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Having a full DAW on the go is a killer feature imho.
The promise has been there since stuff like 8tracks on the iPhone 3G, and various Audio Units already on iOS. But I’ve always found the workflow very limiting or clunky. (Edit: I’m a Logic Pro user on macOS so my comments reflect getting things into that specifically)
The divide from putting down an idea when it hits, to working it into something, has always been really high.
Having something where I can potentially work out an idea with just my iPad , and then take it to my desktop is really exciting to me.
FCPX seems neat as well. I doubt it’ll be something people use in touch mode, but I can see some folks using it for quick on the go edits for things like social media stings. Go to an event, shoot, edit and upload. I don’t see it being used for more than that level of work.
But also, as much as both the things I mentioned are very spur of the moment things, I think the real value here is having a step ladder through the ecosystem.
A lot of people, especially youths, only need an iPad for more of their computing use. Having more pro apps on the iPad signals to them that they can shift more of their computer life to it. A lot may just even need to add a Bluetooth keyboard and mouse.
Conversely, the people who do want to use it more seriously after whetting their teeth on the mobile platform, will then see the Mac as the next logical stepping point.
It’s a smart way imho to get people on either side of the fence to consider the other side.
As developers of professional audio plugins this is very exciting for us. The horsepower is there and the touch interface allows for some really cool possibilities. We already enjoy using AUM and Cubasis, but will be very interested to see if support for pro hardware improves now on iPad.
> Having a full DAW on the go is a killer feature imho.
Macbook?
The idea that any piece of gear enables artist is one of the biggest lies we have been sold. True Artist will use any tool at their reach to do art. In terms of music the level is so high already that is irrelevant. Sound is not music.
This captures my use case pretty well. I’m a hobby photographer and use Lightroom on iPad as my only software step.
I’d like to dabble with video. Now I have an easy avenue to do that. If it goes well and I need more, I can move to the full experience on a Mac.
There already has been a DAW on the go for a while. It's even multiplatform with iOS and Android.
GarageBand was always pretty decent on iPad back in the day, at least as a scratchpad for ideas. But yes, this is exciting. I'd quite like to see something like Ableton or Bitwig make its way onto iPad as well.
> Having a full DAW on the go is a killer feature imho.
I think the problem here that most won't realize is that they'll have no idea what you're listening to and so will be mixing audio in the dark, so to speak. Professionals will check headphone mixes, but generally won't mix with headphones certainly not bluetooth headphones. I suppose there may exist such a thing as powered Bluetooth monitors, but again, the wireless Bluetooth, and what it does to audio, is the weak part in the chain. iPad built in speakers are not flat, so if you mix for them, the audio might only sound alright coming out of an iPad.
There are probably audio docks for iPad which will include a DAC for converting stereo sound from the iPad USB-C port, and jacks for monitors, but I have never seen one that doesn't have the cheapest components available. Not sure of the current abilities of iPad and USB-C, but last I heard, iPad was only capable of stereo in and stereo out. There's a lot that can be done with just two tracks, but do not doubt that everything depends on the converters and preamps, so a professional quality USB-C ADC/DAC with decent pres (unless off-boarded) is paramount to creating half decent tracks, which is paramount to creating very good mixes.
Not everyone is a professional audio engineer, and everyone here that is an expert at everything will likely be satisfied with terrible converters and the audio they produce. YMMV
> DAW
Digital Audio Workstation (DAW)
Yay more Apple users complaining that their VSTs don't work on Apple's XYZ variant that yet again broke something instead of actual talk about the VSTs in question. It already makes many discussion threads nearly useless, I look forward to more of it.
Interesting: Apple is moving their apps to a subscription model.
