Hi folks ,
 
After having taken a personal inventory of how much time and work it seems I have to invest in cresting SONAR's learning curve I feel as if I'm standing at "The SONAR Crossroads"  ...
 
Now don't get me wrong , I'm not about knocking the program at all , it is quite the opposite for me .
When I do learn a workflow I didn't know how to do I'm always surprised at how much easier it is for me to get out of my own way and just focus on the music .
 
I'm grateful that all the info is out there VIA many sources .
In each and every case the SONAR features I have wanted to learn were always right there hidden under my nose in plain sight .
 
I'm putting this topic out there and posing these questions because at times I feel like I'm coming from a space of duality ...
 
On one side of the coin when I'm doing a song / project my focus is to get the music out of my head and heart to get it into SONAR as fast as I can .Technical considerations and easier workflows that I don't know may have to take a back seat .
 
The other side of the coin is I try to learn and work on new features ( to me ) and tips ...
I have noticed that I seem to have a lot of resistance to learning new things.
I guess I may have an acute case of  Learning Curve Indecision Syndrome  Don't always know where to start .
Once I get started I get overwhelmed easily and just shut down ...
 
 I don't seem to have a concise methodology / master plan for how I'm working on cresting SONAR's learning curve ...
Admittedly it seems that I'm working it A la Cart ......
 
 
How are you guys working on cresting the learning curve ..
Do you have a plan you stick to ? or do you work the learning curve as the technical need arises  ?
 
all the best ,
 
Kenny

I plan on knowing everything about how Sonar works by the Lifetime Update expiration date.
 
Take your pick:
 
2037
 
or
 
∞

.

kennywtelejazz
 
How are you guys working on cresting the learning curve ..
Do you have a plan you stick to ? or do you work the learning curve as the technical need arises  ?

I think that with any complex piece of software, most users never approach 100% use of all the features.  Probably more like 10-20%.  There is something there for everyone, but you don't have to be everyone!
 
I think learning as the technical need arises is the most efficient way.  For one, your problem solving juices are revving in high gear, so you are more likely to apply the knowledge gained for an immediate reward.  That's something that you will not forget anytime soon!

soens
I plan on knowing everything about how Sonar works by the Lifetime Update expiration date.
 
Take your pick:
 
2037
 
or
 
∞

I would be happy to make it to 2037
∞ seems a far way off ...
 
thanks ,
 

abacab

kennywtelejazz
 
How are you guys working on cresting the learning curve ..
Do you have a plan you stick to ? or do you work the learning curve as the technical need arises  ?

I think that with any complex piece of software, most users never approach 100% use of all the features.  Probably more like 10-20%.  There is something there for everyone, but you don't have to be everyone!
 
I think learning as the technical need arises is the most efficient way.  For one, your problem solving juices are revving in high gear, so you are more likely to apply the knowledge gained for an immediate reward.  That's something that you will not forget anytime soon!

I have looked at it just like guitar playing .
IMHO, Even the best out there in any form of music are just scratching the surface to some extent ..
I agree w you on the personal rewards and going tech first ...
I know this may be first grade for some folks around here but I started coming up w my own track templates. They are based on some feedback I have gotten on some sounds that people have liked in my music
I think back to how many hour's it took me to dial those sounds in ( one at a time starting from scratch )
Starting w a blank page and trying to recreate all that seems like a lot of work ...thankfully the little light bulb went off and I started there ....
 
hey thanks for sharing ,
 
Kenny
 

kennywtelejazz
The other side of the coin is I try to learn and work on new features ( to me ) and tips ...
I have noticed that I seem to have a lot of resistance to learning new things.
I guess I may have an acute case of  Learning Curve Indecision Syndrome  Don't always know where to start .
Once I get started I get overwhelmed easily and just shut down ...

Could this be analysis paralysis (having too many choices)? I am a believer in lifelong learning, but what's the point of learning about features and techniques you're not likely to use? For me, I'm not concerned with mastering any piece of software.
 
I would focus on learning and practicing the things you find fun and inspiring. I know it's not always easy, and the majority of people who do creative work go through some type of block or periods of time where they're just not feeling it. If there's a particular area you're struggling with, then do some searching on that subject to see how others have dealt with it or ask for some recommendations here on the forum.

And I also find that by reading these forums, and in reading some of the topics or problems posted, it sometimes takes me to a place I haven't explored yet.  One step at a time ...
 
Plus there are always new tips from Craig! 
 
Expanding the comfort zone is always a good thing! 

It seems that anymore, the music is a bi-product of experimenting, learning and fixing stuff. 
Not the other way around.

I agree that most (even advanced) users aren't going to ever need all the many complex features Sonar includes. So I try to learn methodically the ones that I'm obviously going to use all the time. One reason is that trying to learn them thoroughly  without practicing them a lot is useless, so for example I know I'm going to use the smart tool all the time in the track and piano roll views, so tried to be as methodical and comprehensive about reading up or finding tutorials on that one as possible, and then just practiced a lot. Same goes for other edit tools, comping, setting up busses, patch points, and aux tracks, etc.

Other things I delve into when I find I want to do something and don't know exactly how, and then I just try to find the answer as quickly as possible, so I might not comprehensively learn everything about that particular feature or tool. Later, it might come up again, and I want to do something similar but slightly different, and then I'll learn a little more about it. Setting up remote control of softsynths in the synth rack is an example of that, as normally I use envelopes to automate parameters, but then working on a certain project I realized I wanted to be able to tweak from my MIDI controller (and I couldn't get my ACT act together). Same goes for some MIDI routing stuff that I'd never learned, but then I got Maschine and started using it as a plugin inside Sonar so I wanted to be able to set up different tracks to send on different MIDI channels to control Maschine groups.
 
Other things I'll learn when I'm having to troubleshoot something that's not working as expected. It's usually pilot error, so it's time to RTFM. Or it may be some incompatibility with a plugin that I need to find a workaround for. I only delved into how to use the event viewer because I wanted to send some CC controls of precise values at the beginnings of a bunch of clips to make a vst behave properly and the event viewer seemed to most efficient way to do it. BTW, does anyone else use the event viewer primarily to troubleshoot MIDI problems?
 
And then sometimes I'll learn something new that I might not have an immediate desire to use but I just want to check it out. Audio Snap was like that. I still haven't used it on any finished tracks, but I kind of got an introduction and I'll have to find some more comprehensive tutorials if I want to really use it. Finally, sometimes if I've got a few minutes to kill or I've got Sonar open and I'm at a stopping point or I'm just not being productive so I'll just open up the helpfile or reference manual and peruse features I haven't really used yet, or just look at things and glean some helpful details that I'd missed. One thing in that regard, I've been using Sonar for a long time, and so there are a lot of things that I learned a long time ago that have evolved and new features have been added that I was never aware of, and so I've just used certain tools  the way I learned long ago, and then one day I'll look at something in the reference manual and say "Holy crap, I didn't know you could do that too!" Certain things like basic editing in the PRV I learned a long time ago without ever even reading the helpfile, just started clicking and intuitively figured out the basic methods for entering and editing notes and velocities. So sometimes there things like that where I'll be quite surprised to find things that I didn't know you could do when I actually read about it carefully.
 
Wow, I typed a lot of words there. 

Sometimes musical inspiration comes from learning to use a feature that I hadn't really bothered with before.

Sometimes there's a real Wow I didn't realise you could do that, moment. Same as a musical instrument when you conquer a technique it opens the door playing more complex elements making for more interesting arrangement and composition.