Bitwig 6 Automation Workflow Problems and Improvements

[00:00:00] So let's talk about automation in Bitwig Studio 6 and I already told you everything
[00:00:06] I know in my stream and also in my overview video about automation.
[00:00:11] So I want to dedicate this video for showing you how I work with automation and some of
[00:00:18] my problems, okay?
[00:00:20] And I want to say just as a disclaimer, most of these problems are not big problems, they
[00:00:25] are easily fixable if they want to fix it.
[00:00:28] Maybe also it's just me.
[00:00:30] So let me know in the comments down below if it's just me or maybe you have also a problem
[00:00:34] with automation, you can also tell me polarity, you're just old, please adapt.
[00:00:40] This is how we do things nowadays, move along old man, okay?
[00:00:44] So I show you this here in Bitwig 6, so we have a track in the background.
[00:00:50] Let's give it a small listen.
[00:01:16] Okay, so some kind of liquid drum base kind of thing and I want to modulate here the base,
[00:01:23] the cutoff of the filter of the base synthesizer and we can do this multiple ways.
[00:01:28] Now in Bitwig 6, we can first up just enable here the global modulation mode and you can
[00:01:33] see the last touch parameter already here selected.
[00:01:36] It's the cutoff.
[00:01:37] You can also select something different by just clicking on it, resonance, cutoff, right?
[00:01:43] So the first problem I have here is already that this is enabled for every track because
[00:01:49] that's not what I want to do.
[00:01:50] I just want to modulate the cutoff on one track on this here, right?
[00:01:55] So not on the drums, not on the piano.
[00:01:58] So why just enable this on every track?
[00:02:01] So here we can just start and draw in an automation for the filter.
[00:02:07] We can also select the resonance here and also draw this in, no problem.
[00:02:12] So the second problem I have in this mode is that you can't see the notes.
[00:02:17] You can't see it in the background, right?
[00:02:19] If you disable this, you can see the notes clearly here, not possible.
[00:02:24] So sometimes I want, let's say every time, I want to time my automation to the notes.
[00:02:31] So there is no sense of what's going on with the notes.
[00:02:34] You can barely see it in the background.
[00:02:37] There is a note and there's a note, but it's very, very subtle.
[00:02:41] So I can't see what's going on in the notes.
[00:02:44] So that's the second problem.
[00:02:45] The third problem I have with this mode is you can't actually move the clips around
[00:02:50] in the background.
[00:02:51] You can only draw in automation, which is okay.
[00:02:54] It's an automation mode.
[00:02:56] But now when I want to move these clips around, which is something I do all the time when
[00:03:01] I'm automating, I have to switch back here to the track mode and then I can start here,
[00:03:08] move these clips, cut it, duplicate it, make some different versions, move them to different
[00:03:16] places, adjust the automation.
[00:03:18] So now I have to switch constantly back and forth here with this automation mode.
[00:03:23] Okay, I can use a keyboard here, I can use A, I can move this here, change it, paint
[00:03:30] in a different automation, and then say, okay, and then copy this, go back to automation.
[00:03:38] Because it's very cumbersome, very tedious to every time switch between the modes, right?
[00:03:45] So this is my third problem with this kind of mode here.
[00:03:50] So you can say, okay, polarity, it's maybe not this mode.
[00:03:54] This mode is not made for you, okay?
[00:03:56] Use something different, we have different options.
[00:03:59] And we do.
[00:04:00] So let's say here, let's restart, delete this, go back to the initial setup.
[00:04:07] So instead of using this global modulation mode, we can just use here the plus button,
[00:04:11] right?
[00:04:12] So we can hit this plus button at the new modulation lane.
[00:04:16] And you can see the last touch parameter here also at the top, right?
[00:04:20] So this is kind of like it was in Bitwig 5.
[00:04:23] So we can touch here, cutoff parameter, we can use plus, and then we choose here the
[00:04:30] first option, which is the last touch parameter, cutoff filter frequency.
