Freezing

Have any feature requests? No promise they'll get to Reason Studios, but you can still discuss them here.
nickbeman
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10 Mar 2022

I am at a point where making music is starting to become a hazzle in Reason and upgrading My PC won't be the answer. Having lots of effects and VST on multiple tracks creates a terrible workflow because it can't process everything at the same time, it becomes too heavy.

A proper freeze function button that render the track, deactivate the track fully to a point where it doesn't drain CPU or RAM including all effects attached to it that was rendered and then automatically generate a new track with the wave file that was rendered of the original.

This would save so much time, right now this is a real hazzle to do in Reason.

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Loque
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10 Mar 2022

Yes...

And i am curious how all the cabling, splitting, feedback loops, side channing,... will be manged as soon as a Freeze function is available...
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BRIGGS
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10 Mar 2022

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Threpus
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10 Mar 2022

A sensible request is met with derision- by a moderator, no less. Go ahead and justify it.

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Loque
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10 Mar 2022

Threpus wrote:
10 Mar 2022
A sensible request is met with derision- by a moderator, no less. Go ahead and justify it.
No "derision", just curious and a "sensible" hint why we won't see that feature in the near future. Just look at PDC and you get it.
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11 Mar 2022

I've been asking for this feature.for years.

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BRIGGS
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11 Mar 2022

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11 Mar 2022

Loque wrote:
10 Mar 2022
Yes...

And i am curious how all the cabling, splitting, feedback loops, side channing,... will be manged as soon as a Freeze function is available...
Other daws seems to manage it.

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orthodox
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11 Mar 2022

Unlike most other DAWS, Reason doesn't enforce one2one relation between sequencer tracks and mix channels. You can build any wiring mess you like in the Rack, multiple tracks can end up in one mixer channel or vice versa. Freezing is already feasible by bouncing mixer channels, you just have to manually mute the source sequencer tracks afterwards if you want to save CPU.

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11 Mar 2022

orthodox wrote:
11 Mar 2022
Freezing is already feasible by bouncing mixer channels, you just have to manually mute the source sequencer tracks afterwards if you want to save CPU.
Which is why a simple toggle button to do all that for you would be super helpful.

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DaveyG
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11 Mar 2022

orthodox wrote:
11 Mar 2022
Unlike most other DAWS, Reason doesn't enforce one2one relation between sequencer tracks and mix channels.
Studio One doesn't use a one2one relationship and they manage Freeze just fine, even on sidechained tracks.
orthodox wrote:
11 Mar 2022
Freezing is already feasible by bouncing mixer channels, you just have to manually mute the source sequencer tracks afterwards if you want to save CPU.
That's not really a proper Freeze. A proper Freeze bounces everything in place in the selected track then unloads any plugins and mutes the original audio/midi. No extra track is created. Crucially, it has an Unfreeze button so with one click you can Freeze and another click Unfreezes. It's not instant but it does mean you can have a project that uses many more plugins than your CPU will cope by keeping tracks frozen unless you are working on them.

Of course, you can achieve a similar thing manually as you describe but the housekeeping can get messy if you do it on more than a handful of tracks, especially if you need to unload plugins, and there is scope for human error, accidentally editing the muted MIDI track etc. Ironically, the housekeeping of such an approach would be much easier if Reason also had track folders - another common request, and not that complicated to implement. Most of my projects have an "archive" track folder where I put early takes, spare noodlings, and other stuff that I just might want to refer back to.

It all just helps with workflow. I don't know why anyone would argue against that stuff being added to Reason. :?:

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11 Mar 2022

DaveyG wrote:
11 Mar 2022
It all just helps with workflow. I don't know why anyone would argue against that stuff being added to Reason. :?:
EDITED: Because I was in keyboard warrior mode and I'm trying to move away from that.

Indeed. It would be a helpful feature for lots of folks on lower powered machines and or using high cpu plugins.

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orthodox
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11 Mar 2022

How would you freeze a trackless Umpf driven by BeatMap with dedicated Mix Channels for each drum output? Or a compound instrument mixed in the Rack and having multiple midi source tracks?

Of course human errors are possible, as they were in the analog world with lots of wires and jukeboxes. Yet I prefer that Reason stay "indecent" and rack-based with manual control over things.

