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.
Sample app with best workflow?
I'd appreciate it if someone could point me in the right direction here..
I'm looking for a sampler to use with my mostly hardware setup. So I'm looking for something that I can control with external midi gear (fully midi mappable) that I can really shape the sound as I go rather than just a set of fixed samples.
flexible and fast workflow are a must. Easy to sample into and import samples would be a bonus.
hopefully not super cpu heavy - to be used mainly for drums and short samples, that can call banks via program change messages, plus basic modulations and tuning etc.
I've been holding out for Drambo, as I'm pretty sure it will do all that and more - but I need something to hold me over in the meantime.
I've dabbled with Audiolayer. the features are there, but the workflow... maybe it's just me, but I don't get along with virsyn's apps. and they're crashy.
Unless there's another killer Auv3 sampler I'm missing, I feel like my best bets are between BM3 and NS2. Which one is lighter on CPU? and which one has better midi mapping and bank changes etc?
Comments
With workflow it is complicated .. somebody loves BM3 workflow, somebody NS2 workflow, somebody loves Audiolayer .. you need to try it to found if it is good for you. There is nothing objectively "better" or "worse" .. they are different, but none is "better" or "worse". Every one have advantages, disadvantages, unique parts.
Uhm, this is very sensitive topic here at AB, and i'm afraid it will trigger another flame war. Comparing NS2 and BM3 is forbidden topic here
))
But ok. You asked, here is answer. I will concentrate just on facts.
Although some local BM3 fanboys will be mad on me, this is pure fact, very easy to be verified - in terms of CPU efficiency NS2 synth/sampler supperior not just to BM3 sampler. Actually NS (not just synth/sampler but also build in fx's) is one of most CPU efficient apps available on iOS.
I did some comparision tests of sample playback in BM3 sampler vs. sample playback in NS2 sampler (same conditions - same polyphony, same ipad, same buffer size, etc) - and NS2 was able to handle significantly more instances (if i good remember it was something like 10 instances of sampler in BM3 vs. 44 instances of sampler in NS2 ? not sure, but it was major difference). On iPad2.
NS2/Obsidian fits all your needs and lot more with 1 exception - currently it does not accept program change messages.
Ps.: I'm begging all people who love BM3 to avoid any flamewar, yes, there are other aspects of sampling where BM3 is totally superior to NS2, no doubt, but OP was asking about efficiency. So please we should stay with facts and not start another flamewar. Thanks.
Hi @palm
BM3 is still the most advanced and comprehensive native sampler available on iOS, and runs very smoothly on old iPads (even low-RAM models such as the mini 2).
I'm confident it will do everything you listed, and you can definitely map midi commands to switch/cycle between active banks (functionally equivalent to a 'program change')
File handling (import) of samples in BM3 can be via native folder structure, iOS Files App, Audioshare or Dropbox.
I'd be very surprised if your particular needs push your iPad's resources to the point you would actually notice a performance difference between BM3 and NS2.
Sampling itself is very light on CPU.
But the way of transposing samples (included but not restricted to) timestretch and pitch/formant shifting can result in huge differences - and result in very different sound.
(some want the most smooth, others prefer grit)
Filtering varies in a similiar way, depending on filter design and implementation.
The final CPU hog may be reverb/delay effects, a great reverb may easily consume as much as (say) 24 polyphonic voices. It's a natural matter of fact.
Actually 10 instances of BM3 sampler is 1280 samplers, all of which support multi-samples.
But to answer @palm's question, neither NS2 or BM3 support PC.
Hm, good point - but i used just single pad in every instance .. i really believe that BM3 sampler is optimalised the way that unused pads are not taking any CPU, otherwise it would be huge wasting of resources ...
Actually, i'm pretty sure there is such optimalisation in BM3, because in my "Zeeon instances" test i used basically same project structure (in every BM3 sampler instance, Zeeon loaded on single pad) - and in this case difference between NS2 and BM3 were just minor..
@palm Groove Rider GR-16 supports Program Change so you should add it to your evaluation also.
I love love love BM3 but do get spontaneous crashes. Could be a case of ‘blame the AUs’ in most cases, but the slicer is crashable for me even on its own. Once I get over 64 slices, it is danger zone. If you just want to load in small hits etc, and not use the slicer on huge wavs (for this you can just highlight ranges non destructively anyway) it should be stable.
Hard to beat Samplr for workflow.
I do agree that the BM3 sampler starts to become a little less stable when you are using extremely long audio files and/or very large numbers of slices (ie >64). But these are hopefully quite niche cases, and as a sampler it's very solid - even on older hardware.
The pros vastly outweigh any minor cons for me, personally.
Show your work, please!
that's not SamplR's domain
@palm: how important are things like velocity layers and round-robining?
Just remember there are 2 fundamentally different types of samplers:
1) Akai MPC - time stretching, slicing, transient detection are actions that give a me a clue this is what someone is focusing on in the reviews of a "sampler" (@Samu taught me that most of these use cases exist and I still have work to do here). Mostly driven by PAD's which is another big tip off. Samples sold as Loops, Kits, Drums, expansions. A Beat Makers toolbox.
