I assure you we do not have time to make change for "change's sake". For every one of you who dislikes the change, we can find another complaining because VEGAS Pro looks "old fashioned" or "outdated" or "hard to read". So we tried to address those concerns.
We'll take all comments into consideration and weigh them against one another. If a change feels warranted, we'll make it. But not simply for change's sake. We have far too much to do to waste time working like that.
A consistent complaint I'm seeing in these forums are with the icon changes. Some are definitely difficult to see. I've been migrating to another audio production program which provides complete user reskinning/user theming, where I will be the 1st to admit it's not an easy task but has allowed me to appreciate the efforts which goes into updating a user interface. No need for Vegas to go to that extreme. However, part of those theming capabilities is that the default themes are included which each new version release where the user can select previous version user interfaces if that's what they prefer. You're likely always going to run into those complaints of folks preferring the previous interface over the "new" since we're human and creatures of habit and often fall into bad habits of resisting change. Maybe you might want to consider providing a user selection of loading the previous version user interface? Why completely throw away something which is already complete and some prefer over the new? Just add a preference setting to be able to load the previous user interface. That way if someone complains something feels old and outdated....it was their personal choice to go back to the old and outdated user interface. No need to throw out the baby with the bathwater when attempting to keep up to date with the new fresh look.
I completely agree with @Rednroll ... Every UI / icon change over the years attracts criticism about the new being worse than the previous. A choice would be terrific. I could be wrong, but didn't Vegas Pro 15 have a choice of using the Vegas Pro 14 UI / icon display rather than the new VP15 display?
I say team VEGAS rewrites the full UI in such a way that we can skin it however we want, like Reaper does, then trade our skins online.
I say team VEGAS rewrites the full UI in such a way that we can skin it however we want, like Reaper does, then trade our skins online.
I didn't want to mention the name, but yes that is what I was referring to. I love the Vegas UI on the most part. With Reaper the user can swap out icons which is the simple part of customization. You can use older version icons, as well as create your own by just drag and drop into the theme's image content folder. They're 3 stage PNG files and as long as their aspects ratios are the same you won't see any distortion artifacts. Many disliked the Reaper v6 updated user interface and preferred v5, for those users it was just a simple menu change of selecting the v5 interface. You could even go all the way back to v1 if you liked.
I'm currently in the deep waters of more advanced theming in Reaper of creating a custom theme, I still have quite a ways to go. However, it looks/feels a lot like Vegas at this point. I like Vegas for video editing and when I'm working with apps which do similar tasks, I like things layed out in a similar fashion so when switching between them I know exactly where to look for items. Thus, the reason I continued to use Acid Pro for music production since it had a similar layout as Vegas Pro but now that is lagging behind Vegas in user interface.
It was mentioned that this type of customization was available in WinAmp going back to Win95. Well, I guess it should be no surprise then the developer who created WinAmp, also created Reaper so Reaper was built from the ground up with this in mind. Since Vegas wasn't, I still think there's some things that could be borrowed from Reaper that would make these icon complaints easily go away. I would have to assume, most folks who work with Video editing software, are also very fluent with image editing software as well and if not, other user created icons can be uploaded and shared or just swap out an older version icon for the new version you don't like.
For those that prefer gray icons there is the option under Options, Preferences, Display tab, Icon Color Strength. However it does not make every icon display in color. That needs to be changed to include all icons. I also prefer icons with a color for faster identity.
I say team VEGAS rewrites the full UI in such a way that we can skin it however we want, like Reaper does, then trade our skins online.
That's the way to go. All previous icons already exist, users would like to change how UI looks like. It would be great if the dev team would add an option to choose at least from 2 options (Vegas 18 UI or new v19 UI).
VP18's 'Active Take' information was black text on a white background. With VP19, the Active Take background is inherited from the new, intense track colors, and very difficult to read. I'm a function-over-form guy, so the old UI, including track colors, was far easier on my eyes. Maybe VP19's colors/symbols/icons are more modern than VP18's UI, but it's still a fail.
VP18's 'Active Take' information was black text on a white background. With VP19, the Active Take background is inherited from the new, intense track colors, and very difficult to read. I'm a function-over-form guy, so the old UI, including track colors, was far easier on my eyes. Maybe VP19's colors/symbols/icons are more modern than VP18's UI, but it's still a fail.
As my "observations" suggests – most people do like Vegas 18 UI more than the new version. Or at least it's easier to read.
Hope it'll give you some desire to revisit UI changes @VEGASDerek @gary-rebholz
In Vegas 14-15 I just replaced icon with the Resource Hacker or Resource Tuner and was able to make a look like Sony Vegas 13 😇 In Vegas 17 and later - it's now impossible because of some protection - I can't start Vegas if I replaced icons or any graphic 😒 If there could be a possible to start Vegas even with replaced resources - I would be happy)))
And about skins - Ithink it is impossible simply because all icons and graphic stored in the Vegas.Exe file(( So team need to rewrite almost all Vegas to make it possible.
But to change icons and UI - for Vegas team is very simple job - just paint new icons and replace resources. That is easy. And i'm sure there are tons of freelancers (graphic designers) who can paint beautyful interface.
The only way to make it by users is if Vegas Team will make an app, that can change resources in Vegas.Exe and that 'exe' will start because app will save the protection. That would be very good. Even if the new graphics and themes will cost a money, I'm sure people will buy good themes. But this is utopia...
Yes, I prefer also the VP 18 icons for the same reason described above.
Hacking vegas190.exe will destroy Magix digital signature of the exe file, and make your legal serial number not work. unless you use a illegal pirated version.
Just to throw my penny in the box, yep i preferred the old 18 icons at first but i'm getting used to 19..
but white/grey icons on a grey background is not good & can take a moment to recognise some of the buttons, there's no harm throwing a bit more colour in here n there.
the one that gets me is the Delete at the bottom of the screen, surely Delete should be red?
Ok so I join this thread too as I had complained about the icons in another one and someone pointed me to here...
can I please please have the old style icons back? They're all less readable and distinguishable now. Oh, and the GUI grey values changed too. There is no middle grey anymore. it's either very light or very dark, and all text seems to be somewhat smaller.Left is V19 with the same grey value as v17 on the right.
IMO v18 had the state of art icons theme, the best ones since I started using v11.
+1 for giving the users the possibility to load in v19 the v18 icons theme as well.
Cadudesun, I agree with you, VP18 has the best UI. Perhaps it's not modern, but it's very functional. I hate having to squint at screen controls, like the pan/Fx, hidden beneath the track colors.