Upgrade Piano Roll to match FL's for a better User Experience

Share what you’d like to see added to Ableton Live.
jonljacobi
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Re: Upgrade Piano Roll to match FL's for a better User Experience

Post by jonljacobi » Wed Jan 08, 2020 3:52 am

Live's piano roll is a MIDI editor that assumes you will play notes in or at the very least have in mind what you want to enter. For that it's more than adequate and very fast once you know what you're doing. If you combine it with grooves it's extremely musical and powerful. It can do most of the FLS's editor can do, just in a different fashion.

All that said, this appears to have much of what you are speaking of.

https://isotonikstudios.com/product/mid ... ip-editor/

BabyYoda
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Re: Upgrade Piano Roll to match FL's for a better User Experience

Post by BabyYoda » Thu Jan 09, 2020 10:05 pm

I also feel that Ableton should put way more features FL studio style in their Daw.

H20nly
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Re: Upgrade Piano Roll to match FL's for a better User Experience

Post by H20nly » Tue Jan 21, 2020 12:03 am

2MUCHCAP wrote:
Tue Jan 07, 2020 11:45 pm
Ableton's Piano Roll. :x
:x
LoopStationZebra wrote:it's like a hipster commie pinko manifesto. Rambling. Angry. Nearly divorced from all reality; yet strangely compelling with a ring of truth.

Soundtrackband
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Re: Upgrade Piano Roll to match FL's for a better User Experience

Post by Soundtrackband » Tue Jan 21, 2020 12:31 am

Ableton's piano roll, or midi editor, whichever you want to call it is a disaster FAR below the solid functionality of the rest of this software.

There is simply ZERO excuse for offering midi detect on drum beats (which only works for kick and snare I might add), and not tying that into a decent and work-relieving assistance for what is inevitable cleanup across an entire song's worth of drum and kick hits. This function performs miracles, drum replace is on everyone's lips, and yet Ableton has spent zero effort upgrading the midi editor to something that will make it useable. Fact is, the midi editing should be more than one option. If someone likes a stripped down option, then so be it, but it has to offer far more at some point.

Now that I know what midi detect can do, I have to look elsewhere for a DAW, because Live just isn't serious about improving this function.

Beyond that, simple midi editing in the piano roll is horrendous, and there's very little effort expended to offer ways to organize or visualize what tracks match to what in the VST. It's not real DAW level. I know Ableton is a bit of LIVE software, but to claim it's a competitive DAW, which is it in many ways, and not do anything about this horrendous editor, which also does NOT follow my cursor in the least, is a real miss by the company, especially during the much touted upgrade to X, which is when the fix should've occurred. The paucity of change in this EXPENSIVE upgrade has not enhanced the reputation of the software. We buy VSTs, and we don't need delay, echo, and a wavetable synth. We need FUNCTIIONALITY!

kvick
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Re: Upgrade Piano Roll to match FL's for a better User Experience

Post by kvick » Tue Jan 21, 2020 2:29 am

+1 on updating the piano roll.

I dont really mind the lack of most features mentioned elsewhere in this thread but one I would really love to have is like a passive multi-clip editing that is capable of being always enabled. If I could just (potentially) see all of the notes that are playing on the same(or parallel) timeline it would be massively easier to compose with the piano roll.

I was happy to hear the introduction of multi-clip editing but was kind of disappointed when I actually got my hands on it. The UX isn't much improved from just switching between multiple clips, because to do things like hitting Duplicate Loop, as an example, I have to deselect the multiple clips, duplicate, then reselect them anyways. If there was something similar to the arm recording/solo buttons that would say, display notes for multi-clip editing that would be amazing.

Of course all those other features would be awesome as well but in my mind this is the one thing I constantly feel like slows down my workflow more than anything with regards to the piano roll.

jlgrimes
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Re: Upgrade Piano Roll to match FL's for a better User Experience

Post by jlgrimes » Tue Jan 21, 2020 1:42 pm

ohryan wrote:
Mon Oct 21, 2019 11:02 pm
here is (what I think) is an amazing reddit post asking people who have switched between FL and Ableton to describe their experiences with the two, what they missed, what they like etc. https://www.reddit.com/r/edmproduction/ ... bleton_or/

It seems that a lot of people agree that the Piano Roll in Fruity Loops has a much better User Experience. I believe if Ableton put time into matching this experience, it might not just convert FL users, but keep many. The piano roll is such a vital part of a DAW and the song writing process that I see no reason for a software like Ableton to really make it the best available.

if you open that thread and cmd f search piano roll, it seems that every person to bring it up favors the FL piano roll.

this post isn't for a single feature, but a plea to look over the piano roll as a whole and make changes necessary to equal or better the top piano rolls on the market. I love ableton to death and don't see a reason why such a great company and software shouldn't also have the best piano roll.

here's a post from a user in the thread as an example:

"it's extremely ergonomical. left click adds note, right click deletes, scroll wheel moves and zooms. lengthening/shortening/slicing notes are quick processes. editing velocity or other parameters is instantaneous. when you click a note, FL remembers that note length for subsequent note entry. these seem like all very simple things but they all add up and really change the game when you aren't often relying on switching tools, selecting notes, or going through right-click context menus. changing it in Ableton would be a big revamp of how Ableton actually works

