Question about plugin boxes

[TNM]

Originally Posted by K Roche

Interesting so If I understand correctly in DP either you do not have the options available in the PT header bar, (except saving the patch) or they are very tiny , or you have to open another window to access them ?
If so then perhaps it's really only a different compromise, and basically either 6 of one or 1/2 dozen of the other ?

pretty much all daw's have a custom plugin header bar.. just pro tools is quite unique in the way it does it and crams a lot of info.. there's a plus to it also.

BUT, vertical meter plugins look terrible, every single one of them unfortunately.

I just loaded the waves vu meter and dorrough which are horizontal and even small, they look great, cause they meet the minimum width requirement.

@Drew, you are absolutely correct.. that's of course in part to laziness.. I never thought of it that way, perhaps if enough of us asked..
Still though, all the dev could do is one of two things.. offer a horizontal version of a plugin that is not wide enough, or enlarge the gui to fill the grey space.. Because only the width needs changing, it could, i believe, throw vertical/horizontal scaling out of proportion in many cases.

Even ren channel does it.. i love ren channel from waves, yet it's a tiny GUI with all that dead grey space on each side. I actually have avoided using it in PT cause of that.. On the other hand, even though it's the same small GUI in other DAWS, without the grey border, it is much easier to focus on.

In the case of Ren channel, waves could make the GUi larger and it would work, cause it's too small to brgin with anyway.

In the case of vertical slim meters, simply offer horizontal versions.

Finally, in random cases of various plugins, offer a click/drag resize.
klohearts snap plugins are the perfect example of this. Default they are all too small in width and have grey borders, but at the bottom right you can click and re-drag to make them fit perfectly without visual quality degradation, then just save that size as default. problem solved.

So there are three ways for devs to attack this issue, depending on the plugin type.

let's face it.. this is NOT something *Avid* is going to change, cause from their point of view, there is nothing actually faulty about it, and they have used the same plugin header for how many years now? well, many of them I think. It really is up to us to gently and politely pressure the plugin devs. I'm game.

[Sir Hannes]

Same here with bx_meter. This method steals screen space. Dislike.

[musicman691]

Originally Posted by K Roche

Interesting so If I understand correctly in DP either you do not have the options available in the PT header bar, (except saving the patch) or they are very tiny , or you have to open another window to access them ?
If so then perhaps it's really only a different compromise, and basically either 6 of one or 1/2 dozen of the other ?

Automation is handled very differently in DP than in PT. In PT you have to specify in the plugin what you want to automate but in DP everything is eligible for automation by default and if you want to say automate a parameter in DP you add an automation lane and every parameter that can be automated in said plugin is available for automation.

In a DP plugin window (and again referencing the Brainworx metering plugins you have on the top of the plugin a windowlet that allows you to pick what track you're looking at the plugins on. To the right of that is another windowlet to select what specific insert slot one is looking at. To the right of that is another space that has the plugin name and that also allows you to select another plugin in that specific insert slot and lastly on is an indicator/button to select whether the plugin is enabled or not.

The row below that on the left is where you select the preset you want, save the preset, etc. There is one other area on the right of that row to where you select the automation mode for said plugin.

Here's a crop of what the DP manual shows; hope it's clear enough as I don't have the ability to capture the actual window on my daw computer (the width changes to accomodate what the plugin wants):

[amagras]

Please keep voting here: http://protools.ideascale.com/a/idea...a-tab-comments

[TNM]

Originally Posted by amagras

Is not as simple as ignoring standards to save time or money, the whole point of creating an oblong shaped meter plugin is to save space because meters need to be checked out often, if the PT header gets in the way it's time to change that and make it adaptable.

so again, why not ask the dev to allow a horizontal option?

I am going to buy the k meter next as that is horizontal and looks great with PT, yet their dynameter looks awful.. I don't use bx meter as it's way too long for the laptop yet all that grey space.. i mean i bought it ages ago when on logic, but when i saw what it looked like in PT..

hey if you guys think there is really a chance for Avid to change this, that would be great, but I just don't think they will.. cause they have used that bar forever and they will say it's up to the plugin makers to work within those parameters.

i'm going to write to plugin alliance at least and see what they have to say, and i'll write to waves as well when i have the chance. I'll let you know when i hear.

[amagras]

Bump

[amagras]

Bump. This is a really silly thing for 2018

[musicman691]

Originally Posted by amagras

Bump. This is a really silly thing for 2018

Agreed as it's a waste of space. And aggravating. But as has been asked before is this on Avid or the plugin developer? Would be great if we got a definitive answer from Avid (like that would ever happen).

[amagras]

Originally Posted by musicman691

Agreed as it's a waste of space. And aggravating. But as has been asked before is this on Avid or the plugin developer? Would be great if we got a definitive answer from Avid (like that would ever happen).

Why this is so difficult to see, I don't know, but I'm almost certain that it is Pro Tools's problem: as long as the plugin is wider than the minimum size of the header there is no problem because the header can expand, but since there's a minimum size the header is allowed to be when one plugin is thinner than that, then the space around has to be filled somehow...and somehow is with Pro Tools background color! The solution can be to reduce the minimum size the header is allowed to be shrinked, maybe creating automatically a "second floor" or something

[amagras]

Weekly-ish bump