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Why Are There So Many Knobs in Audio Software? (theoutline.com)
John Lagomarsino, writing for The Outline: Skeuomorphic design, where user interfaces emulate the appearance of physical objects, has been popular for pretty much the history of personal computing. The ideas of "files," "folders," and the "recycle bin" in Windows could be considered skeuomorphs, intended to help transition early computer users from analog to digital, as could the idea of an "inbox" and "outbox" in email and the paperclip that symbolizes attachments. More recently, a lot of early iOS apps were famous for their heavy-handed skeuomorphic elements, with felt textures and chunky drop shadows. But no area of computing has so thoroughly gone for it more than audio software. The first Billboard #1 single that was recorded to a hard drive instead of tape was "Livin' La Vida Loca" in 1999; 18 years later, in 2017, most audio software still looks like the designers attempted to replicate physical equipment piece for piece on a computer screen. Faders, switches, knobs, needles twitching between numbers on a volume meter -- they're all there. Except you have to control them with a mouse. Winamp may have been Patient Zero in this gaudy epidemic, but it has spread far and wide. I spend a lot of my time mixing and editing audio, and that often involves having multiple audio plugins (essentially applications that run inside the main audio program) from multiple vendors running simultaneously. But all audio software, for what I suppose are historical reasons, features the most egregious skeuomorphic design in all of software. Alone, each plugin is hideous in its own unique way. A panel of 3D knobs here, a pixelated oscilloscope there.
...so many users are knobs.
I'll be here all week. Try the fish!
One of our competitors trademarked the term "hypothesis". From now on, we will call them "boneheaded ideas".
Without knobs how would I turn it up to 11?
I've even gone so far as to search for plug-ins that DON'T rely on skeuomorphic designs, and came up mostly empty. Plug-in designers put waaaay too much effort into making their front panels look like brushed aluminum and their needle velocity just so, and not nearly enough effort into making their interfaces intuitive and effective.
- The Kessel run is for nerf herders. I can circumnavigate the entire Central Finite Curve in a lot less than 12 parse
What the article should have said is this:
I use GarageBand and only GarageBand and this is how GarageBand works.
For what it's worth, CoolEdit and Audacity don't work that way. I've never used GarageBand so I can't speak to what it does that you apparently can't live without and/or think that nothing else can do, but I've used Audacity for editing and CoolEdit for sophisticated transformations and neither of them look anything like GarageBand does.
If you think MP3 players are bad, try pro Audio stuff. VST synth Plugins, filters, compressors, stompbox emulators, all of them, to a tee are the same. Reason Actually have pictures of stuff tapes to a rack. The virtual cables swing around when you plug and unplug them. Omnisphere, while being a fantastic synth has this horrible blue interface from the 80s. The vintage emulators from Arturia look pretty much the same as the real equipment, scratches on the woodwork included. This is not a good thing, the user interfaces often suffer horribly for it.
Exception include some of the newest things from Native Instruments, Kontour and rounds for instance as well as Zebra and Serum, the hottest VST synth at the moment.
Curiously, there is a lot of innovation in designing advanced input devices to make music. Roger Linn, the guy who built the classic Linn Drum Machine in the early 80s is a big fan of this idea, bringing out the Linnstrument. Other things that are very innovative are the Roli Seaboard, Eigenharp, some of Keith McMillen's stuff, Reactable, Continuum and many of the buttony things such as the Ableton Push. It is also a cool place to play with Arduino and embedded electronics. Making Bluetooth Midi things that use your body to control synths is really fun.
On the hardware input side there is a lot of innovation. On the software side it is Retro, Retro and more Retro. When it comes to the newly active field of analogue or half-analogue synths anything that looks like a digital bit is screamed down by the purists. It really is a shame, there is a lot of innovation that looks and sounds very interesting.
The dangers of excessive individualism are nothing compared to the oppressiveness of excessive collectivism
Do you really expect audio producers to have to learn a whole new interface that has nothing to do with the physical equipment it's digitally emulating? That makes no sense. If you sit someone down who has produced audio on professional (physical) equipment, and they have a choice between one that has familiar controls in a familiar arrangement, and one that has some totally different interface (for arguments sake, let's say it's all number entry boxes and drop-down menus, like it's MS Office or something) that doesn't have the 'feel' of what they're used to, which do you think they'll pick? TFA sounds like it was written by someone who has never used real audio equipment in his life.
Audio engineers are not programmers? Well usually anyways.
They like to mimic what they know, mixers, synths, filters compressors etc. The H/W variety works with knobs, so the S/W variety mimics that to help, you know, real audio engineers.
This! The last thing any audio engineer needs to to learn a new interface after having spent many years learning on that has started to look pretty damn standard. If you really don't like the mouse, why not buy a USB mixer control surface and plug it in to your computer. That way you can physically control all the software controls, just like on a real mixing desk.
"You have to control them with a mouse".
Or a MIDI keyboard such as my Nektar LX49+, or a mixer like the Novation SL Mk 2, the Mackie Mix 8, the Behringer BCF2000, or the Faderport 8. A mouse! This ain't the Dark Ages, you know!
Garry Knight
It turns out that knobs are pretty space-efficient considering the function they perform, when physical or digitally presented. When doing live sound, having quick access to as many adjustments as possible with a simple reach is invaluable. One of the things I dislike about most modern digital mixing consoles is that they tried to limit the number of knobs which in turn leads to more buttons being pushed to switch between channels.
Except you have to control them with a mouse.
No, you fools.
High end audio software ties into physical knobs and sliders and shit on your high end boards. You control the digital knob with an actual knob.
All other software apes the high end software, but most of it can't tie into actual hardware dealies and even the mid end packages that can often don't because the low end users don't have such hardware.
Musicians and enthusiasts who use music creation software usually know very well why their software tools have an interface that depicts music hardware, so I'm a bit puzzled why it's a mystery to the author of TFA.
The reason is that hardware controls like knobs, sliders, percussion pads, 2-axis touchpads, multi-axis RF field interfaces, breath controllers and many others kinds are extremely interactive and immediate in their effect, and so their use comes naturally to music creators. All of these controllers are commonly provided with a MIDI interface today. This has been so for many decades, either baseband MIDI or today commonly carried over USB. Through MIDI, these hardware interfaces are bound by the musician to any desired control points in the software tools, and the result is extremely expressive and a pleasure to use.
The author complains that controlling the s/w elements with a mouse is pretty awful, and indeed it is, but nobody with any sense does that except before they've set up their MIDI control gear. There are literally hundreds of thousands of different kinds of MIDI controllers around, often costing very little, so it's a bit unusual to find a music maker who is not aware of them and of their purpose.
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