"Low-hanging-fruit" feature requests compilation

[antic604]

I'm not English native, but I'm aware of this concept of "low hanging fruit" that is supposed to mean stuff that's valuable to do/have and that requires little effort.

Obviously, it's difficult for us - Reason users, not developers - to tell what's easy to implement, but I guess we can clearly assess that e.g. adding a keyboard shortcut for already existing feature is much easier than folder tracks or MPE. So, let's try to compile a list of such features for Reason Studios' consideration!



I'll start with my own and add stuff proposed by others as we go, so that the top post contains "everything".

1) Keyboard shortcut to make selected MIDI note(s) longer or shorter. It can already be done with a mouse, but it's "annoying" that you first have to click the note for handles to appear and only then drag them, so using shortcuts would be much faster, I think.

2) Have MIDI notes make sound when moved vertically with keyboard. This is already the case when dragging the notes with mouse cursor, but for some reason it doesn't work when using keyboard.

3) Ability to mute or solo currently selected track (when you're focused in Sequencer) or channel (when in Rack or Mixer), by pressing M or S respectively (plus perhaps Shift+M/S to unmute/unsolo everything). This helps to quickly isolate or exclude what you're currently working on, without having to often scroll around to find a tiny buttons to click, i.e. you might be editing MIDI of a track that's off screen or a device sitting on a channels that's off screen, too.

4) Automatically keep tracks belonging together ...together. I often build long / complex chains of devices on my tracks and use a lot of automation. The problem is when I'll add automation to an FX / insert FX, Reason will randomly place a new track and new automation somewhere random in the Sequencer and always with different color. At minimum, Reason should put it ALWAYS below the audio/instrument track and apply the same color, so that visually things are kept together.

5) The "Search all locations" option in Browser should be the default (or at least saved with projects & templates). This one's self explanatory - it's unnecessary friction to having to switch to the relevant cathegory, to find what you're looking for. It makes sense if search yields too much "random" results - instruments, FX, players, presets, samples - but that's rarely the case at least in my experience.



Please, post your ideas!

6) Markers, i.e. visual indicators marking specific arrangement sections, like into, verse, chorus, bridge, etc. + set of keyboard shortcuts to move between them for quick project navigation, like you can now quickly jump to song's start & end and loop's start & end.

[guitfnky]

track folders, auto-punch, markers, customizable keyboard shortcuts, track/project notes, lyrics editor, colored mixer channels, show/hide tracks/channels, VST MIDI out (okay, not 'low hanging', but c'mon)...

[antic604]

track folders, auto-punch, markers, customizable keyboard shortcuts, track/project notes, lyrics editor, colored mixer channels, show/hide tracks/channels, VST MIDI out (okay, not 'low hanging', but c'mon)...

From this list I'd find only "markers" a low hanging fruit, provided you DON'T expect them to work like arranger track, but simply as a marker track.

Added - thanks!

[Ghostrunner]

MIDI chase -> the ability to play a midi note from ANY given point, instead of only from the beginning. The lack of this is especially annoying for ambient music production.

[guitfnky]

I don't think most of what I'd listed should be particularly difficult to implement, and I'm not sure why we're talking about arranging or other track types...I just want markers. just a little flag in the timeline that I can refer to. but anyway, everything I listed is sorely lacking, imo. and agree with Ghostrunner, MIDI chase should be standard in every DAW in 2023.

[selig]

Those are all great suggestions, I especially like the Mute/Solo idea but wonder what would happen when there is no track selected in Rack View and the selection is something like an FX device that isn’t a part of any Mix Channel (and may be connected to multiple Mix Channels). Otherwise I’m thinking I should try to add this feature with my StreamDeck/Keyboard Maestro, if it’s possible.

As for #4, does the current “Auto-group Devices and Tracks” feature not accomplish this for you?

I’m not sure any of my ideas qualify as low hanging fruit, but I’ll keep thinking on it because this is a good idea IMO.

[selig]

track folders, auto-punch, markers, customizable keyboard shortcuts, track/project notes, lyrics editor, colored mixer channels, show/hide tracks/channels, VST MIDI out (okay, not 'low hanging', but c'mon)...

From this list I'd find only "markers" a low hanging fruit, provided you DON'T expect them to work like arranger track, but simply as a marker track.

Added - thanks!

Note that markers in this definition are “Locators”, and would likely need more than just a slot on the timeline. You also need a markers window/list, a way to locate and a way to edit markers, and possibly different marker types such as position markers, selection markers (marking a range like a verse, chorus etc), and bars/beats vs time based markers etc.
Or just go with the Propellerhead “good enough” approach and allow basic markers with no locating or key commands!

And, a big YES to MIDI chase. Oh yea, I DID think of one “LHF” suggestion: Duration Quantize.

