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.
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Also, big ups to @rs2000 and @Gravitas you've been so helpful to understand Drambo. Sitting here on a turtle looking up at your king koopa levels.
I have a new question for you pros
How do I interpolate between the values of two different steps?
I have a plug-in that simply creates noise, and I can p-lock its volume to eg. minimum at one step, and later to maximum at another step. But this of course creates an abrupt change in volume.
How can I let this become a slide?
Thanks!
@alexwasashrimp said:
Okay, so I've researched this and it looks like what I'm looking for is impossible at the moment. While there probably is a trick to retrigger recording every bar, I don't think it's possible to keep playing the Flexi sampler while it's sampling.
You can use the step sequencer automation for this my entering the automation feature and adding the value you want to automate. You can add bezier/automation points by touching the automation line and/or use the tools from the toolbar. The line corresponds to the steps in the sequencer, which makes it easy to time the automations.
As far as I understand, there's no native way to freeze patterns in Drambo. I'm using Flexi sampler as a workaround, but it's a bit of a kludge. Gotta add Flexi and a crossfader, set it up to sync recording, record a pattern, disable the rest of the rack, set up trigger for Flexi and so on. It would've been way easier to just hold a pattern and select "freeze". My iPad Pro 2020 just can't run that many plugins at once.
Also I'm not sure if it's a bug or a feature, but neither Flexi nor Recorder don't allow trimming sample/recording start.
I use Loopy Pro for this, hosted inside Drambo.
There's the sync/clip mode in the rec menu of flexi sampler that can record the current pattern. The only problem I have with it and other recording methods inside Drambo is that it doesn't compensate for plugin delay so you can't really use it on tracks with midi plugins in the chain, like chordjam or drumcomputer in my case. It always misses the first miliseconds.
@mistercharlie
Do you know if Loopy can solve the plugin delay issue in Drambo and records clean loops if a midi plugin is the first module in the chain you're recording from?
It can’t. But you can record a longer loop and clean it up.
I tried that but found it quicker to record some of the loops in AUM and then drop the loops into Drambo. Cleaning it up manually would be easier if there was a beat grid with snapping in the flexi sampler window with the waveform.
Now that I have adopted a destructive workflow I'm wondering if I'd be better off with Loopy pro and using Drambo inside there. I'm just wondering how I'd go about automating filters on the plugins I typically use because LP doesn't have automation and I can't host plugins within plugins.
It’s pretty easy to route your automation from Drambo in a LP project. I switched to LP as host for similar reasons.
Do you know any videos showing how this works? I guess you map plugins inside a LP track to virtual knobs/sliders and then map those to receive midi from Drambo on the same track.
I also wonder if its possible to have Drambo on a group or bus and control multiple LP tracks from a single Drambo instance.
For those who use Drambo inside Loopy Pro, does Loopy Pro have Pdc? Iirc I believe not. Because I work a lot with group processing, I’m trying to switch to Ns2 or Logic Pro for that reason.
I've just recorded a track stem from the Mixer track using a sequenced track with MIDI generated by a MIDI plugin:
The resulting wave file was properly cut to the bars, no post editing needed.
When I do this with Chordjam I get a tiny gap at the beginning which is audible when it loops, it's not visible all zoomed out only when zooming in.
It also happens with Drumcomputer where it cuts into the first transient.
We should make a list with apps that don't work or have too much latency. Maybe it happens because mentioned plugins have their own internal sequencer, that's what they have in common.
Good idea, a list of MIDI plugins that behave like this would be useful. I own neither Chordjam nor Drumcomputer so I can't verify them.
I don't see any gaps with ChordPolyPad, just zoomed in to make sure.
I just tried Pure Acid, happens there as well. It also has a sequencer. The image below is a recording of the default patch after loading the plugin, with only Pure Acid and a flexi sampler with clip/sync recording on a track.
