Audiobus: Use your music apps together.
What is Audiobus? — Audiobus is an award-winning music app for iPhone and iPad which lets you use your other music apps together. Chain effects on your favourite synth, run the output of apps or Audio Units into an app like GarageBand or Loopy, or select a different audio interface output for each app. Route MIDI between apps — drive a synth from a MIDI sequencer, or add an arpeggiator to your MIDI keyboard — or sync with your external MIDI gear. And control your entire setup from a MIDI controller.
Download on the App StoreAudiobus is the app that makes the rest of your setup better.
Comments
@Harro -- thanks for the input -- a lot of this is on the to-do list already (and some of it is done for the next update).
I have not played with ModStep, but I think we're aimed a little differently. I'm really focused on getting ideas down quickly, while MS looks like it's better for full-blown production of electronic music. If I can draw an analogy -- maybe it's like voice recorder versus Auria Pro -- yes, they both capture audio, but depending on what you're doing, one might be a better fit than the other. The UI for Infinite Looper has been designed to let you "get it done," and I've had the iPhone in mind throughout -- you'll be able to bounce projects back and forth between the phone and iPad, and things will be in roughly the same place, and work in the same way.
For full productions -- I'm very much thinking about the pathway to the desktop. I've tried using iOS DAWs, but feel like I'm really boxed in. I have Logic on my Mac, and that's where anything meaningful always winds up. So -- Infinite Looper is designed to work sort of like voice recorder, to capture things easily without being a major burden -- and then with MIDI export, you can take whatever you dream up, and have a solid foundation in a full DAW.
If I was to keep things on iOS -- I'd probably move the MIDI into Cubasis, and go from there. I don't see Infinite Looper winding up as a competitor to Cubasis/Auria/etc -- rather, it's a handy sketchpad, with smooth hand-off when you need to do more.
IL is gonna be sweet on a phone, I'll finally make some use of the synths that just sit there abandoned and unused.
Sure ,but don't forger this is the InfLooper thread
ModStep: arm the channel first then press record and select the track.
@SecretBaseDesign
Really, really great app! I appreciate too that you know exactly what usages you're targeting it for and are resisting requests for feature bloat. The idea of just getting ideas out without having your head spin with details is very useful, and one of the reasons I don't even attempt to develop ideas on desktop DAWs any more.
Only one thing I haven't been able to figure out. Can you rename instrument tracks? In some cases IAA instruments replace the channel name, in others not. And, when using a midi-out only instrument channel, I can't figure out how to change the name from the default.
Is there a way to select a group of loops all at the same time?
Yes, I understand which thread this is. I will try what you just said here then report if it matches my personal definition of live-looping. If it does I will post an apology and acknowledge your wisdom and kindness.
I hope you understand my skepticism about your claim that ModStep can be used for live-looping, when Infinite Looper appears to be designed specifically for that.
I suspect Infinite Looper will be 100x easier to use for it intended purpose and that ModStep will take 100 hoops to jump through before it can be used for live looping.
I might add track renaming in an update -- it should display the name of the patch if you're using the internal synth, and the name of the IAA app if you're using IAA. But if you're using external MIDI, it doesn't (yet) give you the name of the MIDI destination, but it probably should. And I will probably add something so that you can give a track a name of your own design -- future update sort of thing, I'm thinking.
Just go to the song arranger, and create a section. When you tap on the section, the loops associated with the section are enabled (and all the others turn off). When you're in loop mode, you can use the sections from the arranger to move from one configuration to another. The use case for me -- I've got loops that I'll want during verse and chorus, and I may be vamping on something for a while -- with a foot pedal, I can trigger a move from one section to another (either forward or back) any time I want. You can also use the foot pedal to create a new section.
Sounds great!
Was thinking of getting sidecar for that. I recalled your video but I have been having soooooo much fun with IL I haven't even looked at the manual. Its so much fun and easy. Just now in the metro train someone saw me jamming and asked me what program i was using! Nee customer coming your way!
Lady was amazed how much fun I was having, I almost missed my stop
So once you select how you want the loops to play, do we just hit play or is there another way to trigger the song setup?
By the way, in AUM one can have either Toland SC or even Cubasis as the drum module or what ever instrument you wish. Sounds amazing!!!
Those of you that missed the Modstep sale,
Jump on this one before the boat leaves, its that good seriously!
Yeah. What he said. Covered most of the needful there. And I don't consider this 'making it too complicated', but instead making it far better, far quicker etc, entirely in keeping with the sultanna of the app (raisins? raisons?)
Ok, result is in for the test of which app will let a user totally unfamiliar with Modstep or Infinite Looper create a loop the fastest, in live-looping fashion.
