What would have been wrong with keeping layers when they added take lanes?

If it ain't broke, don't fix it. If you add a new feature, make it an extra feature, don't just delete a previous one that was so useful.

I spent a long time today practicing with take lanes and loops as I reached that point on the tutorial videos, I didn't like them at all.

Vab
What would have been wrong with keeping layers when they added take lanes?

To much overlapping functionality, and too much development effort to keep supprting both if they were optional. Lanes are an evolution of layers. As far as I'm concerned, they appear more different than they are functionally. And layers were certainly not without issues. In fact some of the complaints about lanes were true of layers as well.
 
I think part of the problem is that users are conflating new comp recording and editing functionality with lanes. Certainly there are tie-ins, but it seems to me that many issues with the comping workflow are being unfairly laid at the doorstep of lanes. And many of the complaints simply don't pan out on closer examination; ultimately a lot of the issues boil down to garden-variety resistance to change and/or unfamiliarity with the new tools.
 
I spent a goodly amount of time yesterday trying to get to the bottom of a user's complaint that he couldn't follow Seth Perlstein's Drum Production workflow from SONAR 8.5 using lanes in X3. As hard as I tried, I could not pin him down on what the issue was. He ended with "its just nowhere near as smooth or desirable"... oh wait, that was you.  
 
But, seriously, I wish you'd go back to that that thread, and clearly explain what's not "smooth and desirable" about lanes vs. layers with respect to that particular workflow. No offense intended, but based on some of your other threads I've posted in, it's hard to imagine that you would have had enough experience with lanes to really know what the differences are or be troubled by them. 

Vab
Maybe someone should make a video of how to apply the layer drum loop technique to lanes? The layer technique was talked up so highly in the session drummer videos, I wanted to use that technique for creating edits and variations in a repeated drum loop as it looked very efficient.

I'm telling you, the differences are not great enough to require a new video. You can follow right along with that video in X3, and the only difference will be the order of the take lanes and where you click to make a new one.

I think the gauntlet has been thrown...
Think it was previously requested as part of "drumming month"...
 
I like takelanes better nowadays, there are still a few issues that show it is half baked (OK 75%) but it is usable (well sort of). Check the first post of my bug thread for more info (esp the "further clarification" section)..

fooman
I want a video with someone editing a real drummer.  Looping is relatively easy regardless of platform.  But editing a sloppy drumline is an art.  One that I had down with layers and take lanes is just not working for me.  The tiniest gap can spell trouble with crossfades, etc.  Very time consuming.

Not sure I'm understanding the problem. The new comping tool adds crossfades automatically that are fully adjustable for position and fade rate with a one click and drag. I edit live drums from time to time but I have never really considered comping together live drums, I tend to quantise one take rather than comping one together from many as unless the drummer is on exactly the same beat for each take they'd still need some sort of timing correction anyway.
 
Having said that I can't think why it wouldn't be possible. I comp together multi mic'd acoustic guitar takes all the time which have similar problems when it comes to timing (or they do when I'm playing). I find the new way miles easier and quicker but as I said I may well be mis-understanding what you mean.

fooman

FastBikerBoy

fooman
I want a video with someone editing a real drummer.  Looping is relatively easy regardless of platform.  But editing a sloppy drumline is an art.  One that I had down with layers and take lanes is just not working for me.  The tiniest gap can spell trouble with crossfades, etc.  Very time consuming.

Not sure I'm understanding the problem. The new comping tool adds crossfades automatically that are fully adjustable for position and fade rate with a one click and drag. I edit live drums from time to time but I have never really considered comping together live drums, I tend to quantise one take rather than comping one together from many as unless the drummer is on exactly the same beat for each take they'd still need some sort of timing correction anyway.
 
Having said that I can't think why it wouldn't be possible. I comp together multi mic'd acoustic guitar takes all the time which have similar problems when it comes to timing (or they do when I'm playing). I find the new way miles easier and quicker but as I said I may well be mis-understanding what you mean.

I have a drummer that did three takes, for example.  We like take 1 for section A, take 2 for section B, etc etc.  Comp those today to create a comp track.  Now I need to edit timing cause the drummer isn't very awesome.  I find that when I slice a snare hit that I need to move over by 1/32 note or some other manually-moved timeframe to make it feel right, I now have a gap that makes it very tough to crossfade between lanes.
This is especially for manually-moved clips.   They aren't snapping to anything, so I can't get the crossfade tool/icon to show because there is a miniscule gap between clips in the lanes.
 
