FL Studio 10 Producer Edition – Review (Part 1: Strengths)

by John Judd

Today I will focus on the overall strengths of the FL 10 D.A.W. In further installments I will discuss weaknesses and specifics of the application.

First, be aware that FL just recently eliminated playlist pattern blocks (which can still be enabled in the ‘options’ tab). Although I rarely used these, I believe that the appeal of these pattern blocks is what made FL so popular in the first place. A user unfamiliar with music could come up with a beat, write a riff, and build something that sounded like music in a very short amount of time.

FL 10 comes with 5 windows to manage: playlist, mixer, step sequencer, piano roll, and browser. These windows have keyboard shortcuts as well as icon shortcuts at the top of your screen. Audio, midi, and automation are dealt with as clips. You can change the focus on one of those clip types with one of the three buttons in the upper left hand corner of the playlist.

Below I will discuss FL from the viewpoint of someone who needs this program for professional use. Basic functionality is where most of the discussion will focus.

Eyes

Immediately you will notice the dark layout of FL. It will be kind on your eyes, which means you will be able to make more music in a lengthy session. For those of us who ever sat through a long Pro Tools session, eye strain was a part of it. No worries here, FL will be easy on the eyes.

Lanes

For those of you familiar with the ‘lane’ based D.A.W. world, the open lane offerings of FL might be just what you need to free up your workflow. Audio clips, automation clips, or pattern clips can be placed anywhere in the playlist, including on top of one another (placing automation on top of audio clips can be helpful as it does avoid the clutter of additional lanes which usually plagues other programs).

Shortcuts

One of the more intuitive features are FL Studio’s shortcuts. Control, shift, and alt are often paired with other keys or mouse clicks. Once learned, the shortcuts speed up workflow to a pace that helps composing move faster, without hindering creativity. For other various program windows, the F1-F12 keys are also in play. Copy, paste, and move items with ease in the playlist. This includes ‘nudging’ items to make the groove fit a little better. The scrolling and zooming shortcuts are most likely to be the most important to learn and will make FL navigation fast and easy.

Automation

FL deals with automation as clips (instead of a lane, although it can have a lane to itself should you desire). Creating or deleting points is just a mouse click away! You also have control over the tension between points. Just left click the circle handle between points and use mouse movement to control the tension in the envelope. This is very fast and intuitive.

Keep two things in mind with FL automation: if you have copies of automation clips, they are exact copies and will act accordingly. The ‘make unique’ feature will help avoid this, if desired. Clips can also move, so be careful what you are grabbing! Truly one of the best features of FL automation is that once all of it is complete, you can still tweak things without touching the automation in the playlist. The auto clips that are created land in the step sequencer as channels, which have fine tuning capabilities for minimum and maximum values. This is the ultimate in control over what could potentially be the most important parts of your project. One last thing, just about any button or knob in FL or FL native plugins can be automated with a right click. Yeah, really…amazing, eh?

Mixer

One of the great features of the FL mixer is that every insert has a built in Parametric EQ. No need to instantiate a plugin if you want a quick and dirty low cut. Swap left and right channels in a stereo signal with one click, and the same goes for polarity. Plugin Delay Compensation is available for third party plugins if needed. Multiple views are available in the options view tab for those of us that want a wide mixer or for alternate placement of mixer inserts.

‘What does this knob do?’

FL will tell you the function of any native knob/button/wheel/control in the upper left corner hint bar. As silly as it sounds, you will use it.

Updates

Lifetime free updates. Worth repeating: LIFETIME FREE UPDATES! No strings attached. How tired does one get of paying for DAW updates every year or two? No worries here.

Stablility

It has been my experience that FL rarely crashes, and if it does a third party plugin is usually to blame. That being said, every third party vendor software that I have used within FL has worked without any issues. Be it hardware or software, FL will ‘play nice’. Once more, how many of us were working in another DAW just to have a hardware/software conflict that derailed the creative process for hours? Few conflicts in FL means more music output at the end of your day.

Rewire

Yes, FL can be used as a plugin instrument in other DAWS. Perfect for those of you that are comfortable with your existing production environment, but want some new sounds.

Need Help?

Can’t figure out how something works within FL? Check out the Image-Line FL Studio tutorials on Youtube. A multitude of topics are covered and will surely help you where knowledge is lacking.

Secret Weapons

Perhaps not apparent from a glance, here are some of the FL 10 features that you just can’t live without. Slicex is the FL audio slicing tool with quantizing features. The audio is cut and each slice is sent to the piano roll and triggered by different notes. Such a great tool for tightening or mangling audio. Edison is the FL audio editor. It is one of the most powerful FL plugins with a plethora of tools to manipulate audio. There are too many features in Edison to be discussed here, but perhaps in a future installment. Direct Wave is the FL sampler. The perfect tool for manipulating samples and setting up velocity triggered sections of a sample library. A purchase of this plugin can unlock additional functionality, which is well worth the investment.

Summary

For the musician that still has not settled into a favorite and reliable D.A.W., one that is looking for a new ‘flavor’, or someone that has grown frustrated with the issues of their current D.A.W.: download the demo of FL 10. You will have it running in short order and see what this great piece of software can do for your music production. For the relative amount of money spent on FL in comparison with competing software, it will add some invaluable cutting edge tools to your music production arsenal. In the next installment, I will discuss the FL 10 weaknesses.