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TBacker  
#1 Posted : Wednesday, February 2, 2022 12:19:32 AM(UTC)
TBacker

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There are some things that make use of the audio sections a bit cumbersome and unintuitive. This is based on my long experience using consoles and software in broadcast, and what I've observed with operators / users, both inexperienced and experienced, interacting with vMix.


  1. Buss naming was a welcome change. However that user defined name is not shown in many places. I'd suggest when the mouse is hovering over a bus button it show it's user assigned name in the tool tip that pops up.
  2. Possibly a button on the master bus fader blocks to pop up a grid of what is assigned to that bus. The grid would also allow assign and unassign. That would be a huge benefit for complex setups as well as quickly finding that random audio assignment that someone is hearing on their bus.
  3. Redesign of the individual input fader blocks with smaller meters and 6 buss assign buttons vertically to the right of the fader (rather than below it). I think you are using standard winforms slider controls, but putting skinny 3-4 pixel wide meters in place of the ticks on the right side of the fader might buy some space (meters z-order behind fader). This layout would give direct access to control and visual status of M and A-E bus assigns without right clicks. Not sure how others feel, but I would gladly accept the fader blocks being a few pixels wider to accommodate easier bus control.
  4. Sorry, but the on/off and auto mix icons are not intuitive for new users. Speaker usually says "cue / monitor / audition" in peoples minds. The word ON instead of a speaker icon for channel on/off would be intuitive and standard. The word AUTO rather than arrows would do the same for the auto mix buttons.
  5. As has been pointed out previously, a proper scale is badly needed on the master audio meters in the center cluster between preview / program displays. We need to be able to glance up and know without having to move and hover a busy mouse over a meter to see. That master meter would also benefit from peak hold markers that stick for 500-750 ms.


We love vMix here, so don't take this as a slight. These are just nagging / irritating things we actually run into when using vMix in a rapidly changing live production day with a variety of user experience levels.
WaltG12  
#2 Posted : Sunday, February 6, 2022 12:55:24 AM(UTC)
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Originally Posted by: TBacker Go to Quoted Post

1. Buss naming was a welcome change. However that user defined name is not shown in many places. I'd suggest when the mouse is hovering over a bus button it show it's user assigned name in the tool tip that pops up.


+1



Originally Posted by: TBacker Go to Quoted Post
2. Possibly a button on the master bus fader blocks to pop up a grid of what is assigned to that bus. The grid would also allow assign and unassign. That would be a huge benefit for complex setups as well as quickly finding that random audio assignment that someone is hearing on their bus.


So something like the Channel Matrix, but on the Bus side?

I can get behind that. +1



Originally Posted by: TBacker Go to Quoted Post
4. Sorry, but the on/off and auto mix icons are not intuitive for new users. Speaker usually says "cue / monitor / audition" in peoples minds. The word ON instead of a speaker icon for channel on/off would be intuitive and standard. The word AUTO rather than arrows would do the same for the auto mix buttons.


The speaker, to me, was intuitive.

The auto mix one definitely wasn't, but I personally would've been confused by the word "Auto" as well. If I'm not mistaken, I had to look up what was meant by "toggle automatic audio mixing" and "automatically mix audio".

In the case of your suggestion for "On" to replace the speaker icon, I'm not entirely sure that wouldn't be worse for new users. If it says "On", does that mean it is on & clicking will turn it off? Or does that mean it's off & clicking will turn it on?

Once you see that it highlights, rather than changes the word, you'll get it, but, as a learning curve goes, that strikes me as steeper than the speaker icon.

I've dealt with enough programs that have used the word "On" to mean both that when I see the word "On" in a button that's not accompanied by the word "Turn", I'm immediately confused about the current state of that toggle. Heck, at one point, with their "Original Sound" toggle, I'm pretty sure Zoom switched the meaning of "On" from "Turn it on" to "It is on".
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