That's correct, except for the "on the same track" part. Midi inputs in Loopy can be routed to control any plugin, FX, Loopy control or widget, or out to hardware.
No special bus or group needed.
If you load Drambo as a midi source, it can control as many plugins as you like via midi.
You can either load the Drambo midi FX version, or, what I do is first load the it as an audio input, then add that same instance as a midi input so that I only have one instance doing both sound and midi duties.
You could do the same with a Drambo instance loaded first as an FX if you use Drambo more for FX processing, but as an input makes the most sense to me. If I need Drambo as an FX then I add separate instances where needed.
I'm sure it's hard to visualize. Sorry, I don't generally watch video tutorials, so I can't point you to any.
Yeah in my case the track has Scaler and I can see a gap even with synced recording. And trimming doesn't work unfortunately. If it did, I'd be able to trim the recording manually.
@alexwasashrimp I’m surprised that trimming doesn’t work for you, so just to make sure: the starting point for is set with the yellow diamond marker (“offset”). Does that help in any way?
Yeah that's a possible workaround but there's obviously quite a difference in how much delay different MIDI plugins introduce.
"Plugin Delay Compensation" has sparked quite a number of discussions even on desktop apps but looking at the challenges that developers had with AUv3, I wonder if they all report their own correct latency - apart from the fact that MIDI plugins shouldn't introduce any noticeable latency except when part of the effect 😉
Many ways.
I'd suggest this because it lets you adjust the attack and decay response separately (you would then p-lock the Noise button):
Indeed, while the gap issue is easy to reproduce with an audio processing plugin that has lookahead, I can’t make any MIDI plugin do it, which makes the problem more interesting. Could it be related to sample rate?
Unlikely.
Have you tried one of the plugins @kirmesteggno mentioned?
I suppose that some of them just take their time to do their thing.
Thanks, I'm dumb, it helped. I used the bottom marker.
By the way, it's interesting that on the other track with Scaler 2 and the same synth with different preset and effects there was no gap.
Same boat, trimming doesn't work because the silence in the beginning isn't extra silcence added to the audio, it's added in place of the original sound. If you'd trim it it would change the timing of what you have recorded.
Thanks. Just found out that it doesnt support AUv3 multi out yet which I need for my workflow. I'll get Loopy once it supports that.
Might be a noob question, as I’m still slowly getting a grip on Drambo.
I want to build a drum machine in Drambo AU inside Loopy Pro, and be able to control the most important parameters (reverb mix, scenes and clips. mute/solo, volume, etc] from LP. This is no problem as such. I know how to use the midi learn in Drambo and set up widgets in Loopy to control the parameters.
However, I would like to avoid opening Drambo, as I’ll use this setup in a live situation, and I’m not too happy with Drambo’s small UI for that, I prefer Loopy’s widgets. But my problem is that my Loopy widgets don’t show me if I’ve muted or soloed a channel, or similar controls, because Drambo doesn’t expose any parameters and I have to manually set up the midi connections.
So, my question is: is there any way to make Drambo send midi feedback (is that the right name for it?) to Loopy, so my widgets clearly show the state of Drambo, e.g. if something is turned on or off in Drambo, or is that impossible with the way Drambo’s midi learn works?
There's no way to make the Drambo AUv3 send midi feedback from its controls.
The only thing I can think of is to set up "dummy" button widgets near them to serve as indicator, then add an extra action to toggle them on and off. You'd need to take care that the indicators are in sync with Drambo (for instance if you make a change directly in Drambo or if you load a new project in Drambo.
Solos would be a nightmare to try to manage in this way though. So that's probably a dealbreaker.
Thanks. Yeah, I thought about whether it was possible to trick Loopy into making some sort of indication by triggering some random/useless action. Might give it a try and see how quickly I’ll end up getting everything confused by changing things in Drambo as well…. 😂
In Drambo is there a way to save midi mappings from one project and load them into another project?
I know I can make a template but this would be handy for past projects that I haven’t midi mapped.