2) Digital Keyboard Sampler (Nord Stage Piano) - layers, round-robin, release samples, lots of FX and sound engine features like a synth product - samples sold as complete instruments.
A keyboard players workstation.
There's enough overlap in implementations that with a little effort one could do the work of the other but fundamentally the are designed for 2 distinct use cases and 2 types of users.
(I called a Wavetable synth the first hardware sampler "implementation" and I'll never do that again. Just a really small small cache
)
This is an excellent, clear distinction. It seems that you never find anyone who is agnostic about which sampler camp they fall in. For the record, I'm Team MPC.
I don't mind using pads as long as the underlying architecture allows each pad to behave like a fully featured keyboard sampler
I dunno of any app that has everything on your list.
Generally, BM3 is considered the best all around sampler on iOS but I'm not sure how MIDI mappable its controls are.
NS2 probably has better sample manipulation capabilities (because you get all of the obsidian synth controls with which to mess with your samples) but MIDI mapping is limited to 10 controls.
I don't think either supports program change messages but since both offer tons of tracks you could load it all up and then change the MIDI channel on your hardware to control different sounds/sample sets.
If MIDI control over preset switching is important to your workflow, you might consider something like AudioBus 3 along with a sampling app that supports state saving. Then you save states in AB3 and recall them via MIDI. Not sure of such an app off the top of my head. Maybe Elsa? Or, in a different vein, Elastic Drums?
@samu or @kobamoto prolly have better answers for you.
For one shots or full chromatic instruments?
To be honest what you need is the full version of Twisted Wave.
You can apply AU Fx/ Combine samples, ect. edit meta data, ect.
Universal as well.
You can then put your sample(s) anywheres.
TWISTED IS MOST IMPORTANT APP AND PROGRAM I OWN FOR IOS AND MY MAC(I have both)
Given that bank select was bolded by the OP I feel compelled to note that BM3 is good and has bank select but also has a really dumb bug where the user can't select a bank group and then a bank. It just plays the bank in the current group.
And that just makes the concept of groups and banks not work with a controller in a live situation.
Forgot that AUM 1.3 is out in the wild. It also supports preset selection over MIDI (including actual PC messages).
not really important at all. I'm not going for realism, but rather malleability. So envelopes, a usable filter, and other modulators are more useful to me.
ah, this is a very good point!! thank you.
mostly one shots, but chromatic would be fun too. I'll check out Twisted Wave, seems like a very useful tool.
thanks everyone for all the great suggestions
(and for keeping it civil regarding the ns2/bm3 thing)
I agree! I've been loving it on my iPhone ever since I was made a beta tester for it in 2016!
But I digress....
Witty Proboscis sighting.
You definitely have a nose for sarcasm
I’ll take BM3 and NS2 out of the equation and say IMHO iOS is still waiting for a great sampler AUv3. I’ll not get into specifics, but leading contenders lack the dual personalities of something like Sampler and Simpler in Ableton (which for my money is very iOS-centric).
Sampler is the heavyweight contender that provides KONTAKT like capabilities for large multi-sampled librarys. Simpler is the thing that most artists use in Ableton as it provides a really intuitive workflow and great sample manipulation features inc synthesis, but it leaves all the heavyweight layered multi-sample shenanigans of Sampler behind.
The problem I have with the current iOS sampler options is that they're either trying to hard to be an iOS version of KONTAKT, or they're massively underpowered. Unfortunately there's nothing in-between.
The in-host samplers in Auria Pro, NS2, and BM3 are far more successful but I'm personally looking for a great AUv3 solution.
Anyone here actually use Auria Pro for sample manipulation? Thinking about getting g Chameleon just to get the samples in there and then go from there. Or should I just go w NS2?
The Lyra sampler in Auria isn't really made for sample manipulation, it's built to play SFZ or EXS sample instruments (which it does very well).
If you want to mangle samples and do creative stuff I think Obsidian in NS2 is the best option on iOS IMO. BM3 is also very good, and can do time-stretching (unlike NS2), but Obsidian has more modulations and a full synth to go alongside it, so in the end it offers greater possibilities.
@richardyot :Thanks.. Great explanation there although I hoped that w the full set of Fab Filter plug ins I just bought I’d be able to do some good stuff with Samples in Lyra.. Sigh, maybe not so much.
You can always combine the two apps, I often write stuff in NS2 (or Gadget or Cubasis or GarageBand) and then export the stems to Auria. That way you get to use the FabFilter plugins and all the great instruments in the other DAWs.
The way I see it is that Auria is the best mixing environment on iOS: it has the most flexible and powerful mixer combined with the best plugins. But the other DAWS all also have many strengths (Cubasis has the best MIDI and MPE, NS2 the best sequencer, Gadget has lots of great synths etc) so there's no reason to just stick to one app, compose and sequence wherever you're going to get the sound you're after and then export stems to mix in Auria, that way you're not really limited by anything.