The DAW daily technique - is this even a thing?

[ShadTK]

I've been thinking about this for a while. Piano have stuff like hanon or czerny works that keeps your mind and fingers sharp by offering a daily exercise routine. I'm pretty sure that similar works exists for guitars/violins/trumpets/etc

My question being, do you guys know any daily training methods for staying sharp and familiar with your DAWs and/or mixes? Or have you created your own routine of warmups before just banging your head into the software and listening to whatever goes out of it? Or is this just silly, and I shouldn't be comparing piano techniques to DAW manipulations?

[ectogemia]

One hour compos, maybe? The purpose of those compos is efficiency both with composition and with the tools of composition, like a DAW. Hanon's function is also efficiency but in the form of economy of motion. So in that respect, I think there's a parallel between the two.

[Chimpazilla]

For me it would be one of a couple things: either going through some of my libraries and just auditioning sounds/samples/sequences, to see quickly if it inspires a groove of any kind, or watching a walkthrough or tutorial video and trying to replicate what I've learned, quickly. Either of those will often get me going.

[Nabeel Ansari]

For me it would be one of a couple things: either going through some of my libraries and just auditioning sounds/samples/sequences, to see quickly if it inspires a groove of any kind, or watching a walkthrough or tutorial video and trying to replicate what I've learned, quickly. Either of those will often get me going.

Seconded.

Start a "dailies" folder in your projects folder and write a short piece of music (maybe like 15 seconds) every day. Treat it like a finished product (so mix it seriously and stuff like that).

Don't do this too many times though, or your body will forget how to write longer pieces. I'd say try to write one or two full songs a month to keep your creative endurance up.

[Meteo Xavier]

Seconded.

Start a "dailies" folder in your projects folder and write a short piece of music (maybe like 15 seconds) every day. Treat it like a finished product (so mix it seriously and stuff like that).

Don't do this too many times though, or your body will forget how to write longer pieces. I'd say try to write one or two full songs a month to keep your creative endurance up.

Thirded. Keep a variety of things going on - maybe do some shorter pieces some days, longer pieces on others, tutorials on others, audition sounds on others, etc, depending how well you do with repetitive structure.

[Garpocalypse]

My question being, do you guys know any daily training methods for staying sharp and familiar with your DAWs and/or mixes? Or have you created your own routine of warmups before just banging your head into the software and listening to whatever goes out of it? Or is this just silly, and I shouldn't be comparing piano techniques to DAW manipulations?

I don't know if this is what you are looking for exactly but I keep a notebook of everything I know and want to try production wise. If i'm studying and I suddenly think of a good way to process something differently in the notebook it goes. I also take notes from youtube videos or any time I'm watching someone else work. Writing things down helps me to remember what I want to do or try and it's more efficient than just staring at my DAW until something comes to me.

Can't go wrong with short mixes either. I've been doing a weekly thing with trying different styles out but bumping it down to a shorter daily might be better for a change.

Also for ten minutes before I work on anything I have a very active listening session where I play a professional track, or an OCremix and I try to think of everything that could have been done to it to make it sound the way it did.

[dannthr]

As everyone suggests, the only way to remain proficient is frequent practice and activity.

Give yourself GOALS, and challenges.

They don't always have to be about your DAW, remember being proficient in your DAW isn't what you want from DAW proficiency. It's about production workflow and getting the music out the door.

That's why your practice should have a compositional element.

[liquid wind]

- As others have said, do OHC, ensures that you make something at least once a week and it gets you focused on efficiency. On the other days of the week you can study keyboard shortcuts and analyze your workflow

- Try remaking existing songs

- Collect source files like crazy and listen to a lot of music in your DAW, play around with it some too. This is easier for some programs than others, userbases differ and some DAWs may lend themselves to sharing project files more than others...

- Run with any little idea that you have, no matter how bad you think it is, you can always delete the project after but it keeps you in practice

Basically try to compose and study as much as you can. As far as simply repetitively drilling technique, keyboard shortcuts and such, I've never really tried that. Usually when I find new shortcuts I'll just try it a few times to get it internalized. I also keep documents on my most useful shortcuts in FL and renoise but I rarely have to consult them, if you're working with the software daily then it's not hard to remember what you're doing

[ShadTK]

I think the consensus here is on One hour compositions, as far as everyone said. Although I'm still not so sure on how to approach this - grab a picture and attempt to make a theme song for it, improvisation ahoy, picking a musical style a day... there are quite many possibilities.

Having a notepad to note ideas down doesn't seem like a bad idea either.I already have a notepad for writing everything down, anyway. Guess it is worth the shot.

Thanks for the ideas guys. I'll try to eventually come up with something more formal for this.

If anyone else have opnions they want to share, feel free. I think this kind of topic may be useful for many others.

[liquid wind]

A lot of OCR people participate in a weekly one hour compo at thasauce, the listening party is always fun and you can get some good feedback from it too

http://compo.thasauce.net/compos/view/OHC

[ShadTK]

Oddly enough, that site was the first thing that popped up when I was searching more info about one hour compositions.

I'll try to join, although I don't think i'll be available at the time. Anyway it is nice to know this kind of stuff exists.