Image-Line FL studio 20
day-to-day working. This lexible optimisation of
the interface according to what you personally
use ensures a tidier workspace, and the option
of having the toolbar as a single line means
minimalists and hotkey users can have less
wasted screen real estate.
Modern productions can, of course, get
pretty CPU intensive, with many high-quality
plugins requiring a lot of processing power.
Track freezing – rendering MIDI patterns in your
track to audio so it doesn’t have to be processed
in real time – is an established way to work
around this, yet it has not been adequately
integrated in FL until now. This has been
addressed with the new Consolidate feature,
and this new method of freezing is achievable
with a couple of clicks. By right-clicking the track
in the playlist and selecting the Consolidate
option, you can freeze your pattern from either
the start of the pattern itself or the start of the
song. You’re then freed to disable CPU-hungry
synths and efects plugins.
Variations on a theme
The playlist has a welcome new feature set. If
you want to create alternative arrangements of
your track, you can now do this by clicking
Arrangement at the top of it and adding more.
You can switch between your arrangements
from this same drop-down menu.
Secondly, you’ll now get to see the waveform
as you record audio directly into the playlist,
which is a helpful indicator that things are going
OK with your recording.
Last but not least, projects can now have
multiple time signatures. Adding markers to the
timeline of the playlist or piano roll allows for
sections or patterns to be in the time signature
of your choosing. This is a quick and easy way to
get creative with timing; even if you’re not keen
on having a long waltz in your track, it can be
useful to make your ills and breakdowns a bit
more interesting. In addition, the amount of
tracks available in the playlist has more than
doubled, to 500.
So where will they be going next? Well, we’re
still hoping to eventually see better audio
editing capabilities implemented, particularly in
terms of being able to warp audio in a marker-
based fashion in the playlist akin to the ease and
precision Ableton Live allows. This is somewhat
achievable in FL through the NewTone plugin,
but the playlist-based method of having to clone
clips to cut to smaller segments and resize is
quite unwieldy. When you’re remixing a track,
this can litter your project with copies of the
same large sample. It would be much more
desirable when working with audio to be able to
cut the same sample and place warp markers on
it within the playlist.
While the DAW perhaps hasn’t taken quite the
same leap as its version number, FL Studio is a
fantastic production environment that
continues to iterate in all the right ways. There
isn’t really a feature here that’s quite as juicy as
version 12’s vector GUI overhaul, but key
shortcomings are being chipped away at with
every update, and the improvements are smart
and welcome.
The bottom line is that Image-Line have
made the world’s most popular DAW better. If
you own FL already, go ahead and download it
for free. If you’ve been waiting to bite, then we’re
happy to say that the time is ripe.
Web www.image-line.com
Info Fruity Edition €89, Producer Edition €189,
Signature Bundle €289
Verdict
For Now Windows and Mac
Incredible value
Toolbar customisation is very welcome
PDC is inally overhauled…
Against ...but automation still isn’t
Delay Compensated!
Audio manipulation could be better
Full of pro features and bundled plugins,
Image-Line’s DAW continues to be one of
the best value virtual studio packages
9/10
Alternatively
Ableton Live 10
255 » 9/10 » €349/599
Boasts superior audio editing, a
great set of devices and a very
diferent worklow
Propellerhead Reason 10
253 » 7/10 » €349
Reason has inally opened its gates
to VST plugins, and boasts some
great instruments of its own
This is the irst big release to include the updated vector
look for the classic Sytrus synth and Fruity Delay 3
“FL Studio is a fantastic
production
environment that
continues to iterate in
all the right ways”
October 2018 / COMPUTER MUSIC / 89
image-line fl studio 20 / reviews <
FL Studio 20 has made life a bit easier for those struggling with latency-based timing issues
FL’s Plugin Delay Compensation system
operates automatically – with optional
manual adjustment – to ensure your
audio stays in time by correcting
latency introduced by processing. This
can be pronounced when using CPU-
intensive plugins. Looptalk forum-
members have been patiently waiting
for an overhaul of PDC, and this is
perhaps the most signiicant change in
version 20. Are their prayers inally
answered with this release? Almost.
This under-the-hood improvement is a
huge improvement for users, and the
familiar problem with delayed audio
arising from sending one mixer
channels to another no longer requires
tedious workarounds. A considerable
drawback that persists is that
automation clips are still not delay
compensated. Automation clips in FL
Studio instruct changes to parameters
over time, and can be placed in the
playlist like MIDI or audio data. While
the new PDC system is a noticeable
leap, the absence of compensated
automation leaves producers still
having to manually move their
automation clips in the playlist to
correct timing discrepancies. This can
be frustrating in uses such as when
making rapid creative modulation, as it
is very hard to place by ear. Thankfully,
Image-Line assure us that this will be
addressed in the future, but it’s a shame
it was left on the vine for this update.
Nearly on time
CMU260.rev_fl20.indd 89 24/07/2018 15:13