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.

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Audiobus is the app that makes the rest of your setup better.

A musician/non-coder finally made a new iPad app with the FM/ROM Player code...

Musician Jeff Sapiro made a simple sampled Harpsichord app. He had never coded before. While I think his app asking price may be a little high, it's pretty cool that he made the app.

For those of you who want to take a plunge into the world of making apps for fun or hobby- the ROM Player template might be a good start. Sometimes you don't have to make it fancy. Obviously, for a "pro" app everyone wants AUv3, IAA, Audiobus. But, most of the general public will be impressed with something simple like this musician made.

Maybe some of you could make some sampled instruments that you could distribute free in the app store.... And, as the AudioKit tools improve, you can add more and more features.

A free app could be a great way to impress your friends and family, promote your band or music, or just share your sounds with other Audiobus forum members.

If you do sell something and make a million dollars, feel free to kick me back a buck or two. :D

Here's the code:
https://github.com/AudioKit/ROMPlayer

Here's the new app Jeff made:

https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/whiskeyshot-eharpsichord/id1355378147?mt=8

Comments

  • Thanks for this, very generous.
    I have samples I made from my previously owned Roland JP8000. I have soundfonts made from those samples that I use for myself. In the web page listed above you mention synths that can and cannot be legally sampled. Is my JP8000 illegal to use to create an app.
    I actually wouldnt want to sell it, just create it for my own use and pleasure etc. Is it possible to create an app and not put it onto the app store?
    You have me very intrigued and give this a shot for sure :smiley:
    Thanks again.

    dB

  • Sweet! If you're doing things for your own purposes, I'd say you can sample about anything. Then, you can load those sounds onto your iPad from Xcode. You don't actually need to pay the $99 Apple developer license to load your own app onto your iPad. You can download a free copy of Xcode from the app store and be in business.

    And, you're right. Roland is notorious for sending Cease & Desist letters. So, I'm not sure how wise it is to publish JP8000 samples to the app store.

  • Excellent then thats what I will try and do. My very own JP8000 app based on your give away player code. I can replace the exs files samples and attemp a re-skin.
    I have around 6 patches I sampled before I sold the beast in the 90s.
    Cant find the x-code in the app store though? Is an ipad app or just mac? I dont have a mac just PC and ipad.
    Exciting stuff :smile:

  • Yes, correct! Xcode is a mac app. It's a free download in the Apple Mac App Store.

    Luckily, you don't need to reskin if you're using it for your own purposes. I've made the controls open source as well. People can even use the knobs in their own apps.

    Apple's rule is that apps can't look the same in the app store. That's why the repo says that one needs to change the graphics. i.e. If you're going to upload anything to the App Store, make sure it doesn't look exactly like FM Player for Apple to approve it.

    Hope that is helpful,

  • Thanks Matt.
    Then the first thing is to find a Mac :blush:
    Last Mac I used was an SE. Been a PC man since. . . .
    Thanks for the responses I’ll keep you posted my progress.
    dB

  • @analog_matt said:
    Musician Jeff Sapiro made a simple sampled Harpsichord app. He had never coded before. While I think his app asking price may be a little high, it's pretty cool that he made the app.

    For those of you who want to take a plunge into the world of making apps for fun or hobby- the ROM Player template might be a good start. Sometimes you don't have to make it fancy. Obviously, for a "pro" app everyone wants AUv3, IAA, Audiobus. But, most of the general public will be impressed with something simple like this musician made.

    Maybe some of you could make some free sampled instruments with the code... And, as the AudioKit tools improve, you can add more and more features.

    A free app could be a great way to impress your friends and family, promote your band or music, or just share your sounds with other Audiobus forum members. If you do sell something and make a million dollars, feel free to kick me back a buck or two. :D

    Here's the code:
    https://github.com/AudioKit/ROMPlayer

    Here's the new app Jeff made:

    https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/whiskeyshot-eharpsichord/id1355378147?mt=8

    Thanks Matt, I might have a play with this. Is it possible to add Audioshare, AU etc., or doesn’t Audiokit support this?

  • More great info here. I am learning a little more each day. Hope to build a couple of apps I have ideas for eventually. B)

  • His app demonstration video:

  • edited March 2018

    @MonzoPro said:
    Thanks Matt, I might have a play with this. Is it possible to add Audioshare, AU etc., or doesn’t Audiokit support this?

    Good question. You can think of AudioKit as prebuilt components of code that you can use in Apple's default (and relatively easy-to-understand) programming language, Swift. AudioKit has filters, basic effects, oscillators, etc that will work with other code. There are no prebuilt components for Audioshare. Though, it is something that someone could add with code the way someone would normally code Audioshare.

