Is Skeuomorphism Reason's Achilles Heel?

[integerpoet]

I can't stand the dull flat UI of Ableton live! It kills my inspiration.

I thought I was the only one who hates Ableton’s UI. I mean they have some cool effects but the look of everything really sucks.

The human interface design language is part of why I gave it a pass many years ago. But the main thing was the workflow at the time made zero sense to me. I understand that since then it's gotten more focused on, like, music. I remain confused by why anyone would want anything to do with earlier versions, but I am clearly a weirdo because it's been a huge success.

[guitfnky]

I thought I was the only one who hates Ableton’s UI. I mean they have some cool effects but the look of everything really sucks.

The human interface design language is part of why I gave it a pass many years ago. But the main thing was the workflow at the time made zero sense to me. I understand that since then it's gotten more focused on, like, music. I remain confused by why anyone would want anything to do with earlier versions, but I am clearly a weirdo because it's been a huge success.

I had the same feeling about Ableton. every time I tried it, I kept trying to make sense of Session view first, and it was just a tangle of confusion for me. Arrangement view is amazing though, and once I finally got around to trying it, the workflow makes so much sense. I actually find myself wanting to learn the Session view now, too. it’s like a really deep, powerful version of Blocks in Reason (which I love, and so far, still prefer)—but with that power comes a learning curve.

[PhillipOrdonez]

The human interface design language is part of why I gave it a pass many years ago. But the main thing was the workflow at the time made zero sense to me. I understand that since then it's gotten more focused on, like, music. I remain confused by why anyone would want anything to do with earlier versions, but I am clearly a weirdo because it's been a huge success.

I had the same feeling about Ableton. every time I tried it, I kept trying to make sense of Session view first, and it was just a tangle of confusion for me. Arrangement view is amazing though, and once I finally got around to trying it, the workflow makes so much sense. I actually find myself wanting to learn the Session view now, too. it’s like a really deep, powerful version of Blocks in Reason (which I love, and so far, still prefer)—but with that power comes a learning curve.

Never. Arrangement view 4 ever.

[DaveyG]

Session view is the only real reason I fire up Ableton these days. Yes, it confused me at first but nothing that a couple of tutorial vids can't solve.

It's the quickest way to mix and match different elements of a track to find the best combo. In a song backing I might have 4 or 5 variations of a drum loop, a handful of bassline variants plus some chords and jangly background stuff. Session view allows me to very quickly try out many different combinations and when I get something I like I can copy them into a new row in session view and play that row with a single click. It's the tempo matching and no messing about that make it work. Those loops can be audio loops, midi loops or Reason RRP tracks, some of different lengths and they all magically work together. Sometimes it will screw up but mostly it does not.

Then you can either copy them to arrangement view or, as I do, move them into a more "traditional" DAW for final arrangement and vocals/lead stuff (Studio One in my case). I don't think I've ever finished a song in Ableton. It's just sketching and experimentation. I find it a really sweet way to work on ideas and it sometimes leads me to some unusual chord/bassline interactions that I would never have come up with in other ways. That makes it worth the money and the initial effort to get to grips with it.

[Faastwalker]

Skeuomorphism kind of died a death some years ago. Flat is the way forward for design now. I remember when Apple's iOS went flat. A lot of people didn't like it. But it quickly made more sense and then when you looked back at the previous iOS is looked really dated. But I still kind of like it in music software plug-ins. Especially in Reason where the GUI's are still flat - as opposed to those ghastly 3D style Skeuomorphic GUI's. Not a fan. I really like how Reason looks overall now with the flat transport, sequencer, browser etc but the rack still mostly Skeuomorphic. In comparison, whilst looking like an amazing tool, Ableton Live looks extremely flat an dull. Has never floated my boat design wise.

[KEVMOVE02]

Skeuomorphism is no more an Achilles heel for the Reason Rack than the 88 keys of a piano are a hindrance to the novice pianist. The steep learning curve of user interfaces is the rite of passage we all must face, separating the earnest from the persistent. If anything, apps like Reason should be a constant reminder that mastery comes by way of practice, and discovery is the byproduct of practice. It may not be necessary to understand music theory to create inspiring performances, you greatly expand your palette when you do.

[chaosroyale]

Threads like this always have lots of misunderstandings of what Skeuomorphism is. For example "having to press tab" is nothing to do with Skeuo, any more than "chaining effects at the bottom of the screen" is inherent to a flat UI.

In fact, all modern DAWs use "skeuo" elements: they all use knobs and faders, rather than, i dunno , a glowing neon sphere that increases and decreases in size as you move the mouse. The main difference is that Reason is *explicitly* skeuo and actually tries (tried - the new stuff is much more flat) to look like physical devices in a rack, right down to the space-wasting "wood panels" (let us customize the UI layout!!!! I wanna remove every single bit of wasted space!!!). Skeuo at its best works intuitively because it fits with how we expect things to behave; it gives you instant feedback about what you are doing.

There is nothing inherent to Skeuo that prevents Reason from having text input, modernizing and streamlining the tool section, adding track folders, etc. The very first reply to this thread already got the answer;

"It's not the skeuomorphic device design that's going to lead to its downfall.
It's people getting sick of waiting for features that are long overdue."

I love seeing my sound designs right there as a chain of devices. It makes it so easy to see exactly how my signal is being processed and gives me inspiration to plug in, swap around and replace devices to change my sounds. I am sure it is possible to keep that paradigm while upgrading the workflow stuff.

[EnochLight]

The very first reply to this thread already got the answer;

"It's not the skeuomorphic device design that's going to lead to its downfall.
It's people getting sick of waiting for features that are long overdue."

I mean.. we've been waiting in excess of a decade for features that are long overdue.