[antic604]

Those are all great suggestions, I especially like the Mute/Solo idea but wonder what would happen when there is no track selected in Rack View and the selection is something like an FX device that isn’t a part of any Mix Channel (and may be connected to multiple Mix Channels)

If the selection is ambiguous then I'd simply have the shortcut do nothing.

As for #4, does the current “Auto-group Devices and Tracks” feature not accomplish this for you?

Is this something new, like from 11 and up? I just tried it and indeed it tries to keep things together better than I remembered, so that's definitely an improvement. Regardless, I'm still nervous with bigger track counts and I'm losing a lot of energy trying to pay attention to stuff that's taken care of automatically elsewhere.

[antic604]

MIDI chase -> the ability to play a midi note from ANY given point, instead of only from the beginning. The lack of this is especially annoying for ambient music production.

Not sure how easy it is? There can be at least 2 implementations:
1) Easy - when the gate is triggered when note is played in the middle
2) Complicated - when Reason "calculates" how much of the note elapsed from where the original gate is and adjusts the sound accordingly.

Because imagine you've an elaborate, evolving pad, using a 2-bar long note. It will sound different at the start, compared to how it sounds half way through.

Honestly, I never paid attention to how other DAWs are handling this.

But even the "easy" implementation would be a great improvement! Thanks!!!

[selig]

MIDI chase -> the ability to play a midi note from ANY given point, instead of only from the beginning. The lack of this is especially annoying for ambient music production.

Not sure how easy it is? There can be at least 2 implementations:
1) Easy - when the gate is triggered when note is played in the middle
2) Complicated - when Reason "calculates" how much of the note elapsed from where the original gate is and adjusts the sound accordingly.

Because imagine you've an elaborate, evolving pad, using a 2-bar long note. It will sound different at the start, compared to how it sounds half way through.

Honestly, I never paid attention to how other DAWs are handling this.

But even the "easy" implementation would be a great improvement! Thanks!!!

Just curious if anyone knows of a DAW implementing #2, and how it would communicate position with VST synths? Technically speaking, Reason could have something like this on their own devices, similar to how they have pattern programming in the sequencer for pattern devices. But for this to work you’d have to have both the DAW and the instrument involved in the process. But how cool would that be, though definitely not a low hanging fruit feature…

I’ve only seen implementation #1, which would be fine here because at least you hear SOMETHING when starting in the middle of a long held note.

[antic604]

I’ve only seen implementation #1, which would be fine here because at least you hear SOMETHING when starting in the middle of a long held note.

Yeah, that's probably how it works in most, if not all, DAWs.

Unfortunately, it seems I can't edit my initial post anymore to add it

[guitfnky]

From this list I'd find only "markers" a low hanging fruit, provided you DON'T expect them to work like arranger track, but simply as a marker track.

Added - thanks!

Note that markers in this definition are “Locators”, and would likely need more than just a slot on the timeline. You also need a markers window/list, a way to locate and a way to edit markers, and possibly different marker types such as position markers, selection markers (marking a range like a verse, chorus etc), and bars/beats vs time based markers etc.
Or just go with the Propellerhead “good enough” approach and allow basic markers with no locating or key commands!

agreed. my thought was really just the latter—extremely simple (although *with* a keyboard shortcut), and it doesn’t need to be that complex. of course I would love all the more advanced features, but even just the ability to press a key and drop a pin on the timeline while I listen, so I know I have to go back at some point and address something I’d heard would be a huge improvement. I would prefer to use Blocks for a lot of the other stuff (Blocks is something else they could add some cool new features to—some of which you’ve described, but that’s a story for another day).

[DaveyG]

Not sure how easy it is? There can be at least 2 implementations:
1) Easy - when the gate is triggered when note is played in the middle
2) Complicated - when Reason "calculates" how much of the note elapsed from where the original gate is and adjusts the sound accordingly.

Because imagine you've an elaborate, evolving pad, using a 2-bar long note. It will sound different at the start, compared to how it sounds half way through.

Honestly, I never paid attention to how other DAWs are handling this.

But even the "easy" implementation would be a great improvement! Thanks!!!

Just curious if anyone knows of a DAW implementing #2, and how it would communicate position with VST synths? Technically speaking, Reason could have something like this on their own devices, similar to how they have pattern programming in the sequencer for pattern devices. But for this to work you’d have to have both the DAW and the instrument involved in the process. But how cool would that be, though definitely not a low hanging fruit feature…

I’ve only seen implementation #1, which would be fine here because at least you hear SOMETHING when starting in the middle of a long held note.

Yeah, they all do #1. To do #2 you'd have to be rendering every track to audio in the background after every edit, just in case someone wants to start playback several minutes into a really long evolving pad. In reality it's almost always good enough to just hear the correct notes, even if the exact sound is a tad different. You can always manually render a particular track to audio and archive the MIDI track or, if your DAW supports it, just hit Track Freeze and let the DAW do it for you and have the advantage of lowering the CPU load whilst being able to unfreeze it later if you need to tweak anything.

