My weekend just started and although I'm not at my very best right now it didn't take long before I got into my 'audio mood'; I turned on my Push & Casio keyboard, fired up Live and then Reason, hit Control-F5 + Win-shift-cursor_right + Win-cursor_up (bonus points if you recognize what this did) and then I moved my "DAW icons" onto the first section in my taskbar.
Then it was time to turn to Push... I loaded in the 'external instrument' and next the M4lScope. I hit Win-2 on my keyboard and dragged in Europa ("Bubbles in the mud") and just started messing around which got me pretty hyped & excited (ever since I upgraded to Reason 10 and got some extra RE's there's now so much stuff I have to discover; so far I'm growing into quite the Europa fan!).
I started playing a bit on Push, I got excited, hit print-screen and then I came up with this thread.
Care to share?
Would you care to share a screenshot of a situation which is fully 'you'? You know: the setup in which you're most comfortable, maybe a little excited? The setup which - for you - is all about "let's get started (and hopefully have some fun)!". One obvious rule: it has to be Reason related, this is a Reason forum afterall.
Why I ask you may wonder? "Back in the day" (uh oh
) DAWs' were what they were. Maybe except Reason which ever since I started using it always had something about its looks as well. Combinators could select a backdrop for as long as I know (I started on Reason 4) and let's be honest: plenty of Reason devices look plain out gorgeous! This always fascinated me because on one hand I got the rather bland look of Ableton Live (which I also heavily appreciate and enjoy, don't get me wrong here) and on the other end I have Reason which also really looks the part! (this is one of the many reasons why I believe that Live + Reason = a match made in heaven, as the saying goes. They're pretty much the opposite on one hand (workflow for example) but can complement each other so darn well (sound engines). I honestly cannot think of one without the other anymore).Anyway... here's my favorite "me" setup:
What you're looking at... Live is the heart of my setup and I'm pretty much always using Reason ReWired into Live. Even though I have access to all the Live instruments and even though I (since recently) have access to Komplete 12 as well. Honestly you guys... I love Komplete for what it is (just look at my signature which I'm pretty much using on all synth related fora) and it has become an important part of my setup. But I don't think it will ever inspire me creatively as much as Push and Reason can do. The 'grid' of Push helps me to just... go with it whereas Reasons interface... the moment I hit 'tab' I'm usually drawn in completely and so far the results of my experiments hardly ever disappointed me
Anyway, you're looking at Live with Reason rewired into it. There's a very easy keyboard shortcut to get the detached Reason mixer onto your second monitor and I plain out love this setup. I am playing track 2 which is basically Reason in which I have a.. oh what the heck:
This is my active Reason setup in the earlier screenshot (I use both Live & Reason full screen, you don't get easily distracted this way). I route all midi data from Live into this combinator by default and I just LOVE that backdrop I found, because it matches my situation so darn well. I suppose I should change it with a color scheme which better matches Live 10 (the colors have become somewhat softer) but meh... "effort"
I know, I know: even though I enjoy having a Reason mixer on my 2nd monitor I actually do most "rewired mixing" right in this combinator (the line mixer as well as the mtools which I keep in my master section by default). Having the mixer on my 2nd monitor is a force of habit for me because it wouldn't be the first time where my Reason setup expanded and I actually had to "mix" my "reason audio" into my main audio for real I'm pretty sure I'm overcomplicating things but watch me no care because most of the time this is all about having fun while getting some results for me. And this setup gets me good results.Last but not least... slightly offtopic: the M4lScope (first screenshot) is one of the first devices I build within "Max for Live" (= programming environment within Ableton Live) and I'm still using it pretty much everytime I use Live.
Hope some of you care to share
Don't know how to share your setup?
The easiest way that I can think of (note that I'm a Windows users, I simply don't know any good options for Mac) is to grab IrfanView. Install, open it op and then press 'c' to open the capture option. Select what you need (one or two monitors, the full desktop or just the foreground screen, etc.) and go! If you want to share on this forum then my advice would be to hit control-c while IrfanView is still open (so: copy the screenshot), then head on over to Imgur and paste your screenshot, get the share links and share your setup here
Thanks for reading, hope some of you are also willing to share a peek inside your digital (Reason related!) setup!
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