[00:04:36] Then we have a new lane, and then we can start to draw an automation.
[00:04:40] So in this mode, we have now the possibility here to use the clip modes.
[00:04:45] We can just duplicate this, which is something I do all the time.
[00:04:49] I do this every time.
[00:04:51] And then move clips around and also change or adjust automation at the same time.
[00:04:57] And when we are done, we just close this down, done easy.
[00:05:01] But here they also made some changes for me, kind of weird changes, but for someone else
[00:05:08] probably not.
[00:05:10] So first up, we have, if there is no automation already on the track, we have your plus button.
[00:05:17] If there's an automation on there, there we have this unfold button here.
[00:05:22] So I'm not an interface designer.
[00:05:25] I have no idea about these things, but I would guess this is something you shouldn't
[00:05:29] do to just change buttons at the same place.
[00:05:34] So they do something different.
[00:05:38] So there's also no way you can see this beforehand, right?
[00:05:41] You can see there's no icon at the moment.
[00:05:43] We have to hover over this track to see, oh, here's probably something in there.
[00:05:48] Here is no automation lane in there.
[00:05:50] So we can't see it beforehand.
[00:05:53] Also this unfold button was before here in Bitwig 5.
[00:05:57] Now it's here in the same place where the group unfold was.
[00:06:02] This one here.
[00:06:03] And this group unfold is not here anymore.
[00:06:06] It's now here.
[00:06:08] So in the top left corner instead of the bottom left corner.
[00:06:13] So they moved some icons around, which leads to some frustrations.
[00:06:17] If you move from Bitwig 5 to Bitwig 6, because everything is in a different place.
[00:06:21] And then also these buttons here change context or what they do.
[00:06:25] So it's a bit annoying for me at some point, but it's easily fixable, fixable, right?
[00:06:32] It's not a big change if you ask me.
[00:06:36] Also here, now if you want to add something new, this plus button is not working.
[00:06:41] It's an unfold.
[00:06:42] Now we have to use this plus button, which is at the bottom, and we can add new lanes.
[00:06:47] And then we can start automating.
[00:06:49] But here the new lane is added below the last point, right?
[00:06:54] So it's extending to the bottom.
[00:06:57] So let's add something new.
[00:07:00] And I have, when I automate bass sounds, I have a lot of these lanes here.
[00:07:06] I can show you this in a minute.
[00:07:08] So here we have now multiple lanes already.
[00:07:10] We probably also draw hidden here some automation.
[00:07:14] And you can see now the plus button is out of the screen.
[00:07:17] We have to start to scroll.
[00:07:19] We have to scroll down.
[00:07:20] And we can use here the plus button to add something new if we want to.
[00:07:26] So this is a bit tedious because you have to probably unfold, then you have to scroll,
[00:07:32] then you have to click, then you have to click, then you have to automate, and so on.
[00:07:35] So it's a lot of clicking, and it was so easy and perfect, almost perfect for me before.
[00:07:45] And I can show you this here in a minute in Bitwig 5.
[00:07:48] So if you want to delete these lanes, you have to right-click now, or you have to right-click
[00:07:54] here on the device and say, delete automation lane, that's also possible.
[00:07:59] And in Bitwig 5, we had just some small little icon to delete this, which was pretty handy.
[00:08:06] So I show you this in Bitwig 5, and then we go back to Bitwig 6.
[00:08:11] So here I have a drum bass track also, and we scroll down to the bass lane, or to the
[00:08:16] bass track.
[00:08:17] And you can see we have now to unfold the automation lanes here.
[00:08:21] We have this button at the bottom right.
[00:08:23] It's not a global button here at the top.
[00:08:25] It's also not an unfold on the left side, which is sometimes a plus button to add something
[00:08:30] new.
[00:08:31] Here it's pretty clear on every track we have this button, and you can see the automation
[00:08:36] lanes, okay?
