum, or Band Hero/Guitar Hero etc on the accessible side. With online mutliplayer gaming so popular on consoles, and music games like Guitar Hero so easy to enjoy, there is a clear progression to be made.

Making a tune on your computer, then share it with other gamers around the world to play/improve/remix.

--------------------------------------------

In a similar vein, online only systems like Hobnox or Google Docs will become more common. This will go the full circle and focus on user experience and simple GUI design to appeal to more users. Google Chrome is popular precisely because it is simple and easy to use.

--------------------------------------------

Finally, portable music making sytems will become more prevalent. First came the Gameboy, then the PSP. Now the iPhone is killing it with it's multimedia system on the move. iPhone apps and online only apps will become more common as more of the population upgrade their phones to models that allow for rich multimedia content beyond MP3s, photos and games.

So what does the future of music software hold?

> Touchscreen on the move
> Easier ways of making complex music (see post above regarding algorithmic generators being built into software)
> More possibilities to share music creation digitally, via software that connects to others directly or through permanently online music tools.

Pat

[dynamat]

The obvious one so far over looked is that we will see more and more powerful programs get easier to use through better gui design.

User experience is a crucial battleground for winning new customers in an age of powerful and often free computing applications. (Microsoft Office vs OpenOffice anyone?)

Look at how Apple has turned Logic from something ghastly in the emagic days to the holy grail of DAWs today.

Reaper is also popular amongst its users precisely because it does away with unneccessary workflow elements found in other DAWs.

On the synth front, NI Massive revolutionised modulation assignment doing away with mod matrixes and replacing them with their drag and drop system. This was copied later by FAW Circle, although FAW moved one step further by colour coding everything.

And on the FX front, companies like Fabfilter are making their systems complex yet visually comprehendable via exposed routing diagrams on the main gui itself. Imageline have also made some sexy looking fx plugins which give users a visual cue as to the audio proceessing going on under the hood.

In more and more cases, we'll see plugins developed that meet a specific purpose instead being a general fx unit. For instance, a compressor that does sidechaining by default, with no external routing neccessary. A great example of this combined functionality is Apqualizer which combines a parameteric EQ with a spectrum analyser.

--------------------------------------------

Another area of innovation that will see more development is multi-user music creation systems. At the moment, people can use things like OSC on the geek end of the spectrum, or Band Hero/Guitar Hero etc on the accessible side. With online mutliplayer gaming so popular on consoles, and music games like Guitar Hero so easy to enjoy, there is a clear progression to be made.

Making a tune on your computer, then share it with other gamers around the world to play/improve/remix.

--------------------------------------------

In a similar vein, online only systems like Hobnox or Google Docs will become more common. This will go the full circle and focus on user experience and simple GUI design to appeal to more users. Google Chrome is popular precisely because it is simple and easy to use.

--------------------------------------------

Finally, portable music making sytems will become more prevalent. First came the Gameboy, then the PSP. Now the iPhone is killing it with it's multimedia system on the move. iPhone apps and online only apps will become more common as more of the population upgrade their phones to models that allow for rich multimedia content beyond MP3s, photos and games.

So what does the future of music software hold?

> Touchscreen on the move
> Easier ways of making complex music (see post above regarding algorithmic generators being built into software)
> More possibilities to share music creation digitally, via software that connects to others directly or through permanently online music tools.

Pat

safe, u just done half my uni assignment, is that copywritten

[Over7hink]

I find Sony's silence in the past couple of years quite interesting. I think they realized that they were fucking around too much with ACID and need to step their game up if their software is going to be considered relevant in the next couple of years.

Personally I think ACID had the potential to be on Ableton's level. But they fumbled the ball with their bullshit updates. Stuff like "ACID Pro is new and improved! It even has a metronome count in!!!!!!" Really?

ACID has the easiest workflow. I miss it

But they need to incorporate some live performance capabilities.

[babylonjunkies]

haha the ds is killing it

for real though i got a moog emulator on my iPhone. i can make riffs when taking a dump.

i agree with futuresuntold on the whole apps getting more and more specific. i dont want a whole load of generic nonsense. if i want a compressor, give me a simple ass good sounding compressor.

ive got to a stage where i cant even be arsed to work with synths that are ugly, i get confused too quick. cs80 sounds badboy, i dont use it half as much as i should cos it looks ridiculous. fucking wood emulation and the smallest buttons ever! circle knows the score