    Regarding AU: Currently, AUv3s can not be built with Swift. And, require substantial development knowledge. At least for now...

  • edited March 2018

    @analog_matt said:

    @MonzoPro said:
    Thanks Matt, I might have a play with this. Is it possible to add Audioshare, AU etc., or doesn’t Audiokit support this?

    Good question. You can think of AudioKit as prebuilt components of code that you can use in Apple's default (and relatively easy-to-understand) programming language, Swift. AudioKit has filters, basic effects, oscillators, etc that will work with other code. There are no prebuilt components for Audioshare. Though, it is something that someone could add with code the way someone would normally code Audioshare.

    Regarding AU: Currently, AUv3s can not be built with Swift. And, require substantial development knowledge. At least for now...

    Thanks Matt, just wondering what the capabilities are, as I’d want to make anything I build to be as connected as possible. Nice to know Audioshare can be coded in - does it support IAA as well?

    Sorry for all the questions, I’ll check out the documentation tomorrow!

  • edited March 2018

    Thinking out loud...

    For those of you that want to share your sounds with the world. But, don't want the hassle of building an app -
    What if everyone contributed to some sort of "Audiobus Members SoundBank" for some sort of future AudioKit Player app of some kind...

  • The anti-skeuomorphism brigade would have a field day with this one. Is that a crystal vase sitting on top?

  • @LucidMusicInc said:
    The anti-skeuomorphism brigade would have a field day with this one. Is that a crystal vase sitting on top?

    He took a picture of his actual keyboard rig and set it as the background picture in the code template. I believe that's a shot of whiskey.

    He does have a catchy tagline, “Whiskeyshot eHarpsichord: Sampled electric harpsichord, for the price of a shot of whiskey“

  • @analog_matt said:

    @LucidMusicInc said:
    The anti-skeuomorphism brigade would have a field day with this one. Is that a crystal vase sitting on top?

    He took a picture of his actual keyboard rig and set it as the background picture in the code template. I believe that's a shot of whiskey.

    He does have a catchy tagline, “Whiskeyshot eHarpsichord: Sampled electric harpsichord, for the price of a shot of whiskey“

    Ah if it's whiskey then all is forgiven :D

  • This is very inspiring, congrats Jeff!

    Is he on the forum here??

  • Still, 6,99 is VERY sporty for a free base app where he just added samples :o

  • I'm going to blubber some didgeridoo samples into an app and then charge something similar. Finally a good money making scheme to get my annual Apple license paid for...

    Not really. I'd love to make my own app and charge for it but the $100 annual buy-in is just too steep. Instead I would love to make some samples of my own sounds and then contribute them for free to a sample player.

    Agreed that $6.99 is a bit rich especially when you see the grief we've given other app developers who release half-baked apps and charge $10 for them only for us to be beta testers.

  • He'll get the price right over time--maybe he doesn't know the market well (or maybe he does and we don't). Either way, I give him props for just getting in the game.

  • You have to pay $99 just to get in the marketplace? You can't even give something away for free without paying the Apple tax?

  • edited March 2018

    hey guys, Jeff here. Indeed, I am still learning about the market I don't know much about it.
    Just moved it from 5.99 to 4.99.
    There are only about 100 or so of these instruments left in existence, so it is kind of an esoteric sound that folks who are deep into vintage keyboards might be interested in. Maybe not everybody's cup of tea, but the best alternative I know of is a VSTi for Mac/Windows and costs $99. It took me quite a while to sample and get right. I made it because I thought it would be fun to make a vintage sampled instrument that didn't sound perfect, and make it available to people. It seems to me that most currently available apps that emulate old gear are in meticulously perfect tune and have all the mechanical and electric noise removed. They sound pretty soul-less to me in live performance. This is for someone who wants an authentic 60s/70s sounding performance instrument that basically has no controls, like we used to have in the old days. If I make the money back I spent to get into the app store, cool.

    I do have an IT background and have dabbled with node.js and c++ along with lots of other scripting languages, so I'm not a total neophyte, but I had never used xcode and swift before.

  • edited March 2018

    @Wrlds2ndBstGeoshredr said:
    You have to pay $99 just to get in the marketplace? You can't even give something away for free without paying the Apple tax?

    Correct. The only way to get an app to show up on the App Store is to be a registered app developer, which costs $99 per year. You can make apps for free for your personal use all day long using free developer tools on OS X and they will happily show up on your iOS device but as soon as you want to share it... $99 please.

    I still keep a copy of Swift on my iMac, but I'm not sure why since I've not developed anything beyond a starter app in all these years. Maybe someday.

  • @fprintf said:
    they will happily show up on your iOS device

    This also used to require a developer license not too long ago. So they've already opened up a tiny bit... :)

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