Pro Tools Menus Issue & Workarounds [Solved!]
Edit: This has now been fixed
From Pro Tools 2022.5 and SoundFlow 5.1.5, this menu issue has now been fixed.
Please upgrade to the newest version of Pro Tools from my.avid.com and the newest version of SoundFlow from my.soundflow.org.
Pro Tools Menus Issue & Workarounds
Please watch the following video for information about the Pro Tools Menus Issue and workarounds;
What's the issue?
Many of our users have noticed, that when using SoundFlow, Pro Tools popup menus change their color, and their behavior also changes.
The normal Pro Tools menus are dark, like this...
...and when you open them, you can immediately start typing to search through your plugins.
However, when SoundFlow is running, the menus are brighter like this...
...and you can't immediately start to type to search through your plugins.
This is a known issue - but unfortunately, we can't fix the issue by ourselves, since it's something that's happening inside Pro Tools.
The good news is, that there are several workarounds possible and that with SoundFlow's help you can actually get a workflow that's even smoother than by using the Pro Tools menus.
Background Info
Let me start by giving you some more background information.
The issue with the menus reverting to the brighter color is actually something Pro Tools does to have compatibility with software that controls it. In other words, while it feels like a bug, it's actually designed behavior.
Pro Tools detects when any third-party app tries to control it, it can be SoundFlow or an Apple Script for example - and when it detects that it's being controlled, it will change to the bright menus until Pro Tools is restarted.
The reason for this is that these old, legacy, bright menus are easier to control for third-party software but due to the fact that this behavior is designed inside Pro Tools itself, there's nothing SoundFlow can do to control it.
You should know that we are trying to find a solution in the future so that Pro Tools won't have to make this switch to the brighter menus, but we have to work together with Avid to fix this.
Workarounds
So now that you know a bit more about the background for this issue, let me walk you through some of the workarounds.
Workaround 1: Click the “search...” menu item.
What most people are annoyed about with the brighter menus, is that they can't immediately type to search through their plugins, so here's a simple workaround for that. After opening the popup menu you can simply click the "search..." menu item, and now the ability to search through your plugins works again.
So, in this case, you'll end up clicking 2 times instead of once. But hopefully, with everything else SoundFlow does to save you clicks, this is an acceptable change.
Workaround 2: Use SoundFlow's plugin search.
There's also another way to do it, that will save you both clicks.
You can use SoundFlow's built-in plugin search.
These commands can be found by typing "Select Plugin for Insert" into the Search field in the SoundFlow app.
The default shortcut to select the first insert plugin is Ctrl+Shift+F1 - but you can assign this to any shortcut you want.
So, let's say I want to insert a new plugin on insert slot 1 of the selected track. I just press Ctrl+Shift+F1, and now I get a fully searchable list of all my plugins.
What's even cooler, is that SoundFlow's plugin search is much more intelligent than the one that's in Pro Tools. For example, you can search for multiple words, like both the vendor and the plugin name, like this:
Once you've found the plugin you're looking for, just hit return, and it gets added to the insert slot.
So - this is a workflow that's even better than the original one since you had to make 0 mouse clicks.
Workaround 3 - Make a macro to assign a plugin to the next free insert.
But we can make it even better than that!
Take a look at this awesome package from the legendary producer, Chris Shaw:
To find this package head to the SoundFlow App Store and search for Chris's "Insert Plugin On Next Free Slot (Intelligent)" package.
If you install this package, you can see Chris made a couple of really cool scripts & templates, you can use:
If you assign a keyboard shortcut to the first script: "Insert any plugin - one track (searchable)", like this:
You can then, go to Pro Tools, select a track, and hit Ctrl+X.
You'll now get the same searchable popup to select which insert you want to add - and the script will intelligently make sure to add the new plugin to the end of your plugin chain!
Workaround 4 - Make macros that insert specific plugins onto multiple tracks.
We can even take it up one more notch with SoundFlow.
Find Chris's template called "Insert Any Plugin / Multiple tracks (Intelligent)" and add a keyboard shortcut to the "Channelstrip (multi-mono)" preset.
This template will add a specific, predefined plugin to the next available insert on all selected tracks.
Imagine that you added a different shortcut, a different Stream Deck button, or a MIDI trigger, or even a button on your iPad surface for each of the plugins that you use the most often - and then just by one click you'd add that plugin to your tracks?
Summing up
So we know that the menu issue is really annoying, and we know that even the simplest workaround means you have to click twice (both on the insert and on the search menu item) to keep things the way you know them but look at all the productivity you can gain if you dive a little deeper.
As we've said, we're committed to finding a long-term solution to the menu issue, but hopefully, you can use some of the techniques and workarounds we mentioned here, to find a way to work that's possibly even faster than the original workflow.