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Filed under: Editing •Hardware •Post Production •Software •

Review: The Tangent Wave control surface

Setup of the Wave is very easy since it is a USB connection and receives power through that USB connection. Download and install the appropriate Color plug-in and you get the Tangent Wave as an option in the Color control surface dialog box. I had my Wave plugged into a USB hub and it worked well. There was one instance where I hadn’t used the Wave for over a week and it took a couple of restarts of Color before it recognized the unit. There’s also a Wave user manual for Color available (pdf link) so you can give that a read to see all of the fine detail about the unit.

The Tangent Wave Hardware

The main focus of the Tangent Wave are the 3 red trackballs (or trackerballs as the Tangent literature calls them) that dominate the rather large unit and correspond to the three color wheels in the different Color rooms. These three balls feel very much like billiard balls and once inserted into their spaces (see my earlier post on setting up the Wave) and move very smoothly and very easily. Gone are the mechanical, dust-collecting rollers that used to provide the movement for trackballs as the Wave uses optical sensors. They are well spaced and the three trackballs can be easily operated at once with a two-handed operation. A two-handed move where you can adjust all the trackballs at once is key to control surface interaction with a color grading app. You can make adjustments and see those changes in real time on your frame. No clicking, dragging or moving the mouse to a different parameter and changing it one at a time. Above each of the trackballs sits a rotary dial that is used for adjusting Shadows, Midtones and Highlights. The two buttons next to the dials are the reset buttons for both the trackballs and the dials. Above lies a horizontal row of buttons that by default corresponds to each of Color’s rooms. One press of a button will take you to each individual room. Above those are rubber covered rotary knobs that control various functions with each room and each knob includes a reset function by pressing straight down. The knob reset is really the only place where I saw an issue with build quality. On a couple of the knobs a slight jiggle or a less than firm push of the reset might register a tiny parameter change. You’re never going to jiggle the knob from side to side but you will use the reset function a lot. The right side of the Wave is a recessed area. The top two buttons are arrows that step through the “banks” for the knobs, meaning that knobs might have more than one function per room and to access the functions you change the bank. A good example of this is the Secondary room where the knobs mght access the position, size and aspects of a vignette window as well as the regular color controls. Below that lies 9 function keys that are user assignable. And below even further are transport controls for the Color timeline including a jog dial for moving frame by frame. On the left side of the panel is an ALT key that when pressed allows for an alternate mapping to the buttons. That gives you 18 function keys instead of 9.

Operation and understanding of how the Wave works is quite simple with the blue OLED displays. They reflect the room and/or function of the knob or button they are above or below. Want to know what one of the rotary knobs or 9 buttons do? Just look at the display. It would be nice if the display could reflect which room you are currently in, say by having the name of that room in red instead of blue. That would probably require a different type of display which would surely raise the $1,795 cost. The 9 function keys have no display so you’ll have to settle for your own titles labeled onto a plasticy overlay. I might suggest using a small labelmaker to label your function buttons so they can be changed later. I found myself changing the F keys several times in the short time I had the Wave. At the end this is how my function buttons ended up (pretty much all remapped from the default settings):

My custom mapping of the F keys using the Wave Control Mapper software

I found this little picture that I printed from screenshots of the Wave Control Mapper software a handy reference until I learned my function keys. The unit also includes a rubber wrist pad that can be affixed to the surface of the Wave in the area below the trackballs. It’s rather thin and isn’t made to elevate your wrists more than it is more to provide a little bit of padding and a different type of surface.

Mapper software makes the Wave even more functional

Like any good computer hardware input device with buttons and knobs, there is software that controls what exactly the buttons do. For the Wave it’s the Wave Control Mapper software. The main window of the software is an image of the Wave itself:

The Tangent Wave Control Mapper software

Click on a knob or button and you get a very long list for many of the functions in Color with which you can assign to a knob or button. There are tabs across the top of the Wave Control Mapper window for each room. It’s also possible to make a button assignment “stick” in all of the rooms with one assignment. Not every function in Color is assignable in the Mapper software but most all of them are. I found a couple of instances where the name of a function in the Mapper software wasn’t the same as the name under the Color menus, like Start Render was listed as Print Queue. A minor gripe sure but when the Mapper terms more closely match the phrases or menu items in Color is makes them way easier to find. At first I thought there was no Mapper equivalent to the Control+G command to Disable Grading (which I use a lot) until I realize it was listed in the Mapper software as Toggle Grading. Yes you are toggling grade but if Color didn’t see fit to name the command toggle grading then no one else should either.

Next up, the very handy mouse mode and Color’s RED tab

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Thanks for the comment Mezigue.

I hope to check out the Euphonix unit as well as that’s the Wave’s direct competitor. Stay tuned ......

Posted by Scott Simmons  on  11/04  at  07:09 PM

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Why is it that all these color grading interfaces have the rollers in a straight line? Why not configured like your rubber-band illustration - in a triangle? Not that I have used any Hardware Interface like this that I have any authority on the matter - but with that configuration wouldn’t is be easier to tweak?

Posted by Synaptic Light  on  11/05  at  07:32 AM

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I would think that if the trackballs were arranged in a triangle-type pattern then it would takes up more room on a control surface and not leave at much room for the displays and buttons and knobs. It’s not difficult to use at all with the trackballs in a line as that’s how they are in the software as well.

Posted by Scott Simmons  on  11/05  at  03:25 PM

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