Though a device "power" or "unload" switch in the rack would be a nice addition.

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Loque
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11 Mar 2022

How do you freeze if the compressor's CV out is triggering a EQ on another channel?

With bounce in place i messed up my setups more than once, when i suddenly recognized the sidechain didn't worked anymore after i removed the bounced devices.
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Threpus
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11 Mar 2022

There would certainly be cases when a freeze function wouldn't make sense or couldn't be applied. Nevertheless, for many tracks- if not most- I suspect it would make perfect sense. They (RS) could and should make it available in those cases.

I honestly think a lot of this debate would, once boiling the water off, be reduced to how different people use Reason. Some enjoy combining things in novel ways, and see it as a sort of playground; others (like me) just want to do relatively basic things quickly. I started using Reason because wiring devices with cables always made a lot more intuitive sense to me, the devices and instruments were really solid, and I didn't need the sequencer to do much more than capture performances.


I don't think that the people using Reason in ways that differ from mine are doing anything wrong- but people like me that enjoy Reason because of its simplicity and want workflow enhancements are routinely told that our preference is somehow inconsistent with the essence of Reason, and that the ordinary things we would like to see added are either impossible to implement or would ruin the program.
Last edited by Threpus on 11 Mar 2022, edited 1 time in total.

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Loque
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11 Mar 2022

Threpus wrote:
11 Mar 2022
There would certainly be cases when a freeze function wouldn't make sense or couldn't be applied. Nevertheless, for many tracks- if not most- I suspect it would make perfect sense. They (RS) could and should make it available in those cases.

I honestly think a lot of this debate would, once boiling the water off, be reduced to how different people use Reason. Some enjoy combining things in novel ways, and see it as a sort of playground; others (like me) just want to do relatively basic things quickly. I started using Reason because the cables always made a lot more sense to me, and I didn't need the sequencer to do much more than capture performances.

I don't think that the people using Reason in ways that differ from mine are doing anything wrong- but people like me that enjoy Reason because of its simplicity and want workflow enhancements are routinely told that our preference is somehow inconsistent with the essence of Reason, and that the ordinary things we would like to see added are either impossible to implement or would ruin the program.
I agree, that i would like to see this feature, even if it would work only on simple things.

But when i think about how i work, i am not sure this would work in a good and understandable way for the user. Here is one basic scenario:
* I create a cool kick drum, EQ it, compress and a lot of other processing
* I normally would bounce it before i make sidechaining and other fancy connections. Now i would freeze it
* Now i start making weird things with my frozen track, like splitting one signal into a bus which mix different signals into a side chain of a compressor. Ofc i also EQ or filter the singal before
* Now, later, i think i need change the overall sound of the kick and unfreeze it. How should my project look now? And how should re-freezing now work?
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deeplink
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11 Mar 2022

I think the best and logical way to implement this has already been done, with bounce in place and muting the original track.

I would only take the sequencer a step further by offering the ability to hide channels. With those channels not being affected by the UnMute All toggle. Also the relative Main Mixer Channel and Rack Instrument/Chain being slightly transparent (or similar) to indicate that it's been hidden from the sequencer.
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crimsonwarlock
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11 Mar 2022

Threpus wrote:
11 Mar 2022
There would certainly be cases when a freeze function wouldn't make sense or couldn't be applied.
And that is the core of the problem for Reason. With all the possibilities to freely route stuff around, it is near impossible to algorithmically decide whether that is the case or not. Chances are that whatever you would implement in software for this, would be easily broken by some unexpected routing by a user. I understand why RS doesn't attempt to implement something like that.
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Loque
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11 Mar 2022

crimsonwarlock wrote:
11 Mar 2022
Threpus wrote:
11 Mar 2022
There would certainly be cases when a freeze function wouldn't make sense or couldn't be applied.
And that is the core of the problem for Reason. With all the possibilities to freely route stuff around, it is near impossible to algorithmically decide whether that is the case or not. Chances are that whatever you would implement in software for this, would be easily broken by some unexpected routing by a user. I understand why RS doesn't attempt to implement something like that.
Agree, sadly. Thats why i dont use auto-routing/connect for devices too. That feature sometimes messed up everything which i did not directly noticed and it was horrible to fix this in a later stage.