Modstep - Fired it up, mucked with it, scratched my head no sound.
Infinite Looper - Got nylon string guitar and square wave synth looping together in less than 60 seconds.
Winner: Infinite Looper
I still don't get the comparison to ModStep, after having played a bit with both. Maybe people think they're similar because they both have black backgrounds.
Thanks for considering it. It's not a big deal but I think it's something most people would expect to be able to do. Still, with just six tracks I can't see getting too confused.
Wow now I understand the song mode. Pretty cool how we can select the different sections to play with whatever loops selected.
Both released within the same timeframe. That seems to happen quite a lot. One app historically gets compared to another, probably because people make a purchasing decision that week, from the apps that came out in that week.
Both apps are awesome!
I've seen people ask "If I get Infinte Looper and [RandomApp], is it the same as Modstep?"
When using Synths and external midi to AUM is there any way to have IL control panning and mixer levels orbisbinly available when using internal sounds?
Now that infinite looper is done, any chance of getting sidecar fixed so the icade mappings work properly?
No rest for the wicked! I think I should have some time this weekend to figure out what got screwed up with the iCade stuff, and I'll add in support for toggling (some pads, you might want to toggle on/off, others you might want to just have intermittent).
I may have to take the day off tomorrow, though, because I'm wiped. I had a light-bulb go on WRT the iPhone UI for Infinite Looper, and that made things easier to get into a state that I liked. Wrapped up the tweaks on that, and submitted the update this morning. Infinite Looper will go universal, and probably get a price bump shortly after I release the update. Aleph Looper will be an iPhone-only version (math nerds will get the joke), and be a bit cheaper.
And I'll think about adding in support for CC looping, as a lot of people are asking for it. Might need to do something tricky, though -- if you're hosting a synth in AUM, and have a couple of effects in the chain attached the the synth, the "right" solution is to bundle a bunch of MIDI CC streams to potentially different destinations -- so when you toggle on a loop, multiple different streams toggle on or off. Hmmmm. Anyway, doing it right is going to be tricky, and if I'm going to do it, I'd like to do it right. Hmmmm. The other option is to expand what I allow on IAA and AU hosting, and add in effects chain routing.... This is going to take a lot of coffee, I think.
And one other thing while I'm rambling.... Did you know that if you click on a link to an Infinite Looper project in an iOS web browser, it'll prompt you to import it into IL? Works with DropBox links too! I'm hoping that people will share some of the grooves they've put together (yay viral marketing!). If you've got the app, give this a go: http://www.secretbasedesign.com/dev/abc.ilp -- that's an early test file with some random garbage loops, but it's the proof of concept....
Good effort (s) and thanks for giving us insight into your crowded mind....don't burn out over there
@SecretBaseDesign - Patrick, get some rest man. Just picked up your app before the price hike. It looks very promising, like what Auxy/Pro Midi couldashouldawoulda been, with all the right connectivity to boot
Link worked fine @SecretBaseDesign . Nice to have that capability!
One thing that I would really like to see is a redesign of both tool bars. The buttons could be way bigger and using more of the horizontal space, especially for the top tool bar. There is plenty of room around the project name. For now it is a pain to push the play and record buttons that are touching literally the iOS top bar which is sometimes turned into a go back to an other app, and I press it often unwillingnly..
This fix is already on the way! Version 1.1 is waiting for review, and I've made the record and play buttons bigger, and shifted a few things around a bit. I would guess this will be available by Monday (but with Apple, you never know).
The UI is still a bit packed in some spots -- the app is now universal, and runs on the little old iPhone 4S (which is really really small -- I pulled my old one out for testing; I had forgotten how tiny the thing is). I'm trying to keep the iPhone and iPad UIs very similar, so that I don't have to completely redesign things, and to make it easy for a user to move from one to the other without getting lost. The "export project" can send things to AirShare, which makes it easy to move things from one iOS device to another. My expecation is that people will work on their songs on whatever device they have handy (I always have my phone, but just have the iPad some of the time).
^ yeah, iphone version will be huge, looking forward to aleph , thanks @SecretBaseDesign
That is good to hear! I have a 4S, and jumped in when I read IL would go universal. The 4S can run ios9 after all, and with some features turned off, it runs quite smoothly.
Can't wait to try that.
Hi, i was wondering if Infinite Looper can record and loop CC's, for recording knob movements?
The app doesn't do this now, but a lot of people have asked for it. There's actually quite a list of things that might make sense to add in (the list looks surprisingly like the merged feature set of Ableton, Logic, Reaper, Reason, Mathematica, and Photoshop ;-) ), but CC automation is towards the top.