Do you have a video editing a drummer without using any sort of snapping.  Using take layers was easy to do this, whereas lanes I can't get it to happen.
 
TBH, I haven't truly given it a go in X3d other than experimenting here and there, and trying things out, because I can't kill time guessing on how to change my workflow in front of paying clients.  I bought some vids so hopefully those shed light on how I 'should' be working.

Have you tried using either Audiosnap, Melodyne, or V-Vocal to move the audio within the clip instead of creating a small clip and moving it? I usually find that much faster and fewer problems with blending pre/post sound...

Keni

fooman

FastBikerBoy

fooman
I want a video with someone editing a real drummer.  Looping is relatively easy regardless of platform.  But editing a sloppy drumline is an art.  One that I had down with layers and take lanes is just not working for me.  The tiniest gap can spell trouble with crossfades, etc.  Very time consuming.

Not sure I'm understanding the problem. The new comping tool adds crossfades automatically that are fully adjustable for position and fade rate with a one click and drag. I edit live drums from time to time but I have never really considered comping together live drums, I tend to quantise one take rather than comping one together from many as unless the drummer is on exactly the same beat for each take they'd still need some sort of timing correction anyway.
 
Having said that I can't think why it wouldn't be possible. I comp together multi mic'd acoustic guitar takes all the time which have similar problems when it comes to timing (or they do when I'm playing). I find the new way miles easier and quicker but as I said I may well be mis-understanding what you mean.

I have a drummer that did three takes, for example.  We like take 1 for section A, take 2 for section B, etc etc.  Comp those today to create a comp track.  Now I need to edit timing cause the drummer isn't very awesome.  I find that when I slice a snare hit that I need to move over by 1/32 note or some other manually-moved timeframe to make it feel right, I now have a gap that makes it very tough to crossfade between lanes.
This is especially for manually-moved clips.   They aren't snapping to anything, so I can't get the crossfade tool/icon to show because there is a miniscule gap between clips in the lanes.

 
Here's where I get a little confused. If you've comped the takes together and flattened it to a composite take I don't understand why you need to cross fade between lanes as there is only one lane in use albeit over multiple tracks.
 

Do you have a video editing a drummer without using any sort of snapping.  Using take layers was easy to do this, whereas lanes I can't get it to happen.

 
Not currently but i might be able to put something together and stick on youtube if I can find the time. I'm not currently doing much with live drums for various health reasons (not mine). But I've probably got some old projects kicking around that I can use.
 

TBH, I haven't truly given it a go in X3d other than experimenting here and there, and trying things out, because I can't kill time guessing on how to change my workflow in front of paying clients.  I bought some vids so hopefully those shed light on how I 'should' be working.

I can appreciate not wanting to waste time "on the clock". 
 
The "new" comping method has just made the old way (that I used) more automatic. I can't say that there's anything in the "old" lanes that I can't do with the "new" takes but I do appreciate that I have my workflow and you have yours which can make a big difference to how useful the tools are or aren't.
 
If it might help I can easily knock up a screen capture video on how I work with the multi mic'd guitar scenario as I'm doing that all the time. Might be a bit rough and ready as I'm real busy at the moment but I can soon start Camtasia running while I work.
 
My main beef with lanes is the restrictions on size and unlike most I want to be able to make them smaller rather than larger. With multiple takes I start to run out of vertical screen space at about 9 or 10 takes, they then become a pain but the benefits of the newer tools out weighs that drawback (for me)

I'm honestly a little confused about what can be done with layers that can't with lanes. I know they are called different names but essentially they are the same thing, just lanes have more control.
 
I did see SteveStrummerUK cite a case with  his workflow and the "Rebuild layers" option (which personally I hated) but I think that has been sorted with X3 and the Flatten Take option.
 
I for one appreciate solo and mute buttons that I can see as well as the notes area. The new comping methods for the way I work are superb.
 
I'm not saying lanes are perfect they are not, especially regarding size limitations but I personally prefer them over layers.

I don't want to speak for Steve and I may be completely mis-understanding what he meant but I was referring to specifically that case and not suggesting flatten comp was a replacement for rebuild layers. I should have made that clearer, sorry.
 
I never understood "rebuild layers" and learned to avoid it like the plague, all it ever done for me was re-organise the layers into some seemingly random order. Now at least if I want a take in a specific position I can put it there manually. I could live with a rebuild function if there was some sort of control over it but not in the state it was in.

