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.
Little OT, best paint app for the iPad to paint like you are using a real canvas with real paint?
Thanks for your opinions! I'm getting a new iPad with a pencil.
best,
greg
Comments
I used to like Corel Painter a long time ago. Something like that, with organic fluid brushes etc...
I like Procreate or Art Studio Pro. Probably in that order.
The Pencil is great for those music apps with tiny buttons and such
Procreate
Thanks everyone! Should I wait til Apple releases Pencil 2? I hear it could be soon.
O good, I was actually wondering about that! Thanks!
I have no skill… but FWIW, Procreate is an app you should get.
Procreate - Best digital painting
Artrage - Emulates the real stuff (but it's better on PC/Mac)
Sketchclub - Best community with daily / weekly challenges
Thank you! Can you use the pencil with Artrage on a Mac?
Uhhm not sure! Not familiar with pencil! lol
But you can use it with a wacom tablet
But sticking with the ipad with pencil and procreate, you're good to go
Greg, the above mentioned apps is supergreat, but, if you really care about the exact behavior of brushes contra real world and not maximum speed, go for Paintstorm Studio!
http://www.paintstormstudio.com/index.html
I just did this on my iPad mini 4 with a discontinued 53 Pencil stylus on a free copy of Adobe Sketch. It’s Richard Rorty.
wow! really great! thanks...
Concepts (by TopHatch) is another great app for the pencil.
I find a stylus easier to reach and use with buttons, knobs, faders, etc. compared to finger. I use a Wacom Bamboo stylus with nylon tip that glides smoothly and leaves no smudges on the screen. However, Pencil with a sharper tip could do even better. Embarrassingly, Steve Jobs was wrong about stylus in some ways because Apple released a Pencil anyway!
Procreate - with Live Broadcast (remember to turn off the default Time Lapse Recording in Settings to save space)
Sketch Club - community based with built-in screen recording
Drawing Pad - for kids
Affinity Photo - for photo editing
Adobe Comp - for quick prototypes
Okay, so here’s how I lay out the apps....
-ProCreate - Simple but damn great! This is your bread-and-butter app. Many brushes take advantage of tilting. Also, having P3 extended colours which go beyond your simple RGB scale is pretty damn amazing.
-Sketchclub - Not as realistic, but the procedural tools kick ass. I actually prefer sketching with the procedural tools, exporting the file to ProCreate, resizing it, and going forth from there. Great community too.
-Art Rage - A bit more realistic than ProCreate, but also a bit more complex. I think it lags a little bit too if on an iPad Air 2.
-Artstudio Pro - Not as simple as ProCreate, but the filters and adjustments this app has is mind-boggling. They even added a liquify feature in the most recent update.
-Adobe Sketch - Photoshop lite which can import PS brushes! Also offers an OPTIONAL subscription for more storage space on their Creative Cloud.
-Adobe Draw - Illustrator (vectors) lite which also offers an OPTIONAL subscription for more storage space on their Creative Cloud. (I love when subscriptions are optional and serve the purpose of storage rental/constantly updated content library).
-Autodesk Sketchbook - You can get the full version either through a one-time IAP, or a subscription. If I didn’t have the full version, Autodesk could go f-ck themselves for discontinuing their 123D Sculpt+ app and not providing a suitable replacement. (Despite Sculpt+ being free, I’d have paid $19.99 or so for a replacement 3D sculpting app).
-Clip Studio Paint - Professional desktop software I’ve waited years to be ported onto iOS, but the only way to pay to play is through a pricey monthly subscription that offers NO cloud storage, NO premium content library, an update schedule that’s basically the same as if you paid once for the app (i.e. months at a time), the sole purpose of the subscription being to purchase the ability to save your files on your iPad’s local storage. In other words, Celsys can go f-ck themselves right alongside Autodesk.
-Paintstorm - Wanted to love this since Borodante uses it on PC, but it’s still unusable even on the 2nd Gen iPad Pro. Boro just discovered ProCreate and Artstudio Pro on the iPad, so...
-Affinity Photo - Like Snapseed on steroids, but also has very nice set of art brushes.
-Inspire Pro - Almost as realistic as Art Rage, but not laggy. Really great set of tools. Only caveat is the fact it doesn’t have layers. It’s a bit too realistic, lol, but limitations often inspire the best creativity.
That’s about all I can think up at the moment. Cheers.
wow! super great and helpful. Thanks for taking the time. Looking into all of these...
My pleasure mate. Actually, I’ve mucked about with art apps for a fair number of years. I’m talking about since the iPad 2 days where the largest canvas size one could create was 1280x960, where ProCreate was hardly the fullest featured app and only had a fair number of brushes to choose from, etc. Can’t believe 2012 was 6 years ago!
Lol... same here
I first bought my iPad 2 for both music apps and drawing
Back then I don't even recall ProCreate existing. Brushes was all the rave
it‘s worth mentioning that the Sketchbook IAP is only 99ct. highly recommended.
ArtSet Pro is also worth a look, the interface is quite unique but you don‘t have layers, so more for playing and doodling than for pro painting.
+1 for Procreate. Pretty much the only one I actually use.
Also, works great when going back and forth between Photoshop on a Mac using iCloud Drive.
Art Set Pro looks pretty intriguing, thanks!
good to know! thanks!
The choice for drawing apps is like the choice you have for DAW apps. Just get one that meets your needs and love it, stick with it and get good at using it.
very good advice. I learned this the hardest way before I settled on Bitwig for my desktop DAW! Sure wish they'd come out with an iPad version!
Yeah I should mention that I posted I was using a Pencil 53 I got for super cheap on a clearance rack. Thing is, it is pretty much no longer supported by the company and apps that did support it have dropped support. I use it with Adobe Sketch, but it doesn't pair with Adobe. So it is basically just a stylus at this point with no extra features working. Pretty annoying. Also, not sure if anyone mentioned but the new iPad does support pencil now.
However, as I have noticed, you are a contributor to the Reaktor community, so I bet before long you will want to be running some modular app like Audulus or stacking tracks in a DAW with multiple AUv3's and automation, etc. It doesn't take long before you start getting serious CPU hits, which messes up your workflow having to bounce to audio and loosing the ability to fiddle with dials when you are done with your track and you want to automate parameters in your synths, FM drums, etc. in order to add interest to your final mix. In light of that, really consider a maxed out pro -- or even a used pro from a local online buy and sell.
o wow, didn't occur to me. Was thinking the new iPad compared favorably with the last gen pros. Thanks for the heads up on that! I'll look into this further...
if you want things to feel and look like oils or acrylic on canvas, then ArtRage is the app you are looking for.
thanks! That is what I'm looking for so appreciate the emphasis on this!