Sure, theoretically you should memorize a bunch of keyboard shortcuts and painstakingly map macros for tools you use every day. Or you could use Metagrid instead.
Metagrid is an iOS app that provides a series of touchable, visual shortcuts for editing functions and macros, in a variety of tools on Windows and macOS:
- Ableton Live (just added)
- Logic Pro X
- Cubase/Nuendo
- Digital Performer (DP)
- Reaper
- Studio One
- Dorico (just added – music notation)
- Screenflow (for Mac screencasts – get that new Logic tutorial done, folks!)
Also new in this 1.5 version – a viewset that stays consistent across apps irrespective of which is open, plus the ability to lock triggers and apps (even when something is in the background), new Spitfire Audio integration, and more.
It has a combination of keybindings (for keyboard shortcuts) and MIDI triggers in order to do that. Those integrations work out of the box, says the developer, but there’s also a user forum where a community are free to beta test and contribute their own integrations.
I’m actually keen to see easy custom layouts / custom tools, too, but I’m a bit unclear on how this works. The tool is new to me – I just asked for an evaluation version – but it definitely looks promising, and the UI design is nice enough.
It’s also nice to see music notation covered. The iPad layout for Dorico will give anyone with Sibelius background some warm, fuzzy feelings relative to the numeric keyboard shortcut layouts that first drew a lot of us to that program.
But there are hundreds of macros here – a huge workflow boon to this set of DAWs. (Plus, if like me, you’re swapping between them – this is a godsend. Seems I may soon have the iPad on one side, Sensel Morph and Novation Launchpad on the other.)
One indication of just how powerful it is, there are already tons of macros that even the native iPad remote apps from Apple and Steinberg don’t cover.
Plus you can save your own custom layouts and share them via Dropbox.
https://metasystem.io/metagrid/
And there’s more – hundreds of specific notation references (sharing the font used by Dorico), unique articulation triggers for Spitfire Audio’s powerful instruments. It all looks like an essential for people scoring for film and a boon to anyone else wanting that kind of power.
As with other remote apps, you run a server on your Windows or Mac machine, allowing your iPad to extend the computer as an additional controller.
If you have an iPhone, the company also makes a unique gesture-based controller for handheld iOS. It looks like what would happen if the old PalmPilot gestures got crossed with iOS got crossed with Star Trek. That tool works with Cubase, Logic Pro X, Studio One, Ableton Live, Final Cut, Sketch, Xcode, and others.
https://metasystem.io/metapad/
1.5 what’s new video:
And check these integrations:
DP:
Reaper:
Created by Przemek Mieszkowski.
US$29.99.