FL also offers a ton of tools specific to the piano rool beyond simple quantizing and randomization, such as: instant chord stamps, slice dividing by rhythm, and even arpeggiations. for example if i draw out a C major triad, i could turn that into a 1/16th note arpeggio with one hot key. and since it actually chopped up the MIDI notes, i can rearrange the order into any other pattern I want. I could also have each 16th note play twice, making it a 32nd note stutter per note, with just another hot key. to do something like that in ableton would take a ton of selecting, copy and pasting, and hell even resampling Ableton's Arpeggiator device to get the MIDI data out. this is just one example where FL Studio's piano roll just seems to understand the things that you'd want to do with editing MIDI and lets do you it very fast. not even Ableton's pencil tool is comparable

for the record, i'm an ableton main, but still prefer FL's piano roll"


the point of this post is not to ask for an immediate overhaul of the piano role, but mainly and more importantly, to bring attention to it as a whole and the voices and criticism of its users. If this gains enough traction, the next step would be to outline a set of features that are desired, rank their priority, and design a method of development and construction

thank you :)
I hope Ableton makes improvements here but in the meantime I recommend trying out,

Live Enhancement Suite,


It is a script that runs in the Background and adds extra functionality to Live.

In particular one of the developers goal was to make the piano roll more like FL Studio.

It adds the following features,

1. Adding a note with a single click.
2. Being able to draw chords.
3. Being able to draw scales quickly.
4. Buplicate. (Duplicate 8 times)
5. Switching from envelope edit to piano roll via key command.


It isnt perfect but it is free and the developers seem pretty passionate.


I'm surprised it isnt talked about too much on these forums as most added features are pretty cool and time saving because it also add extra menus, and more arrangeview functionality as well.

theonlymanraj
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Re: Upgrade Piano Roll to match FL's for a better User Experience

Post by theonlymanraj » Thu Mar 26, 2020 12:17 am

Definitely wanna see Fl Studio Piano Roll in Ableton Live. This will be a game changer and its the only thing I miss about Fl Studio, will also improve the work flow so by many times. Devs should listen to the Ableton Live community ASAP. This is a MUST HAVE :x :x :x :x

jonljacobi
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Re: Upgrade Piano Roll to match FL's for a better User Experience

Post by jonljacobi » Thu Mar 26, 2020 9:48 pm

No, it’s not. I and many other users like the way it operates now. Don’t confuse your desires with something universal.

VibeStorm
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Re: Upgrade Piano Roll to match FL's for a better User Experience

Post by VibeStorm » Thu Nov 25, 2021 10:51 pm

Wish I could upvote this post, can't believe they haven't done anything with this yet

tomgulbinas
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Re: Upgrade Piano Roll to match FL's for a better User Experience

Post by tomgulbinas » Fri Dec 03, 2021 7:44 am

This is my biggest problem with Ableton by far.

I always return to FL for a bit because that piano roll feels so good to use.

jlgrimes
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Re: Upgrade Piano Roll to match FL's for a better User Experience

Post by jlgrimes » Sun Dec 12, 2021 2:03 pm

jonljacobi wrote:
Wed Nov 20, 2019 9:45 pm
Lokan wrote:
Mon Nov 18, 2019 4:31 am
jonljacobi wrote:
Sun Nov 17, 2019 3:09 am
Have you tried shortening and duplicating?
Please stop suggesting workarounds. Although it's been a year and a few months since I switched to Live, I successfully finished some commercial projects and I'm pretty much aware all the features.

If you want to split eight notes, which each lengths is different, you have to do eight precise drags but with a cut tool it's only one precise drag, with Ctrl+E it's much simpler.

But if you want to keep the lowest note intact, it's better to have a dedicated split tool.

Resizing a long note is a quite cumbersome thing, since you have to move around in the piano roll, or zooming in and out. This happens a lot when working with pads or orchestral stuffs
Okay, I won't try to be helpful. Instead, I'll just say that many of us use Ableton Live because it keeps things simple. It minimizes the number of functions and tools in favor of increased user facility with those that exist so you can perform live with it. Yet, you can still do just about anything you want with it. If it's not quite as easy for some obscure operations, such as splitting one long note eight different ways, then it more than makes up for it with the speed of common functions and unencumbered workflow.

I can't speak for Ableton, but I'm assuming that the reason there is only one tool is that they don't want to risk mistakes during live performance. If they ever implement a "non-performance" or "composition/studio" mode or more granular configuration of features, then you might get your wish.

Ableton in this regard is sort of like Reaper which also have a limited tool set by default but makes heavy use of mouse modifiers. That said Reapers piano roll is far more extensive than Lives but for some reason I can't vibe with it as it's functions seem to go on forever.

FL Studios piano Roll has great functions, I'm just not used to it's workflow and find Ableton has a good workflow here.

Studio One probably had one of my second favorite piano rolls. It relies on tools but the tools are easily switchable.

I think Ableton realizes they need to think carefully about improvements here as they realize many want a more powerful Piano Roll but at the same time they don't want to take away the simplicity from users who appreciate Ableton's piano roll workflow. A good balance does need to be found. That said I'm optimistic as almost every major update, they add something new to the table and even tweak some old features to make more usable.

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