I really would like to have a freeze, auto-route and so on, but the freedom in Reason has its price.

Even bounce in place does not work in some cases or it just produces crap or nothing when performed.
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Creativemind
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11 Mar 2022

Heater wrote:
11 Mar 2022
orthodox wrote:
11 Mar 2022
Freezing is already feasible by bouncing mixer channels, you just have to manually mute the source sequencer tracks afterwards if you want to save CPU.
Which is why a simple toggle button to do all that for you would be super helpful.
You'd just freeze that track so every instrument associated with that track would get frozen in the rack, don't see the issue?

EDIT - Ok, so I see an issue. If a cv or audio connection was wired to a different device which wasn't on the frozen track (thus another track.) Maybe the cable coming from the frozen instrument to another track was just allowed. If you clicked the port on the unfrozen instrument in the rack and moved it away slightly to unwire it, it unwired. If you wanted to rewire an instrument in the rack to a device on the frozen track, you'd have to temporarily unfreeze that frozen track and reconnect the devices and then freeze that original track again.
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adfielding
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11 Mar 2022

What I've done in the past is to route the direct outputs of whatever instrument I'm trying to "freeze" into the master outputs in Reason, export that, bring the audio track into Reason, and then route that directly into whatever the output of the instrument was originally going into. It does mean you're not going to save any CPU cycles on effects and such, but it does mean you can safely remove the instrument, your routing should be intact, and you save CPU cycles that way.

Edit: yes, this only works if you're not using any CV outputs on the device in question

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visheshl
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11 Mar 2022

Loque wrote:
10 Mar 2022
Yes...

And i am curious how all the cabling, splitting, feedback loops, side channing,... will be manged as soon as a Freeze function is available...
Magic i guess...what else...i think the only way forward is RRP and if reason studios want to provide Modern DAW features it will have to be a new DAW based on tracks and Reason Rack as a plugin...reason can stay as it is, Propellerhead or reason studios could come up with a track based new daw like Ableton...or cubase or whatever...the rack and the daw could be seperate products.
and they each could be following their own paths...i think this should be the way forward for reason studios...a new fresh DAW which comes along with the RRP, i just want them to figure out how to manage midi controllers...the DAW should have a midi controller scripting engine using which any midi controller can become an optimal reason midi control centre.l to be able to control every important DAW control

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jam-s
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11 Mar 2022

Loque wrote:
11 Mar 2022
How do you freeze if the compressor's CV out is triggering a EQ on another channel?

With bounce in place i messed up my setups more than once, when i suddenly recognized the sidechain didn't worked anymore after i removed the bounced devices.
In general the freeze function could work on a device level by simply saving the rendered output of all its outputs (CV and audio) and then simply unloading the device and using the frozen output signals and a screenshot of the device with some added ice overlay on top instead.

Tweak
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17 Mar 2022

Device freeze for audio already exists, this should be complemented seamlessly with CV freeze.

See my request here:

viewtopic.php?f=6&t=7526827

CV freeze could be accomplished by allowing automation channels in the sequencer for CV input ports on the back of devices. The CV freeze process would create those channels for in use ports. Once sequencer automation channels are available, write the incoming automation to these channels as part of the freeze process, and put a visual indicator on the CV port on the back of the rack to show it is getting its values from a sequencer track, rather than live from a cable and other device.

Unfreeze would simply mute/lock the automation channel and allow the CV port to accept data from other devices again

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mcatalao
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17 Mar 2022

We've already seen things that get broken by odd routings. Freezing in my opinion has/should be focused on track and channel freeze and be sequencer centered. Anything that gets out of "normal" mixer routing breaks delay compensation, aggregated CPU Load, current channel bouncing or even Mixer channels export.

So, if freezing is thought on the perspective of a sequencer track -> mixer channel pair -> device all that has to be done is extend what is now working with bounce in place, to a more solid freezing solution (again, sequencer track centered). If you work out of the box, ie, if you sequence with matrixes and similar devices, and everything is out of the sequencer, then you couldn't probably do that kind of arrangement on another daw anyway.

IMHO, defined these bounds, a complete freezing solution is doable.

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