FastBikerBoy
I'm honestly a little confused about what can be done with layers that can't with lanes. I know they are called different names but essentially they are the same thing, just lanes have more control.
 
I did see SteveStrummerUK cite a case with  his workflow and the "Rebuild layers" option (which personally I hated) but I think that has been sorted with X3 and the Flatten Take option.
 
I for one appreciate solo and mute buttons that I can see as well as the notes area. The new comping methods for the way I work are superb.
 
I'm not saying lanes are perfect they are not, especially regarding size limitations but I personally prefer them over layers.

Hi Karl...
 
The more I've worked with the new Lanes paradigm, the more I manage to get my work done, but it has complicated the older process far more than it's new features help (my opinion)...
 
As for things you can't do with Lanes that you can with Layers? Here's one that has bugged me (no pun intended) since the appearance of Lanes...
 
I often prefer to see my lanes while seeing all my tracks... the new system of displaying the lanes below the track and at a minimum size far larger than tracks has made this impossible and I must continually re-size and/or scroll screen to see what I want...
 
With Layers, all layers were visible within the track even when it's space was tiny and I could see far more tracks on screen at one time while seeing the displayed Layers...
 
Keni
 

fooman
This is where workflows differ haha
Rebuilding layers is tied to a shortcut and I use it constantly in X1!  I miss it in X2/X3.
 
I wish I knew enough about making videos and had some time to kill to make a video of editing drums and whatnot.  I'd like to know if I'm doing things a lot differently than FBB, who knows enough to get people to buy vids.  I actually bought them last week hoping to shed light on these lanes specifically ;)

 
Thanks for the supoport..........
 
If you've got the X2 video I use live multi-tracked drums to demo quantising audio in Audiosnap Chapter 3 (7:08:57). Also in the X2 video using the crossfade method of comping is covered in the Comping & V-Vocal chapter (6:11:25). While that isn't multi-tracked the only thing you have to do to make it multi tracked is make sure the clips are grouped across the tracks.
 
X3 makes this even easier as it automatically applies the cross fades and adjustment of both position and fade amount is a one click drag operation. That is demo'd in the "Comping" chapter. Although I use vocals there that is across multiple tracks and something I do regularly with multi mic'd acoustic guitar - again the key to that is clip grouping.
 
HTH
 
 

I've comp'ed live drums on a few occasions. As a semi-producer on those sessions, the way we recorded was via drummer-priority. He played drums until he got the take he felt was dead-on. If he varied, we gave him a click-track. If he had a really solid take, but missed a snare-hit, or hit-hat flub, I would fix that from another take, perhaps. But I no longer quantize them. I've found issues with transient-smearing, cymbal phase-issues, and sometimes other artifacts that I can hear. If I only need to edit one hit, such as a kick-drum, that's easy to tailor in the mix, but I have to move the transient on all the drum tracks, or risk phase-cancellation.
 
Using Lanes, I have, say three takes opened for each drum. I don't edit them as a folder or clip group, because I don't trust that method (too easy to jack it all up or encounter weirdness still). However, after editing this sort of thing on an old Yamaha AW4416, doing this in Sonar is a snap. I will unmute both takes. Place markers, and use Gain Automation to mute the take I only want a single kick from. I Gain automate-mute the kick from the good take that I want to replace.
 
No editing for me. Fast comping will work, and moving a single transient is fine, but that's as far as I'll go for acoustic drums.

people really attached to the previous way things were done tend to state "don't fix it if it ain't broken" as if it is a fact written in stone that the previous feature was universally loved and "not broken' to all. It's obvious that Cakwalk thought it was not ideal and got enough feedback from users to think change was in order.  No matter which way you go with any radical change you are going to have people divided. If companies decided to never move forward because a subsection of their base wanted no change, they would stay still forever and eventually get lapped by the competition.

CakeAlexS
I want to keep take lanes, they just need improving (check my bug thread).
I agree about radical change being resisted, that's why the best users are new users as they don't know any different :). Well sometimes :)

I agree, but as a (relative) long-time user... I hate your point haha.
I also don't think that everyone worked the way I did, loving layers and using it quickly and impressing clients... but I have tried out other DAWs and Sonar killed them when it comes to editing DUE to track layers.  It just clicked for me I guess.
 
I remember when I was trying out DAWs years back, track layers was one of the key items that hooked me to Sonar.  So now that it's gone I'm kinda thrown off.  Enough so that I'm using a DAW that's 2 years old even though I bought every version since.