Comments on: Interface Design Redux : Part 2

By: Andy Schubert

Andy Schubert — Sat, 07 Jan 2006 06:28:53 +0000

I have played the violin (a few years in junior high), the piano (since age 9), and have integrated Reason into my digital studio in the last couple of years (I'm now 41).

Reason's most recent upgrade (3.0) significantly extended the ability to integrate the software with hardware devices called control surfaces. This seems to be the direction that software based music will continue in for the next few years.

A control surface might have a piano style keyboard or it may have drum pads, but typically either will have a quantity of rotary knobs and sliders that can be mapped (very easily) to the virtual synth's knobs and sliders. Thus, you control the software with the hardware, but this time, instead of the 104-keyboard and mouse setup, you have something with which you can easily set variable values.

M-Audio makes control surface, as does Korg, Roland, Yamaha, and many others.

Here's an example of the M-Audio control surfaces, just to give you an idea.

M-Audio control surfaces

By: Jennifer Grucza

Jennifer Grucza — Sat, 07 Jan 2006 02:50:57 +0000

I disagree with CM & G R. :) I play viola, and while the piano may be a difficult instrument (I know I would have a lot of difficulty playing so many notes at once), it is SO much easier to produce a good tone (i.e. one that doesn’t make other people try to get as far away from you as possible). Anybody can sit down at the piano and make pleasing noises. Not so with a violin!

By the way, I think I used Max/MSP (or something very like it) for a class in the MIT Media Lab once. It was kind of fun to play with, though the Mac kept crashing (didn’t help that Macs were completely foreign to me). It was hooked up to a keyboard and synthesizer, and I “wrote” a little program that would “listen” to a short phrase played on the keyboard, and play back a similar, but different response. So basically it would let you play an improvised duet with the computer.

By: Jens Meiert

Jens Meiert — Thu, 29 Dec 2005 03:18:34 +0000

Audiopad is very interesting since it's really innovative. There is another article on it by IBM [1].

[1] http://www-306.ibm.com/ibm/easy/eou_ext.nsf/publish/4876

By: Fernando Lins

Fernando Lins — Wed, 28 Dec 2005 22:45:09 +0000

I have been discussing this for a while with an Interface Designer I work with. I showed him a few pictures of Traktor DJ Studio 3, a DJ software that uses a lot of knobs. That co-worker says that knobs on a software interface are "stupid", because a knob is a real object that you can twist around with two finders, and you can't do that with a mouse.

A agree with him, they are not used in similar ways, and I pretty much find it boring to keep dragging the mouse around on the knobs till they start to turn, but I don't see how vertical sliders or any other control could solve this issue.

Now, about Reason, which I use too, the cables ideas is excellent specially because in the real world you can't right-click a cable and have it show a list of ports it can connect to. A nice "reality extension" I might say.

Wonderful article, by the way!

By: G R Gosselin

G R Gosselin — Wed, 28 Dec 2005 22:32:15 +0000

I’d have to agree with Mr. Harrington. I play the saxophone, and previous to that the clarinet. I have little to no clue on how to plunk on the piano, though my oldest son has taken lessons for about a year and is doing quite well. Reading more than a single line of music frightens me. So the example of a piano being easier… I think that’s a personal example that doesn’t exactly pertain to all your readers.

As in web design, give the readers/users what they expect and they’ll use it quickly, no matter how easy or hard the GUI actually is to understand/use for a novice.

By: CM Harrington

CM Harrington — Wed, 28 Dec 2005 19:27:21 +0000

The original GUI interfaces made a distinction. The real-world metaphor only applied to a very limited set of objects (nouns), whereas many Reason-like applications take that metaphor to extremes. From a pure interface design standpoint, they are horrible, and yet, because musicians are used to their real-world counterparts, the transition from “real” amp to “virtual” amp isn’t so bad. It would be rather easy to create an interface that was more efficient, however, that interface would violate the cardinal law of user experience and design: “Give the user what they expect”

Musicians use Reason. Sally in accounting, doesn’t. Propellerhead and others like them have come up with a specialised interface that allows musicians to work in an environment in which they feel comfortable. They “Give the user what they expect”.

Oh, and I wouldn’t necessarily consider a piano “easier” to learn than a violin. I play cello, and I took to it much faster than a piano. You really don’t want to hear me play piano.