[00:08:38] Very straightforward.
[00:08:40] We have also here a button to add something new, or we can see the last touch parameter
[00:08:46] here at the top.
[00:08:48] So when we click something here in the synthesizer, let's say this button here, you can see it's
[00:08:53] automatically here selected, and we can start drawing right away.
[00:08:58] Done.
[00:08:59] Next this one.
[00:09:01] Drawing in.
[00:09:02] Done.
[00:09:03] All right, this one.
[00:09:06] Start drawing.
[00:09:07] Done.
[00:09:08] And it goes down here, and you extend to the bottom, and the last drawn automation is basically
[00:09:13] here also in the list, the next one.
[00:09:16] And then we can still use here cutting.
[00:09:21] We can copy this, clone it, rearrange it while we have this automation open, and we can work
[00:09:28] on this track and leave this open as long as we want until we are happy.
[00:09:33] And then we can close it down, bounce the track, upload to Bandcamp, get rich, okay?
[00:09:39] Also very easy, very straightforward.
[00:09:43] I think there's also here, no, that's not, that's something I talk about later.
[00:09:50] So this works pretty neatly, and also we can use here the delete button, right?
[00:09:56] Just click on it multiple times, you can delete everything or just some parts of it.
[00:10:02] So if they just bring back in Bitwig 6 here this lane to show you the last touch parameter
[00:10:08] always at the top, and you can unfold this every time, even though there's no automation
[00:10:14] at the moment you're at the track, maybe delete this here, right?
[00:10:17] There's no automation on this track, just leave this unfold in one place.
[00:10:22] And it's so, it's perfect almost for me, I'm so used to this workflow.
[00:10:28] So they changed it, and I hope they make some adjustments to make it work more like in Bitwig
[00:10:35] 5.
[00:10:36] But maybe it's just me.
[00:10:37] I want the comments down below, maybe it's just me, and I'm just a maniac in using so
[00:10:42] many automation lanes.
[00:10:45] So here in Bitwig 6 again, when we have the base, maybe let me unfold here and then show
[00:10:51] me last recently touched parameter lane always at the top, and I'm happy.
[00:10:58] I'm super happy.
[00:11:00] Small fix, you can even leave this plus and unfold thing, I probably adapt to it, but
[00:11:06] I would say it's not a nice design choice, but it is how it is, and I can adapt to it.
[00:11:14] I'm old, but I can adapt to things, okay?
[00:11:17] But I would like to have here some, at least the last touch parameter at the bottom so
[00:11:22] I can unfold every time and just start drawing instead of having this plus button, which
[00:11:27] then also moves down out of the screen, and I have to start to scroll, and then I use
[00:11:31] the plus button there and so on.
[00:11:34] So it would be nice to have this back, and I would be happy, and I just leave everything
[00:11:39] else untouched, okay?
[00:11:41] So these are just my minor things I want to have different, and I think the global modulation
[00:11:47] mode is maybe is not that bad for some other people, but for my workflow, how I use automation,
[00:11:56] it's probably not made for that.
[00:11:58] But I would say it's not a bad thing at all, right?
[00:12:01] So I also hear that a lot of people like this change, okay?
[00:12:05] So instead of just talking about these negative points, let's see actually what I like.
[00:12:12] So we have here automation, let's bring it back here, the color frequency.
[00:12:18] What I really like is the updated visuals, it looks so much cleaner.
[00:12:23] You can now take your also this node and move it here, and it's automatically removing some
[00:12:31] of the unnecessary node points or value points, which is really nice.
[00:12:38] I also like that you can now just time select here something and hold down alt and move
[00:12:47] it around something like this.
[00:12:50] So dope to have a lot of people wanted this.
[00:12:54] We can also now do this kind of stuff.
[00:12:56] You can just click and drag above here, and then move it around.
[00:13:05] Very nice to have also here alt track to make curvatures.