„ Pricing and Availability Starting Tuesday, May 23, Final Cut Pro and Logic Pro for iPad will each be available on the App Store for $4.99 (US) per month or $49 (US) per year with a one-month free trial.8 Final Cut Pro is compatible with M1 chip iPad models or later, and Logic Pro will be available on A12 Bionic chip iPad models or later. Final Cut Pro for iPad and Logic Pro for iPad require iPadOS 16.4. For more information, visit apple.com/final-cut-pro-for-ipad and apple.com/logic-pro-for-ipad.“
So many “I don’t get it” comments in this thread. And complaints about the subscription pricing. The market for this seems pretty obvious - teenagers. iPad seems like the default computer for kids these days and kids like to create. When I was a teenager I had to build my own PC, struggle to pirate Cubase and some plugins and it was a nightmare. When I finally got a MacBook Logic being $200 was out of reach still. A subscription makes it affordable for the people who are going to use it on a tablet. The same thought applies for teenagers trying to make YouTube videos. Now they can legally and easily use the professional tools on hardware they already own.
More companies should just adopt Jetbrains model.
Month subscription available, but by paying the annual subscription you get a perpetual license for the last release covered by your purchase, which makes an annual subscription pretty much the same as "buy with 1 year of updates".
I'm positively surprised by the pricing. While I still prefer outright buying apps instead of subscriptions, last time I paid €230 for Logic on desktop (and it used to cost even more), this new sub would take four years to match that. This massively lowers the cost of entry especially for countries with devalued currency against the USD.
I was about to wish Apple had made Logic Pro free or cheap for students / hobbyists, and a $5/month subscription does that. I've want to get into sound design but not going to drop $1000s on software.
Though I wish they'd do something like Kilohearts, where subscribing for enough time basically gives you a perpetual license (https://kilohearts.com/products/kilohearts_subscription#rewa...). It's good because if I pick up something and then drop it I can just cancel the subscription, but if I decide to keep using it until I reach the price point I get to keep it.
At $50 a year (equates to $4 a month if paid annually), this is - albeit a subscription model - so much better than Adobe's £20 a month plan for just Premiere (obviously to get you to go for the £50 a month plan). It's a much better plan and I hope things like this make Adobe consider their costs. It's a big ask and I know they won't... but you can hope.
I think next month's WWDC and the AR goggles/glasses are really going to define how this decade plays out for Apple. There's clearly some kind of unification strategy going on behind the scenes but whether it's going to be good enough to win out over competitors or not is up in the air. Combos like NReal Air and Samsung Dex/Steam Deck are going to become more and more common and unless they get a move on I can see them falling behind the competition like Intel did. Stuff like this is kind of in the right direction but I do tend to be in agreement now with the people who say that we need an iPad with MacOS, or at least something that's leaning more towards MacOS than iPhone OS, especially on the large screen models.
Am I the only one that finds the process of getting files of a decent size from non-Apple devices to Apple mobile devices incredibly frustrating, almost enough to be a deal breaker?
What is the current best practice for the fastest way to get video files on an IPad as of now?
Wow, huge. Can’t wait to try Logic Pro. The iPad is a fantastic device for music making in many ways with lots of amazing apps, but I’ve never been happy with any of the “full fat” DAW options. Hopefully Apple have nailed the usability and flexibility - $49/year is a reasonable price to pay in my mind if so.
Neat....although sad that it's via a subscription model, rather than buying the program outright.
That said, what's the point of this? Everyone works off laptops already, even people new to A/V production. Especially in the audio world, laptops are just so much more convenient because you can host 3rd party plugins and other stuff like sample libraries. Can't do that on an iPad, can you?
They're also bringing the subscription pricing model...
Subscription. I'm out. I already paid for these softwares on Mac and I don't get even a discount in the price. I was expecting some kind of upgrade option.
A VR analyst observed the port could also be related to future headset: https://twitter.com/SadlyItsBradley/status/16559348583074693...
"This is notable because the Apple headset is supposed to support every iPad app on Day 1 of its launch
If you want professionals to do things with it, you need the software to push it. With or without a connected PC"
As someone who started editing videos in the early 2010s when Final Cut Pro X was a beta and Final Cut Pro 7 was extremely expensive, I think the age of charging for video editing software is already over. FCP X was only $300. These days you can use DaVinci Resolve for free. Plenty of very good videos by independent creators on YouTube or TikTok are produced without spending a single cent on video editing software.
