Keyboard navigation - zooming & selecting

[Suds]

For me, if it's a different key combination, or method, that's fine.....I'll adjust. It's when you just can't do something at all that I am used too, that's what I miss

And what I miss is the way to draw around a section and zoom to it and then zoom further and further......now, I know you can do that with the crtl scroll and shft scroll, and it's actually pretty cool.....so that I can adjust to that method EZ..... but you can't easily go back to the initial state.....so you end up with a zoomed in section, and you can't easily zip back to the initial view......right? a zoom back so to say......I guess scroll the other way? wait, that might be fine......I'll try it

That's really about all I miss.....I have learned all the playhead features (a video on those is a good idea) how to setup cycles, punches, all that.....so I am getting around pretty good, would love that zoom feature to finish the deal.

[Intalik Jalál Milne]

@Ben, I will begin to compile a list of improvements that I would enjoy to see implemented in future versions of Mixbus. I understand that every studio guy has a different workflow that they prefer, and I think it's great Harrison is not too proud to see what other companies have done well.

I'll get back when my list has a few points on it.

[Intalik Jalál Milne]

@Intalik: where possible, we added the most common ProTools shortcuts as "alternates". For example you can use B to split/separate (in addition to our normal "S"). And you can use the num-pad for transport controls.

If you have some specific examples we should recreate, I'm open to discuss it. It's hard to get consensus on the must-have features; everyone has a different set that they use. ProTools is a pretty old application, and there are multiple ways to get around in it.

In Pro Tools I am in the habit of using Command-E exclusively for "Split Region". This brings me to another suggestion: When in "Smart Mode" or "Select/Move Ranges" it would be great to be able to place and click the curser on a region to place the playhead (rather than exclusively in the "Rulers" bar). This makes editing much easier and more precise when splitting regions.

For example, something simple like accessing the "Preferences" window having the standard Apple Command-(comma) would be very reassuring for a new user. (I find it frustrating when applications for Mac do not use this, which to me is an unspoken standard. Currently MixBus uses Option-O).

---

Something else that I feel is necessary is that zooming in and out, using keyboard shortcuts happens, centered around the playhead. This again, is an extension of my desire that clicking in a region moves the playhead to that point (when the marquee tool is used).

I feel it is important to have a visible point/marker (in this case the playhead) to visually fixate on when zooming in and out. This assists in not getting disoriented when looking at complex waveforms.

[Support@Harrison]

This brings me to another suggestion: When in "Smart Mode" or "Select/Move Ranges" it would be great to be able to place and click the curser on a region to place the playhead (rather than exclusively in the "Rulers" bar).

Under the "Play" button, there's a wide button with the tooltip "link playhead to edit selection". Turn that on, and I think you'll find it works like you want it to.

For example, something simple like accessing the "Preferences" window having the standard Apple Command-(comma) would be very reassuring for a new user. (I find it frustrating when applications for Mac do not use this, which to me is an unspoken standard. Currently MixBus uses Option-O).

OK, that's a good idea.

Something else that I feel is necessary is that zooming in and out, using keyboard shortcuts happens, centered around the playhead. This again, is an extension of my desire that clicking in a region moves the playhead to that point (when the marquee tool is used).

You can choose where the zoom is centered with the selector in the bottom-right corner. That only affects zooming via the Zoom menu or associated keybindings. Zooming with the mouse wheel will always focus on the mouse location, and that is by design.

Thanks for the suggestions! Keep 'em coming!

[davidestevens]

The thing that kept me with Cubase for so long was the click&drag in the ruler for zoom function. It made all the different kinds of editing I do incredibly quick. I didn't realise that you could use the Magic Mouse to do something similar in Mixbus, so I'll give that a go tomorrow and see how it works out.
The other thing that's really frustrating me at the moment is re-ordering tracks. The ONLY way I can get it to work on my retina MacBook Pro is by going to the dropdown menu items, which gets tedious pretty quickly if I want to move a track up more than a couple of places. I tried reassigning the shortcut in the text file, but that doesn't work either. Which seems very odd to me. Anyone on a mac got this working?
There were a few other things I noticed a day or so back, but in the middle of working I didn't note them down. I'll look again in the morning and see if I can remember what they are.

[davidestevens]

Obviously not thinking clearly last night - though I have a Magic Mouse, I use a Wacom Intuos on my audio work computer. I tried assigning one of the touch strips to command-scroll, and that does indeed work as advertised. It's a bit clunky though, and misses the advantage of using mouse movement to simultaneously scroll left and right if the point you want to zoom in on gets zoomed off screen. (For some reason the view isn't staying centered on the play head at extreme zoom, even though I have Playhead selected in the menu on the lower left).
Related to this, another thing I miss a lot is being able to vertically zoom the waveform on any specific track. At the moment I have to increase the track size to do this, which means that other tracks I'm looking at may go off the bottom of the screen.
Hmm, and while I was playing around, I used the zoom buttons to zoom back out, and then the touch strip became vertical scroll. After zooming back in a little using the zoom button [+] it's gone back to horizontal zoom, but it's still not centering.
Some of this May be down to the vagaries of the Wacom, but my RSI insists that I stick with that!

[Support@Harrison]

(For some reason the view isn't staying centered on the play head at extreme zoom, even though I have Playhead selected in the menu on the lower left).

If you zoom way out, then the view has to stop at the left edge (time 0) so you can't keep the playhead centered. Does that explain your issue?

If zooming "in" is the problem, then check the zoom-focus control in the bottom-left of the editor. You can tell zooms to focus on the the mouse, the playhead, the left side, or the right side. It sounds like you want it focused on the playhead.

Related to this, another thing I miss a lot is being able to vertically zoom the waveform on any specific track.

Right-click on the track and choose "view->logarithmic"

After zooming back in a little using the zoom button [+] it's gone back to horizontal zoom

I suspect that is a setting of the Wacom somehow.

[Gálosi László]

@Intalik You can place the playhead with the P shortcut at the mozse if you set the edit-point to the mouse.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk - now Free

[Intalik Jalál Milne]

Cool. Thanks for the tips!

[tweed]

Could you (pretty please) bring back "center playhead"? For me its just a very quick way to get back to where I was editing. I know about view saving but if I'm moving around alot in the timeline on the fly I want something less 'planned out' (view save) and more quick and dirty like 'center playhead'. Thanks for this thread (and for Mixbus! - top notch). Now I need to go watch the Mouse Shortcuts video