[00:13:13] And also something I have never seen anywhere else is here to spread this one, randomization.
[00:13:18] So you have static automation points, but you can bring in randomization.
[00:13:24] So on every iteration, it's slightly in a different place or it's slightly randomized.
[00:13:30] It's a, yeah, it's something I really, really like.
[00:13:35] Also we have now here these different nodes for the nodes, this hold thing, right?
[00:13:40] So we have just one value change, and then it holds this value until we have a new value
[00:13:45] change.
[00:13:47] So for stepped modulation, it's very nice.
[00:13:51] We can use the spray can tool for that here also.
[00:13:57] So a lot of great changes.
[00:13:59] We can also just select everything and then use here, oh no, we need to make a time selection
[00:14:06] here.
[00:14:07] We can use this hold down the alt key, and then we can do something like this.
[00:14:15] Catch it.
[00:14:17] I think you can also do something like this where you have here on the, on the right side
[00:14:20] and on the left side, so you can tilt it in a certain way, change the whole thing as
[00:14:28] something at the bottom here.
[00:14:30] So the minimum and maximum values, it's so straightforward, so easy to use.
[00:14:36] And they made some great changes there.
[00:14:39] Also when you have here the pointer tool, you can use the alt key and then it looks like
[00:14:45] this and it makes basically a clip out of this automation as long as the parent note
[00:14:51] clip is.
[00:14:52] So when we cut this here at this point, right, and you go back to the pointer tool, we can
[00:14:57] make a new automation clip just for this parent note clip.
[00:15:04] Also the automation clip is now linked to the note clip here and we can change this behavior
[00:15:11] by using here the automation lock mode.
[00:15:15] So we click this, this is enabled, and now here the note clip is separate from the automation
[00:15:21] clip.
[00:15:22] So we can just, you know, make different automations for different clips or just move it around
[00:15:27] or loop it in different, different ways, let's say make this here something like this and
[00:15:32] then you loop it, you know, so it's so fun to work with automations now.
[00:15:39] And I think they make some really great changes there.
[00:15:43] Also something I just experienced today is when you have here, let's say the pointer
[00:15:50] tool and you are hovering over this note clip, you can see it's still a pointer tool even
[00:15:55] though you go to the lower region of the note clip.
[00:15:58] And in Bitwig 5 this was different and someone in the Bitwig Discord told it to me that you
[00:16:04] have to enable here a feature.
[00:16:06] I think it was Diva.
[00:16:08] You have to use here this button on the right side, the settings, and it's called pointer
[00:16:14] tool supports time selection.
[00:16:16] So you have to enable this.
[00:16:19] And now it looks like this.
[00:16:20] We have here at the top a pointer and when you move down, you have now time selection.
[00:16:25] So you don't need to switch between here the pointer tool and time selection.
[00:16:30] It's basically done automatically dependent on where you hover over the clip.
[00:16:35] So you can bring back the old behavior of Bitwig 5 if you really like this and then
[00:16:40] just time select here easily without switching the pointer tool to the time selection tool.
[00:16:48] And of course we can use these automation clips inside of the clip launcher if you want to.
[00:16:56] So we can move this here, delete it there and maybe just leave this running in here and
[00:17:02] have automation playing poorly rhythmically and modulating stuff here on your note clip.
[00:17:09] So very nice in my opinion.
[00:17:13] So before I told you my problems, I also wanted to give you basically my positive insights
[00:17:22] of what I really like about automation now in Bitwig 6 and like I said, it's easily fixable.
[00:17:29] Let me know in the comments down below what you think about automation.
[00:17:33] I think it's great.
[00:17:34] It just needs small fixes to make me really, really happy.
[00:17:38] Okay.
[00:17:39] Yeah.
[00:17:40] That's it.
[00:17:41] Thanks for watching.
[00:17:42] Leave me a comment.
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[00:17:47] That's it.
[00:17:48] Thanks for watching.