I think Apple will regret this pricing decision and make the software free (as in beer) in a few years' time. I mean I paid for iWork 09 and iLife 09 and I was livid when Apple made them free but still I think that's the trend of where things are going.
Subscription! Even Apple has fallen. This is really disappointing.
Although I understand the reasoning, I’m sad to see the move to subscription pricing.
I bought Final Cut and Logic a long time ago in the Mac App Store, and now my kids get to use them through Family Sharing. One of them has written hundreds of songs in Logic and published an album.
The one-time purchase of Final Cut and Logic with Family Sharing and a lifetime of upgrades has been such an unbelievable value for such powerful software.
Hm.. I have had Logic (OSX) for a while. It wasn't cheap but it was fairly priced. And they supported all you can eat upgrades (admittedly, not very many major versions). Sort of a bummer that it's a subscription model on iOS.
That said, it's totally worth $49/yr if it's part of your workflow.
For me, I'll just continue use a MacBook, until I can't.
I'm still a bit skeptical about Logic's ability to be a full-featured DAW on the iPad. The move is great, but we need to tackle several challenges to make it suitable for final editing rather than just a work support tool:
- It needs to have open and comprehensive plugin support
- The workflow for uploading and exporting content needs to be seamless, and the iPad OS is still limited in this regard
- Screen size and real estate are still a concern
- Ready-to-use ecosystems for operating with the iPad, such as interfaces, audio monitors, etc., need to be developed.
I love the idea of being able to record, create, edit, and mix on the go, but I've kind of moved away from the DAW paradigm on tablets. Today, I focus my workflow on a Dawless idea, with the M8, Digitakt, Organelle, OP-1, and several other devices. More expensive? Definitely! But it fits my creative mode.
Holy f**… how on earth will any other DAW vendor compete with that price? Logic already was crazy cheap, but now the price really just seems to be to boost iPad sales.
It’s amazing what you get for $5/month here. But I’m a bit worried about innovation if everyone gets used to these prices.
This is great, but why not just have Garage Band work the same / be the same on both platforms?
I'm a PC user; few years ago I realized how great iPad GarageBand was for playing around. Like an idiot, I literally purchased a used MacBook so I can edit my iPad travelling doodles at home with big screen as well, only to realize that they are different software with different capabilities and you cannot seamlessly copy projects from one to another.
I openly admit I'm an idiot for jumping in like that, but for all the discussion on how user friendly and seamless Apple ecosystem is, I still don't think it was a ridiculous assumption to make :-/
It really says a lot about the future of editing. Everyone doing it on their phones is growing up showing us what editing packages are going to look like… and it’s something like this. Big screen, touch interface, more fluid work flow, definitely going to be ai assisted… it’s interesting timing.
I feel like Apple is going to do the magic they did for spell checking with the iPhone keyboard for professional video editing. Might take them a while but this fcp finally evolving to the iPad feels like the bellwhether.
Anyone else see the trend? 3-4 generations down the line probably. But do you see it?
I guess my mac logic pro license won’t cover the iPad version, right?
Logic will do for now, but I really want MainStage for the iPad. MainStage is one of the best collections of synths you can get, much less for $29, and being able to gig with it small touch-screen hardware like an iPad mini would be incredible. I'm all in on Android, but would but an iPad just for music.
For anyone interested in how the iPad is actually used by professionals to make/produce music you can watch this video by youtuber Henny Tha Bizness.
