I posted a similar thought in another thread,  but I want the Bakers to really read this.
 
SONAR could easily become the "premiere" DAW for scoring to picture by:
 
 
 
1) working on a Mac OS

2) adding a "ripple" editing feature
3) Update the notation editing!!!!
 
Next thing you'll see is SONAR in all the school systems.....JUST SAYIN"!
 

1)  Yup, happening.
2)  Yup, happening.
3)  Nope, sorry.  I've been writing for film and putting up with the staff view for years.  They even removed features from it between 8.5 and the X series.  Today's announcements further emphasize to me that staff view simply isn't a priority, as it hasn't been in the past.  No mention of it in the roadmap at all.  
 
We can keep beating that drum but I just don't think it's in the cards, unfortunately.  When a company decides to fiddle with color themes and add touch support to a DAW instead of improving a long-neglected feature that some of us rely on, it's obvious.  We are not their target audience.

So I guess I'll go ahead and beat this dead horse again:  I, for one, am not asking for staff view to be Finale or Sibelius or anything close to them.  The staff view workflow has a good foundation as it is.  It needs polish and workflow enhancements geared toward producing recordings, not sheet music.  Cubase is probably the closest to this, but it felt too restrictive by comparison (despite its plethora of markings and sheet-music fluff).  In addition, the fact that Sonar's staff view is integrated into the DAW itself is a major boon and trumps, for me, the workflow of writing in one app and importing into Sonar.  

I haven't tried any of the offerings on Mac.  They may be better and my answer lies there... but one thing I do know is that the answer does not lie in Sonar.

Yep, I tried DP8 for a while.  The scoring features where way cool (Streamers and notation and versions),  but DP8 was weak on everything else like handling soft synths and mixing....

uhh..you forgot the most important part for scoring to film.....the video support for Sonar isn't what it needs to be.  It needs to support formats people actually use.  

Brian Walton
uhh..you forgot the most important part for scoring to film.....the video support for Sonar isn't what it needs to be.  It needs to support formats people actually use.  

No doubt, but this is relatively easy to work around.  Usually I'm sent files in all sorts of formats and they're usually HUGE.  So I use a video file converter that can A) convert it into a format Sonar is happy with and B) compress it down to a reasonable file size, which reduces seek time for Sonar when I'm jumping around a project.   That's the main reason I don't harp on it, because there are ways around it.  There simply aren't ways around Sonar's notation deficiencies, even with Duckbar added.

Well Cakewalk will still need a revenue stream. so I'm willing to wait if they have something planned. - like a third party scoring / video suite -even as a paid add on.

Tbh the mac version success will be pivotal for this to happen.. since it will widen the userbase. Question is will staff view be improved before a Mac launch in order to boost appeal.

As mentioned above by JF,  the video support is not an issue.  If you seriously score to picture you should have the tools and knowledge to work in Sonar without a problem.  In fact, I would suggest following his workflow for any DAW.  The are just two many different types of files/codecs and other issues that come up day to day.  I would not want a DAW that wasted resources on Picture issues like editing and such.  There are so many apps that specialize and do that just fine.  
 
When you are being paid to score to picture,  you are usually under very tight deadlines and there is a ton of pressure to work fast and efficient.  There is no other DAW, in my experience, that has handled rendering and plug ins and now mixing as well as SONAR.  If SONAR polishes up notation, adds rippling, goes Mac......no reason whatsoever to not use it.  It would just be so far ahead of every other DAW.
 

Elffin
Question is will staff view be improved before a Mac launch in order to boost appeal.

See, this is what I was thinking in the brief period earlier today when we knew about Mac support but didn't know what the 3rd announcement was.  I was hoping that it would lead to many areas of the app being spiffed up and made more stable, to deliver a rounded product to the Mac audience.  But when the last announcement listed several months worth of potential work, and none of it mentioned staff view, is when that hope was dashed.  It tells me they expect their target audience on Mac to be similar to their audience on PC: songwriters, bands, DJs, what have you.  

But man, I really, really hope I'm wrong.  I would easily pay for a notation upgrade pack, but I would prefer it be first-party to keep the tight integration and not stray too far from the current staff view's roots.  

and better OMF support, AAF support and as said above, better handling of videos and a better export video function.

markyzno
and better OMF support, AAF support and as said above, better handling of videos and a better export video function.

 
See to me Exporting Video out of Sonar is a waste. I export a wav file so quickly, load into a Video Editing App (Sony Movie Studio) and render a video file that matches my needs.  I'll bet BIG money I do this way faster, better than anyone working in ProTools, Cubase, Logic or whatever.  
 
As far as OMF...I have been sending OMFs rendered out of Sonar to mixers for years, with great success.