Ubuntu LTS

You seem to have actual work to do on Linux and a large suite of software to get working. This will be your most significant challenge. Ubuntu is one of the default targets for nearly all software projects, open source or proprietary and if there’s any documentation or information, Ubuntu will be in it. This alone will give give you a ton of mileage. You probably don’t want to add the difficulty of figuring out why something written and tested for Ubuntu doesn’t work on another distro. Resources like wiki.ubuntu.com, help.ubuntu.com, askubuntu.com and discourse.ubuntu.com are there to help.

The choice of distro isn’t too important, you can usually run any software on any distro. The installation process varies a bit by distro because they use different package managers, but they generally all have all the software you need

The most important choice for the start is your desktop environment. I’m partial to KDE and can highly recommend it for linux beginners because it’s a lot like windows by default and extremely customizable. There are also XFCE (very light and fast, not too many features), Gnome (some people swear by it but it doesn’t let you customize much), cinnamon (no bullshit, fast and windows-like) and a bunch of others.

Then pick a distro based on that. The popular ones are usually also the best ones to start with, with one notable exception (in my opinion): Ubuntu.

It uses snaps, which are an alternative way to install software that’s made by canonical (the makers of ubuntu) and generally disliked among the linux community because it slows down application startup and causes very weird issues that are hard to figure out. Ubuntu will install some applications via snap instead of the package manager (which is apt for ubuntu) even if you specifically invoke apt instead of snap.

You can sti use it and probably be fine, but you’ll have to endure snap problems or go out of your way to avoid using it. Picking a different distro from the start is easier than that.

Pretty much any distro will do, but Ubuntu-based ones tend to be easier to use due to having menus and buttons for most everything. As for apps, here are my suggestions

_3D

Blender

_DAW

Ardour

LMMS

Bitwig

~VIDEO EDITING~

Davinci Resolve (if on Nvidia)

Kdenlive

Olive (alpha software, be wary of crashes and save often)

_IMAGES

GIMP

Krita

Photopea (web app)

Inkscape

Lights may be possible with OpenRGB but I haven’t personally messed with these kinda of software

There already good recommendations, so i’ll just add that you shouldn’t make your work life harder for the sake of running Linux.

Definetly give it a go, and see if it fulfills your needs, but maybe hold off on nuking your Windows install until you are satisfied.

I use my Linux computer for personal stuff and some work stuff (web-browsing, email, office suite) and i have a separate Windows PC just for running applications specific to my field, which don’t have Linux versions or alternatives (or where it makes the most sense for me to use the industry standard)

Fedora or Ubuntu/Ubuntu based both are very beginner friendly and stable, both have wide community support and both have user friendly app centers.

I recommend Linux Mint. It’s based on Ubuntu with all the same benefits but without the drawbacks. Mint is lighter, faster and very stable. Looks visually similar to Windows and is more complete and ready for use than Ubuntu.

Ubuntu uses the Gnome desktop which is heavy on RAM and needs extensions to be really useful. Mint uses their own Cinnamon desktop and it’s highly optimised, full featured and ready to go.

It also automatically makes backups of your system incase anything goes wrong.

Highly recommend.

Most mainstream distros will work with pretty much all of the software suggestions. I tend to avoid recommending Ubuntu these days as Canonical have some stubborn ideas regarding things (snaps should have been shelved long ago in favour of flatpack), that said, PoP-Os is an excellent choice for buntu based without the snaps.

Video,editing: shotcut is pretty good alongside Kdenlive. For anyone working with audio, Audacity is a definite must have for track/sample editing and effects. Whilst Ardour is an extremely capable DAW, there are others you might want to check out, LMMS is a nice sequencer (fruity loops) DAW for example. On the professional side there is Bitwig (never used it but heard good things about it) and my personal favourite Reaper.

I’ve been using vanillaOS for work & school for the past year and it’s been problem free

I’d also recommend Ubuntu LTS or Linux Mint. You may need to add a startup flag or swap to a low-latency kernel but since the mainlining of some features, a special kernel is rarely needed. Basically, keep an eye out for latency-related audio issues and take action, if needed.

For DAW, if you’re not already using one that has a Linux release, you might check out Ardour.

For video editing, check if KDenLive covers what you need.

For design software, it really depends on the type of design work. There’s options for about every niche, from FreeCAD to Inkscape (vector), and Gimp/Krita (raster). Figure out what your need and find the project that best suits.

Now. With all that said, I will add another thought. I’m not a fan of Apple but, if you find that you’re having too much trouble getting what you need working, I would seriously contemplate a Mac Mini or MacStudio, if you don’t absolutely need a laptop. I switched my spouse to a Mac Mini w/ an M2 from Costco for her studio because of the constant instability and system-breaking “updates”. It’s less tinkerer-friendly but that’s not its purpose. It is there for DAW and related duties, nothing else and it works great for that use case, letting me focus on FOSS stuff elsewhere.

EDIT: To clarify, it was MS causing the instability.

Maybe check out Pop! OS

But, yes, nearly all linux software will run on any distro. And even a fair amount of windows software will run on any of them with WINE (or VirtualBox if desperate). Occasionally commercial software will get packaged in an “installer” format a particular distro doesn’t know how to install. A fairly rare situation, for which there are almost always work-arounds. You can cross that bridge if you ever encounter it.

For light shows (dmx related) i use “qlc+”, video editing “kdenlive” and the Linux show player is great (no open source software in that field on the windows side…)

@StrongFox Give a try Tromjaro. User friendly and very well maintained.