ronjams wrote: ↑Tue Apr 02, 2024 2:27 am
When I read post like these, I want to remain a mouse guy. These controllers like the EUCON and the Avid products and others make it too expensive to buy and not get your money’s worth.
My question to you is which one of these type products offers the best compatibility with DP? Until I know the answer to this I will remain a mouse guy. Please chime in with your thoughts and opinions. -Ron
You know for basic mixing and writing automation and that sort of thing, EUCON stuff in DP isn't horrible. It can be possible not to have to touch a mouse or keyboard very often, but it takes time to learn your way around the control surface, and then develop the habits and muscle memory to be quick on it. Where DP falls short for me is the ability to deal with plug in editing as well as adding and removing plugins from the the surface.
As far as expense goes, the Avid stuff isn't all that bad if you look for used.
For example for about 600 bucks on the used market you could probably pickup two older Euphonix MC Mix units and then combine them with an iPad on a stand and run the FREE Avid Control app, and you have a very capable system for pretty cheap. The tricky part is just finding units in good shape. You could also use the newer blackface Avid units. Until I got my S3 I was using a Euphonix MC Mix and MC Control combo and it worked pretty well with DP. The problem with instantiating plugins was still there, but the parameter mapping feature isn't supported on those units so that issue is academic.
I got an Avid S3 a while back on eBay for $2K. I'm very happy with it. 16 faders... two rows of LED screens and encoders for much less cumbersome navigation and plugin editing. One really nice feature is track colors in DP are reflected on the LEDs on each track on the S3 so much easier to find the track you're looking for. Plus track layouts is a really nice feature and I've been going through my old projects and setting up VCA groups controlled by a VCA track as the S3 has a VCA spill feature. I can double press the SEL button on a VCA track and then the surface shows me just the tracks that belong to that group from left to right and moves the VCA track to the right most fader. I can adjust a track say in my "Vocal" VCA Group, then double press SEL again on the VCA fader and I go back to my previous layout.
That all may not make sense, but it can be a really good tool for mixing. I combine my S3 with the Avid Control app running on an iPad on an articulated stand just to the right of it and I can easily select tracks, or use soft keys to trigger macros, etc. And again the app is free and if you already have an iPad you're golden.
I guess I went on in my previous post because DP right now is so tantalizingly close to having really top notch support for EUCON... it just needs a few more refinements. Obviously Pro Tools has the best EUCON support since they own it.
But that doesn't answer your question... I do not know if other controllers that use Mackie protocol can do a better job.
Also depending on how much control you need, DP supports the Mix mode of the Native Instruments Komplete Kontrol S-Series keyboards pretty well. You an page through tracks... adjust volume and pan... enable/disable looping... and have some basic transport function. The screens of the S-Series keyboards will even show you level meters on your tracks, etc.