Maybe Track Freeze qualifies as a low hanging fruit. Not that RS will take any notice of this stuff!

[avasopht]

I dunno, ... I kinda just want things to stay just how they are otherwise I'm never gonna upgrade.

Who's with me, ...


....


Seriously though, ... I don't know what I want most. I've started threads like this here and on the PUF.

I'd like better hardware integration. Remote was light-years ahead of its time.

Maybe we should wait for R13 to come out, as I suspect it will come with the first major installment following from the core rewrite.

[Ghostrunner]

MIDI chase -> the ability to play a midi note from ANY given point, instead of only from the beginning. The lack of this is especially annoying for ambient music production.

Not sure how easy it is? There can be at least 2 implementations:
1) Easy - when the gate is triggered when note is played in the middle
2) Complicated - when Reason "calculates" how much of the note elapsed from where the original gate is and adjusts the sound accordingly.

Definitely #1. It would be enough to have at least something playing. If one does need the exact context at a specific point in the mix, track freeze would be the way to go, but I don't think that qualifies as "low hanging".

[deigm]

I'd like a hokey to toggle 'bypass' on whatever device is selected/highlighted.
Using the mouse to manipulate that tiny switch makes A/B-ing harder than it has to be.

[deigm]

And some form of key/scale indication on the piano roll.

Currently I need to split the screen space in half so that I can keep an eye on the chord detector RE while I'm noodling about in the piano-roll.

Could be as simple as a a highlight overlay on they notes or something.

[dvdrtldg]

MIDI chase -> the ability to play a midi note from ANY given point, instead of only from the beginning. The lack of this is especially annoying for ambient music production.

This is exactly why I use sequencers rather than MIDI for ambient or drone-based stuff

4) Automatically keep tracks belonging together ...together. I often build long / complex chains of devices on my tracks and use a lot of automation. The problem is when I'll add automation to an FX / insert FX, Reason will randomly place a new track and new automation somewhere random in the Sequencer and always with different color. At minimum, Reason should put it ALWAYS below the audio/instrument track and apply the same color, so that visually things are kept together.

This one drives me crazy, I'd also love to see it sorted out

And yes, markers

[antic604]

Two more keyboard shortcuts that I'm often missing:

1) Adjusting sequencer & piano roll's grid spacing - I know it can be set to follow zoom state, but sometimes (quite often, actually) I don't want to zoom in to see details or zoom out to have a sparser grid. Having the ability to manually adjust that by pressing e.g. "<" and ">" (Bitwig's default) or Ctrl+1/2 (Live's default) really helps me in other DAWs

2) Reverse to Shift+Z (zoom to selection) - Shift+Z zooms both vertically and horizontally to clip or clips you have currently selected - which is awesome! - but there's no way to get back to the view you had before: 2nd tap of Shift+Z provides overview of entire project project, which isn't quite there. In Live, 1st tap of Z zooms in horizontally into selection, 2nd tap does vertical zoon, Shift+Z goes back to original view. I love that.

[dioxide]

A lot of my frustrations are Remote related. Here are a couple of things that would be easy to add (I think):

Remoteables for Alt-click Parameter Reset: This would allow you to map a button to reset a parameter to its default (eg. Pan to Centre, Fader to zero etc.)

Remoteable for Show/Hide Spectrum EQ: To allow you to open and close the EQ window from a MIDI controller.

Improved Remote capabilities for the Browser: You should be able to navigate folders. Target and load patches separately (currently if you select a patch Reason loads it). Refer to DJ software for this one as Serato and Rekordbox have this right.

[Ottostrom]

Hunting down and recoloring the track every time I add a new automation has become so second nature that I've forgotten how stupid it is to have to do it manually in the first place

+1 to the midi-chase feature as well since that would be incredibly useful

[jam-s]

I think extending the blocks sequencer track to allow for stacking of blocks would be quite easy to implement and a really powerful sequencer enhancement.

[pushedbutton]

I just want to be able to see another midi track in the pitch tuning window.

[luckygreen]

Wasn't aware of it but today I saw that even ProTools has copied the Ableton session view. So after Bitwig, Logic, ProTools and most problably other DAWs I'm not aware of have an Ableton Live like session view sketch pad, I would guess that one of the next big feature upgrades for Reason would be a Live-like session view.

[avasopht]

It's worth considering the low-hanging fruit in other directions.

Reason could advance as:

1. A DAW.
2. An NI competitor production powerhouse of instruments, synths, effects and music-making tools with a lightweight DAW.
   1. With RRP and the Kontakt compatible-ish RE tools from uJam, it covers some of the same space as Kontakt.
3. A modular-ready virtual studio (which is what it originally was and still has its place).