FL studio Producer edition for rock and metal? Need input.

[Axonic Rot]

I need wisdom from people who know more than me.

Here is my question:
Are there any compromises I will be making with FL for increasingly serious recordings other than not having the ability to export project files for others to work with and of course having no street cred whatsoever? I have seen absolutely no one else mention using FL other than as a plugin for programming and figured there definitely is reasoning behind it.



I started learning recording a few years ago and my friend who got me started uses FL Studio because he uses programmed drums exclusively and the piano roll is very pleasant to work with. I know some people run it as a plugin inside of other DAWs for programming. I've gotten familiar with it and think the way everything is set up aligns with how my brain works. When programming a left click places a note, simple click and stretch changes the length and click and drag changes placement. Right click deletes the note. It automatically loops a measure and you can highlight an area to loop while you program. The way the grid looks is easy to see. That's specifically what I like about it.

Now that I've spent a lot of time learning I want to do some money making work. I think it's time to make a decision and purchase a copy of what DAW I am going to use. Please don't attack me for using a cracked copy to learn with. I've been committed to buying whatever I decide to marry from the start. I just wanted to date for a while because I only have enough money to do this once ($500 budget right now).

I have slept around with Reaper, Cubase and Studio One and didn't seem to like programming drums with them right out of the gate. And that is really important for me since that is what I do exclusively at the moment. I will record acoustic drums in the future and also have in the past. I'm currently using presonus Audiobox interfaces and will be upgrading to RME as soon as I can if that information matters.


Thanks in advance!

 

[Kohugaly]

Well... FL studio is made for crating electronic music. You can get things done quite fast in it, but editing audio files is a pain in the ass! Recording and working with wave files in general is clumsy in FL.

 

[abaga129]

Its doable but highly not recommended. Routing in FL is a nightmare and it just doesn't have the audio editing abilities and shortcuts that audio-based Daws have. The piano roll and the way they handle midi and vstis is nice though.

 

[bryan_kilco]

I used FL for yeeeeears to program drums, only I did it without the piano roll and punched in single-shot samples in the boxes/patterns.

I was all confused when I first started toying with piano roll and midi programming, but now I'm sooooo much happier I've made the change.

 

[Loki Laufeyiarson]

I'm using FL for years now. But not for editting audio, way to limited for that. Programming and mixing only. Recording is also a big hassle to do properly, but doable. Big plus is though, is that you have lifetime free upgrades. So, you'll only buy it once.
I'd recommend to always use some other DAW for editing audio and recording though.

 

[Axonic Rot]

Thanks for the replies. I would appreciate even more specific information: What are the specific audio editing tools that are missing in FL? How important are they going to be to me later? I don't know much about editing the audio tracks other than slip editing, cutting at specific points, rearranging, moving parts etc. which fl does.

 

[Rob Humanoid]

Thought about something like S1? It's ideal for Metal (or anything really). It's years since I've used Fruity Loops but it's definitely better for edm, etc.

 

[abaga129]

Honestly I think the one thing that bothers me the most about FL is how difficult it is to keep everything organized. I used to go insane trying to keep track of everything. As far as editing goes, perhaps I never learned the right tools. But I don't think I would every go back to FL for anything except writing electronic music.

 

[Loki Laufeyiarson]

Thanks for the replies. I would appreciate even more specific information: What are the specific audio editing tools that are missing in FL? How important are they going to be to me later? I don't know much about editing the audio tracks other than slip editing, cutting at specific points, rearranging, moving parts etc. which fl does.

Sometimes slipeditting leaves a gap that you might want to fill up by timestretching a small part, wich can be done, but in a rather complicated manner (by loading edison in your mixer, get the wavefile in edison, edit and then somehow get the edited wavefile back in your track). Just as tuning vocals (same procedure only instead of edison, get newtone loaded in your mixertrack). Just a big hassle. Fixing DC offset issues is not possible either.

Don't get me wrong, I think it's a great piece of software wich evolved a lot in the last couple of releases and nowadays rivals a lot of bigger names (not just for electronic stuff anymore), except for the way some of the editing and recording works.
The again: if you feel you can do what you want and need with it, I don't see any reason not to get it.

 

[Kohugaly]

Sometimes slipeditting leaves a gap that you might want to fill up by timestretching a small part, wich can be done, but in a rather complicated manner (by loading edison in your mixer, get the wavefile in edison, edit and then somehow get the edited wavefile back in your track). Just as tuning vocals (same procedure only instead of edison, get newtone loaded in your mixertrack). Just a big hassle. Fixing DC offset issues is not possible either.

Don't get me wrong, I think it's a great piece of software wich evolved a lot in the last couple of releases and nowadays rivals a lot of bigger names (not just for electronic stuff anymore), except for the way some of the editing and recording works.
The again: if you feel you can do what you want and need with it, I don't see any reason not to get it.

DC offset is removed by one click in channel settings BTW. But really, Editing the audio is generally a horror in FL. there is no simple way to do:
-time strenching on individual parts (if you time stretch one part it will time stretch whole audio file)
-Tempo automation. Starting point is fixed, but length (of the visual representation) is calculated from actual tempo. That means, when tempo rises in chorus, audio files start in verse and continue to chorus, they will be aligned right if you play if from verse, but they will be late when you start play from chorus (because the actual starting position is calculated form different tempo).
-Sending one part of the audio file to one insert and another part to second insert at one time. (for example when you have guitar recorded once and it repeats, so you want to slice the part and use one as left and second as right routed to different inserts - you have to make each one standalone file to do so)

I disagree with Loki Laufeyiarson's opinion on vocal editing - Newtone is great way to do it. Kind of like exporting the files to melodyne, but since is FL native the process of exporting to session is simple and fast.
Also the workflow very messy as every plugin and instrument has it's own movable window. Sometimes it takes forever to click yourself through the windows to get to specific plugin gui. Sometimes I feel like having 100different papers on small desk and try to find specific page. Copying plugin parameters from one track to another could be better (I literally have one "clipboard" preset for each plugin, that I save and rewrite and open on different track when I copy specific settings form one track to another)

 

[Loki Laufeyiarson]

Copying plugin parameters from one track to another could be better (I literally have one "clipboard" preset for each plugin, that I save and rewrite and open on different track when I copy specific settings form one track to another)

Doesn't seem that hard to me though...

 

[Axonic Rot]

Thank you guys for the replies. Very helpful information.