What will consoles look like in ten years? Will they continue to sit in trucks and theaters, tethered to outboard gear? Will the kings of software find ways to integrate third party plug-ins directly into boards built by multiple manufacturers? ... no, that doesn’t seem likely; too many operating systems to contend with. I hear rumblings that suggest bridge technologies might be on the way from several companies, small foot print devices built to house plug-ins and patch into consoles.
However it’s done, someone has to integrate the plethora of inexpensive plug-in processors into consoles built for broadcast and concert work; Pro Tools is great for the recording studio and sound stage, but live application engineers are being short changed when it comes to the availability of software, and that has to change.