He has a great video on how he got started [0]
D̶o̶e̶s̶ ̶t̶h̶i̶s̶ ̶w̶o̶r̶k̶ ̶w̶i̶t̶h̶ ̶a̶n̶y̶ ̶i̶P̶a̶d̶ ̶m̶o̶d̶e̶l̶?̶ ̶I̶ ̶u̶n̶d̶e̶r̶s̶t̶a̶n̶d̶ ̶t̶h̶e̶ ̶f̶o̶r̶m̶ ̶f̶a̶c̶t̶o̶r̶ ̶i̶s̶ ̶n̶o̶t̶ ̶t̶h̶e̶ ̶b̶e̶s̶t̶ ̶i̶n̶ ̶a̶n̶ ̶i̶P̶a̶d̶ ̶M̶i̶n̶i̶ ̶b̶u̶t̶ ̶c̶o̶u̶r̶i̶o̶u̶s̶ ̶t̶o̶ ̶k̶n̶o̶w̶.̶
I read that it works on >= M1 processor. It is at the end of [1] before the footer:
"Final Cut Pro for iPad is available on the App Store. Requires an iPad with Apple M1 chip or later and iPadOS 16.4 or later. Downloading apps requires an Apple ID. To subscribe to Final Cut Pro for iPad you must have an internet connection."
That is currently iPad Pro and iPad Air (10.9" display).
Now I just wish iPads would have an audio jack so that I could plug in my headphone while using Logic.
As the years go by, the entirely different OS for tablets vs laptops which at first seemed like the only route to get a quality experience seems like a huge misstep now the tablets all have keyboards and trackpads stuck to them when used for work.
Allegedly this supports audio interfaces, so I presume it's supposed to able to be used for recording. What kind of latency can be achieved by ipad hardware? This announcement is mysteriously quiet about that.
I don't get it.
People have been wondering when this would happen since the very first iPad Pro, so lots of people will be happy now...
Even assuming all the required horse power is there, I still don't get it...
Maybe I'm getting old.
There is a great app for iPad called LumaFusion, which is very similar to Final Cut. I tried using an iPad Pro for a couple of weeks when it came out, to see if it can replace a laptop or desktop.
Biggest problem was ergonomics. So incredibly bad ergonomics to work on an iPad, even with the pen. Impossible to work without strain in neck and arm.
So I'm back to Macbook and I will never again attempt to edit video on an iPad.
This is exciting.
I'd love it if they opened the iPad up to tools like Rogue Amoeba's Loopback[1], because a tool that allows audio capture from the device is critical for any sampling workflow.
I'm not holding my breath, but that would complete the dream, for me.
A subscription for Logic is nuts. It's already $300 software for the Mac. I would be fine paying another one-time fee if it meant I had it forever on my iPad. It really is stellar software, as evidenced by it's two-decade presence in the industry, but to move to subscription feels very... un-Apple (at least in this Professional Media Software context).
I wanted to go iPad only for live music for a while, but found the supporting hardware to be lacking. (This was like five years ago.)
I spent money on a dock that would allow me two audio inputs (microphone and guitar for example) and a USB jack for plugging in an external MIDI keyboard. The experience was somewhat janky and unreliable. I wonder if that has changed.
Now one of the hardware companies needs to make a 2+/in/out digital audio interface _and_ usb c hub. Who needs this? The pro amateurs like me. I have a MiniFuse2 attached to a dongle with a synth and sometimes drum machine in there and it’s getting kind of wirey. It’s not as backpack friendly as it could be.
My money is on a larger iPad (think Microsoft Studio) that takes the place of an iMac. Likely 15” at first, larger later. I really enjoy a keyboard and trackpad with an iPad and an external monitor. This would be my only machine if I could run Xcode/Terminal on it.
Last week my company launched an iOS app that gets music into Apple Music and Spotify.
Timing unintentional but neato that musicians can now record, distribute & promote all from the device.
(not mentioning name of app cuz promotion, also we're not the only app that does this)
I'm pretty excited about FCP and subscription model. I pay for Adobe CC and for videos, FCP always felt out of reach (couldn't justify spending $299) for me to tinker with and move past using iMovie for quick family edits.
I’m looking forward to seeing the feature set. I recently tried out a few of the iPad DAWs and wasn’t able to find anything that could even correctly record and edit MIDI and also automate tempo (like MacOS Logic Pro’s tempo track).
Slightly unrelated: is there a way or an app to shoot 4k on iPhone or iPad and store it directly on external ssd?
Apple often advertises their new pro phones with „professional“ level video production so I always assumed that is possible somehow