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Old 04-18-2019, 02:35 AM   #407
Xaos
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Join Date: Sep 2015
Posts: 158
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Coachz View Post
Would it have killed him to say hey I can't do this now because I'm working on the future?
I'm not sure I understand this. He is doing this now and we've been looking at the future faces of REAPER in this thread, which is either a test balloon or just caught someone's attention at Cockos. I'm sure he'd love to respond to some of the snarky whinging here (guilty!), but once they made the decision to adopt this officially, WT likely had to sign some sort of NDA and stop releasing updates to the project or commenting on it. Jon mentioned it so casually in that video—as if it was just common knowledge—but that was the first I'd heard of it other than my whimsical remark earlier in this thread. Had anyone else heard anything about this before?

Lets just be glad that REAPER is getting a major facelift. The most common gripe I hear from new REAPER users is about the interface. A couple of people have told me utterly ridiculous things like it feels "unfinished" because "you have to put this thing in that folder" to add functionality, which is like saying a preamp rack is unfinished because you have to plug all those pesky cables into it to record. I couldn't even respond other than to roll my eyes. It's way beyond me how someone could not grasp the power and flexibility REAPER's relatively open structure offers the end user by allowing us to customize and tweak it to our hearts' content! They acted as if things like the SWS Extensions, ReaPack, and the resources in the stash were bad things.

We know REAPER is brilliant, but people react to appearances even when not consciously aware of it, and, as much as I love REAPER, it does still look like someone's class project. Out of the box, it's like a Lamborghini engine inside the body of a Yugo, and even the best themes have some functional quirks or trade-offs. When I'm telling someone about how great REAPER is, I feel obliged to make excuses for the interface design. I think this is partially why a lot of the "names" who are now using it don't talk about it. One company for whom I did graphic design let us do a series of test mailings. We'd send the same sale catalog out to two groups. One group would get it on higher quality paper stock, a layout based on the golden ratio, or some other subtle difference while the other group got cheaper paper or a layout that didn't adhere to premium design principles. To the chagrin of our VP of marketing who though our clients were oblivious to those kinds of details, we often got as much as double the response from the group that received the higher quality mailers. And our clients were construction workers and handymen. We were selling faucets and toilets, not jewelry or perfume.

I'm pretty sure I won't get anyone in trouble if I say that Disney/Pixar have been using REAPER on some of their orchestral recordings for a while. And I originally found out about it from a friend who discovered it while working on a project at Abbey Road, so it's definitely getting noticed by people who are sick of PT's channel limits, horribly inefficient audio engine, lack of support for VSTs, and the general lag in adopting support for new technologies. But some of these guys literally try to hide the fact that they use REAPER. Maybe it's brand snobbery, but I think some it has to do with the interface. (I don't think it's price, because they're fine telling people when they use Logic for something, and it costs 26 USD less than REAPER.) With the interface choices we've seen in this thread, I don't think we'll hear much complaining about the interface anymore, and people will proudly launch it and show it off to their colleagues with pride.

Also, Cockos are usually pretty open about most of what they have in the chute, e.g. offering pre-release builds, etc., but they are pretty silent on v6, FWICT. I've never heard any of their team of testers mention any specifics about what we can expect from v6, have any of you? This is why I think v6 is going to have some majorly innovative features along with this facelift, and these will catapult it to its rightful place at the top of the industry.
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