Studio Pro (SP) related/adjacent re: bundled plugins:
I spent about an hour with Tonalic essential -- thanks for flagging that it was available
@Luny .
PSA to not make the same mistake I did (lol):
I skipped the walk through video and initially opened the instrument by drag/drop -- selecting "Tonalic Instrument" like I would Kontakt or any other instrument. I didn't see that it
has it's own browser tab.
It was not a pleasant experience using "Tonalic Instrument". I wasn't enjoying the "deep integration" with Studio Pro...I couldn't drag and drop into the arranger and was operating from a small plugin window that I found difficult to navigate.
I appreciated what it was doing...the instrument sounded nice and I had a quick jam session with some addictive drums 2, Session prime bass, and my Strat (for amp/pedals I used mustang native and also installed the free pedals from Safari Pedals), and Repro/Diva. I was happy with the sound and everything ran speedy on my rig. But the workflow with Tonality within that little window was an unpleasant experience. I thought, for sure, this is not for me.
And then, a few minutes ago as I was typing this I opened Studio Pro (SP) to refresh my memory of all the things I wanted to complain about, and saw the "Tonalic" tab. Ah-- I get the integration now! A much better experience! Complete 180.
I haven't looked into the upgraded versions/subscriptions, but I think this is pretty powerful tool! For example, if I had to write a "cinematic folk" collection for sync, or something like that, or time-sensitive work, I think I'd be all over this.
The elements version is indeed limited, but I'm going to spend some more time with it and actually watch the tutorial videos.
I was initially turned off by the "explore page"...but after some thought, I've changed my mind -- these are real players -- nice they and the instruments they're playing are showcased and highlighted.
Further experimenting, I had the thought to pull a random chord progression from scaler 3. I learned I can drag that onto the chord track, and have the Tonalic patterns follow the chords. I imagine the more expensive versions (not sure if subscription or perpetual) allow for individual note editing -- would love that! But as is -- man... this is pretty cool!
It was nice to throw together a fresh backing track for me to jam over in a matter of minutes. Good to know in a pinch.
Curious to hear what others think!
Thanks for reading!
PS. I'll add one minor annoyance and wonder if there is a way to customize:
Minor annoyance -- I think it'd be nice feature to be able to customize/ re-arrange the tabs at the top of the browser as "Tonalic" now appears next to Splice. I don't use either much, so would be nice to remove or move to the end (would prefer "pool" and "files" to be after "instruments" and "effects".