Less focus on AI tools, more focus on improving audio video editing
D
David
Descript has so much potential to be an incredibly powerful tool, but the current focus on all the AI tool hype is really hurting the product. 95% of the time I try to use Underlord, it doesn't come close to a correct result, no matter how simple the request or how clear the prompt. Absolutely there are great use-cases (eye contact & auto multicam are examples that actually enhance my projects) and lots of great tools and improvements lately so I don't want to sound negative or anti-AI entirely, I'm not, but the focus lately on all marketing I've seen has been mainly generative tools that either aren't working that well or that I don't remotely need as a podcast producer (like generative video).
What Descript needs most are UI and functionality improvements, not AI hype. There are countless suggestions in this community, many of which seem relatively simple to implement, that would improve the app far more than these AI tools. Just a few that come to mind now:
- organizing projects into folders
- strategizing app updates better (so it isn't constantly like "restart the app!!")
- further improving timeline UI so that layer height can be adjusted and vertical scrolling of layers is easier (a scroll bar, a way to control height of layer and audio bars, toggles for different types of layers like to be able to show or hide audio, etc)
- exporting audio from a video composition (used to be able to do it, why require another composition to be made? Then if you have to make an edit you have to do it in multiple compositions, unnecessary)
- exporting chapter markers (I use Buzzsprout and I've tried to submit this request over and over again)
- being able to adjust marker locations and scene boundaries by dragging in the timeline
- improving transcription accuracy
- improving assigning of speakers (very buggy often, always needs correcting)
- improving the sequence editor (very tricky to edit when there are multiple tracks)
- make audio editing more like a DAW to be able to control individual tracks (a bigger update but this should be a top priority since pro audio editing should be a core element of a podcast editor)
- returning to having actual humans respond to support requests, not AI bots
I can't be the only user that wants to see my subscription fees put to these kind of things instead of towards AI tools that are highly unreliable and that I don't even need. And again, I say this as a fan and longtime user of Descript that sees so much more potential in it.
Matthew Brown
Agreed on this, the fact that we can't even change the shapes on the EQ to a high/low-pass is also annoying (I know we have a high/low-pass filter plugin, but that's besides the point).
To also add to this as well, there is still no plugin for De-esser and the UI for the compressor and limiter plugin look horrendous.
N
No
My biggest issue is that the app becomes (very!) slow when working on any kind of videos. Up to a point where it freezes completely. I mostly want to edit simple videos and audio, but that becomes impossible sometimes.
The rendering can sometimes takes minutes, I make one change and then I have to wait another couple of minutes.
I'm talking about videos of 5-7 minutes (in HD, not 4k) on a Macbook pro 2022. Should it really be that slow?
Can we got offline rendering, or quicker loading of the files so that editing becomes less waiting and more getting work done?
Manuel Simon
Especially transcription accuracy in German is one thing to optimize. The AI's often halluzinate - but each one different so you can choose between bad or bad. Even 15-20 s timeframes are missing.
I also have problems with the assigning of speakers.
Organizing in Folders would be so helpful to keep track of different projects...