[ardour-dev] Re: [ardour-users] disappearing meters & plugins

[Mark Knecht]

On Sat, 04 Dec 2004 13:42:14 -0500, Paul Davis
<paul at linuxaudiosystems.com> wrote:
> 
> 
> >On Sat, 04 Dec 2004 11:51:59 -0500, Paul Davis
> ><paul at linuxaudiosystems.com> wrote:
> >> >it was working. I am BEGGING for some sort of graphic marker at
> >> >automation inflection points though...
> >>
> >> they will become visible when the mouse pointer enters them :)
> >>
> >>
> >
> >Sure, I've seen that. It's just my opinion that they need to be
> >visible all the time. Just a little square box showing where they are
> >so I don't have to go searching for them.
> >
> >It doesn't matter much when the change in slope is large, but when
> >it's small and you're working at small height this is hard to find and
> >grab these things. I end up thinking I've got the point, but actually
> >Ardour has grabbed the line and the whole thing gets pulled up and
> >down which isn't what I need to do.
> >
> >It would just be nice to see the data.
> 
> ah, if only you knew :)
> 
> the problem here is defining what the data is. when doing automation
> recording, we record data at a very high density. even after thinning,
> there is actually a lot more data than will fit on the screen unless
> zoomed way, way in.
> 
> so we filter it for the screen display (which then creates one of the
> hardest programming problems in all of ardour). but even when we did
> that, it didn't really feel usable to me or several other people.
> 
> so for now, we are hiding even the control points we chose were
> relevant to the display. this is under slow review, i don't know what
> will happen in the long run.
> 
> ultimately, trying to give users what they think they want will
> probably mean not doing what i currently think we really should. it
> will mean doing straight-line approximations, and eliminating points
> that are a certain distance from the line. fine tuning the
> approximation and elimination thresholds will be tricky and time
> consuming, i am sure.

Yes - that sounds difficult. I know that under Pro Tools I run into
all the same problems. When I've written automation from the mixer and
then looka t it in the editor it's often a big mess. Their choice was
to show me everything and give me an eraser to thin it out by hand so
when I first view automation data it looks like a horrible mess. It
doesn't take long to get it down to something more managable though.

On the other hand when I'm doing global fades at the beginning and end
of a song it's nice to just drop in a few points and adjust them by
eye. That's more the mode where I'm looking for these points to be
more visible.

What about a toggle option of some type? Leave them off by default but
hit a key and see them?

Thanks,
Mark