Pro Tools: First and 12 (Not about football)

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Pro Tools has announced that the new Pro Tools 12 will have another new edition: Pro Tools | First.

Some people may remember the last time Pro Tools did this in the year 2000 (cue Conan O'Brien) with Pro Tools Free (v5.01). The Mac version worked relatively well and the Windows Me version... well it was a Windows Me version. It did, however, let me learn how to use Pro Tools and allowed my university (which no longer exists, so I can admit our possible breach-of-user-agreement without fear) to put a copy on every computer in our lab giving all the prospective sound geeks continuous access to Pro Tools.

Pro Tools | First seems to take a similar approach (back then it was by Digidesign, before Avid bought and since re-coded the entirety of the software) but can be confident of their improved cross-platform performance. Also, it should give them a good opportunity to load-test their new cloud-based project storage system, which is a new feature of the version 12 family. If that became widely used before they iron all the bugs out, they'd only have to lose a couple of big projects before the flaming bags of poo started to fly.

In talking with several other Sound Designers at our Vancouver Sound Designers meetup over the weekend however, the prospect of the new pay-per-month licencing system unsurprisingly has a lot of people turned off; and in some cases downright livid. Discussions immediately turn to what systems current users are thinking of switching to. 

While a monthly licence fee has been gaining ground in the professional media development world (See: Adobe Creative Cloud) and the costs can even be less in some cases for staying up-to-date, it's a daunting prospect for the independent / small-time designers that perhaps only upgrade every-other version or stay behind because, say, they spent $5000 on a digital console that still works perfectly fine but for some reason the new version decides to not support any longer (what do you mean that one sounds personal?)

Contenders around the bar table were Nuendo, Cubase, Logic and REAPER, that last one being new to me but apparently a choice pick (and also there was a brief ironic mention of Audition CC). Different users all seemed to argue the strengths of their favourite over the others, but the prime concerns in switching from Pro Tools generally seemed to be: Keeping your plugins, not having to get an additional hardware licence, and most importantly being able to preserve your workflow. That last one is a challenge because of course because everybody uses their DAW differently, from Old Habits That Die Hard to codependence on other external softwares (I personally can't imagine removing Sony's Sound Forge from my toolkit, I know and love it so well).

A lot of the early emotional reaction to this seems to be that someone else will come and take the lead among the defiant who don't want to be held to a monthly contract - but how many will cave and just add "software" to their monthly operating costs?

Pro Tools 12 is expected to be released in summer of 2015.

Toronto, it's not you, it's me.

Hey, Toronto.

I would’ve liked to have told you this face-to-face, but I guess it’s just easier to write you. I don’t think we should see each other anymore.

You’re great, really. It’s just that I don’t think it’s going to work out. When we first met, things were great: all was new, we went on some crazy adventures- it was exactly what I needed at the time. So much potential. Now though, I don’t think things have changed so much as the more we learn about each other the less of a chance you and I really have. We don’t click.

You’ve done a lot for me, I’ll admit. You got me into doing shows again, taught me the power of a community of super-talented and smart people. And you have the coolest friends! I’ve met the greatest people through you, and though I think they’ll probably side with you in the split, I’m hoping they’ll still keep in touch. Also, thanks for getting me that job.

The thing is I just don’t see us together long-term. Your style and mine are ultimately incompatible and though it sounds cold it does sadden me to rationalize it so. I wish I were more flexible, I do! But if I don’t follow my heart/guts/cojones, well then anytime we fight and let each other down I’m just telling myself “I told you so!”

It's... well it's Vancouver. We've always been close and yeah, I've been seeing Vancouver a little bit here and there and I guess I never really got over it. We just work so well together. I’m a west coast boy. I need greens and blues, I need my temperate climate and my buckets of rain. My family’s almost all there, and I never get to see my old friends anymore… I know, I’m making excuses. The basic underlying theme is that I’ve never felt any sense of permanence in this whole thing, and I think it’s time for me to move on. I know you’ll be fine without me. Maybe after some time has passed we can still hang out.

You’ll always have a special place in my heart.

Love, J.Rai

P.S. I hope it's okay if I stick around for a few more months while I find a new place.

Too much week, not enough weekend

Got a call Thursday night to see if I could work on Caprica late Friday. I had said that I had an early morning on Saturday so I couldn't if it might be late. The agent tells me it's a 4:00 call and shouldn't go long, and it'd be a huge favor for him if I could make it. I say yes.

Call time: 7:30 pm. Wrap time: 4:30 am. Class time: 10:00 am (In North Van). God Damnit.

Interesting show though. Without giving too much away... well, I guess I can't say much because there's a lot of weird stuff about the show that nobody's talking about. But there's enough widespread info about it to say that it's supposed to take place about 50 years before Battlestar Galactica, before their planet explodes or whatever and they're on the run from killer robots.

As for my class, I took the Vancouver Film Industry Orientation weekend class that the unions require you to have. It doesn't really pertain to Vancouver specifically really, except for a little P.R. info about why we're supposedly so great, but I'm told that the ticket I get for taking it might be worthless in Ontario because... well supposedly IATSE Toronto is jealous of Vancouver getting all the work or something. I dunno. Turns out the union thing isn't a big deal anyway because the number of non-union shows being produced in Vancouver has been on a steady rise in the last few years, so you don't relaly need to be a member to work on most of them.

Wish I'd known that before I sat around waiting for them to return my bloody phone calls.