I think this has been mentioned before: The bar-line numbers over the Main Track in the Arrange Page are so dark they blend in with the gray-black background and can hardly be read. I would welcome lighter bar numbers, so I can keep tracks aligned between Scaler 3 and my DAW. Thanks!
For me the whole UI could do with being a bit brighter and more “contrasty”, and probably a bit more colourful too. The endless blue and grey can feel a bit drab at times. Font size is a tad small for me but it’s still usable.
It would be nice to be able to edit the track colours and maybe the chord colours, the latter would help us keep track of the verse, chorus etc.
These comments highlight the importance of theming, a fundamental aspect of product usability that should really be addressed early in development.
The current grey text on a dark grey background, for example, is inherently problematic. It’s comparable to other ‘difficult’ combinations like red on blue (which can cause visual vibration) or yellow on green (which can be difficult to discern). The fact that this colour scheme is unchangeable makes the problem that much worse.
This is particularly critical when the interface uses a simple ‘dot’ for both radio buttons and pseudo-checkboxes. Without sufficient contrast, it’s difficult to distinguish between selected and unselected options, and the intended grouping of radio buttons becomes ambiguous, hindering effective use.
In short, the UI sort of works Ok… but it could be better…
But why do so many DAWs and plug-ins have this problem? Is it because the developers use other, better monitors and aren’t aware that some (not all) users have problems with the GUI? I’d also like to know if it’s worth the programming effort to provide users with multiple, distinctly different skins, rather than, like in Scaler 2, just very similar, overall much too dark skins.
Scaler used to have a ‘light’ theme option, which was better for discerning certain ‘regions’ of the interface… but it’s been removed (I think?)
Fully scalable and ‘themeable’ interfaces are significantly more work.. but not so much so if considered early in the initial design. I’ve had problems with lots of software ‘failing’ to render properly when you don’t have the default 100% ‘scaling’ set-up in Windows. I’ve used some ‘name’ products where the fonts became black blobs… and we’re talking about $80k per seat software…
Most ‘non-pedantic’ types (most of us! ) will not fully calibrate displays, for example… so what appears clear and distinct on some displays will be ‘muddy’ on other displays.. though, it’s not always a function of $$$, brands, etc.
IMO, the ‘dark theme’ is very fashionable at present … and while it can help prevent eye strain problems, the dark colour schemes for software originally designed with a normally ‘light’ interface are not always ‘retooled’ with as much effort..
UI and usablity is a big thing, particularly if you consider your user base may have vision issues, budget constraints, etc… so your ‘experience’ ..cof.. may vary…
Yes. I would encourage more investment in UI and UX design!
The color customization of a skin is today not only a nice to have. I did a lot of HMI interfacing for large test bench projects and my experience was that you need a light on the eye skin. As long as you are not working in a very dark room it is less stress for the eye. There was a trend for dark skins for DAW. Still there are a lot of which never let you feel happy because of black with grey as most of cars here in Germany.
But please not a FL-Studio skining with only hue and brightness … changes. Then the way Live does it seems for me the better solution. A color mapping file and a good documentation which parameter stands for what.
Maybe a problem for AU and VST3 plugins?