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 Store

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

New Noise Gate & Downward Expander cleans up drum reverb (video)

We released this app almost two weeks back. Today we finally made the first video demo:

It shows how a downward expander can be used to calm down the background noise of a live drum recording without making harsh gating sounds that a typical noise gate would do. It can also be used to tame the reverb on drum samples that hang on a bit too long.

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Comments

  • @Blue_Mangoo Great explanation and demo.. these videos are extremely helpful in trying to understand what the app is capable of and possible other uses.. bring on the guitar version (video) by all means.. look forward to all your demos - always full of useful knowledge.. thanks for taking the time to do them..
    It's definitely my next purchase as soon as I top up with funds.. :)

  • Great video! Well explained and certainly a good reason for using downward expanders instead of noise gates.
    I feel a little pride when I see that you've implemented it so well :smiley: :+1:

  • edited December 2019

    @rs2000 Ah, yes.. I recall that you may have coaxed @Blue_Mangoo into releasing it.. is that correct? If so, a thanks to you as well..

  • @royor said:
    @rs2000 Ah, yes.. I recall that you may have coaxed @Blue_Mangoo into releasing it.. is that correct? If so, a thanks to you as well..

    Yep, finally my constant preaching ... err ... bugging has had an effect :D

  • @rs2000 said:

    @royor said:
    @rs2000 Ah, yes.. I recall that you may have coaxed @Blue_Mangoo into releasing it.. is that correct? If so, a thanks to you as well..

    Yep, finally my constant preaching ... err ... bugging has had an effect :D

    Thanks again for the suggestion. ;)

  • Bought, of course!

    I am wondering why there are so few views of those immensely interesting and informative videos, though :o

    Waiting for the Saturator now :)
    Any ETA, @Blue_Mangoo ?

  • edited December 2019

    @tja said:
    Bought, of course!

    I am wondering why there are so few views of those immensely interesting and informative videos, though :o

    Waiting for the Saturator now :)
    Any ETA, @Blue_Mangoo ?

    6-8 weeks. We will call it an amp simulator rather than saturator

  • McDMcD
    edited December 2019

    @Blue_Mangoo said:

    @tja said:
    Bought, of course!

    I am wondering why there are so few views of those immensely interesting and informative videos, though :o

    Waiting for the Saturator now :)
    Any ETA, @Blue_Mangoo ?

    6-8 weeks. We will call it an amp simulator rather than saturator

    You must be laboring over small details like A/B with any classic Amps you have handy. But 6 weeks does mean 2020. Anyway, make it great. This is a tricky app genre to satisfy the huge range of guitar enthusiasts and their favorite apps and pedals and amps and heroes and pickups and cabinets and guitar types and string types and plectrum types and venue types and FX responses and...

    Carry on.

  • edited December 2019

    @McD said:

    @Blue_Mangoo said:

    @tja said:
    Bought, of course!

    I am wondering why there are so few views of those immensely interesting and informative videos, though :o

    Waiting for the Saturator now :)
    Any ETA, @Blue_Mangoo ?

    6-8 weeks. We will call it an amp simulator rather than saturator

    You must be laboring over small details like A/B with any classic Amps you have handy. But 6 weeks does mean 2020. Anyway, make it great. This is a tricky app genre to satisfy the huge range of guitar enthusiasts and their favorite apps and pedals and amps and heroes and pickups and cabinets and guitar types and string types and plectrum types and venue types and FX responses and...

    Carry on.

    Sad to say I sold my amps years ago. I am just listening to recordings, plugging my guitar in and adjusting by ear.

    I made my first attempt at digital amp modelling seven years ago and the result was awful. I have been hesitant to do this project precisely because i dont have a collection of classic amps to tear apart and test. I live in an area where the only way to get a classic amp is to make arrangements import it yourself.

    But after years of tinkering around with it I finally reached a point where I feel we can make something useful, and I hope the fact that we aren’t tearing apart amps and measuring them might actually be a boon, because we will get a sound you havent heard from other amp sims, and its tuned to sound good, rather than to measured specs.

    Mr Kemper gave an interview on Anderton’s youtube channel where he talked about his methods, and he does things in a similar way. He said he hasnt got a single person in his company that knows how to build a tube amp. And they always go by sound more than measurements. The Kemper profiles are an automated way of “listening”, but the amp itself doesn’t use circuit models of any amps at all.

  • @Blue_Mangoo said:

    @McD said:

    @Blue_Mangoo said:

    @tja said:
    Bought, of course!

    I am wondering why there are so few views of those immensely interesting and informative videos, though :o

    Waiting for the Saturator now :)
    Any ETA, @Blue_Mangoo ?

    6-8 weeks. We will call it an amp simulator rather than saturator

    You must be laboring over small details like A/B with any classic Amps you have handy. But 6 weeks does mean 2020. Anyway, make it great. This is a tricky app genre to satisfy the huge range of guitar enthusiasts and their favorite apps and pedals and amps and heroes and pickups and cabinets and guitar types and string types and plectrum types and venue types and FX responses and...

    Carry on.

    Sad to say I sold my amps years ago. I am just listening to recordings, plugging my guitar in and adjusting by ear.

    I made my first attempt at digital amp modelling seven years ago and the result was awful. I have been hesitant to do this project precisely because i dont have a collection of classic amps to tear apart and test. I live in an area where the only way to get a classic amp is to make arrangements import it yourself.

    But after years of tinkering around with it I finally reached a point where I feel we can make something useful, and I hope the fact that we aren’t tearing apart amps and measuring them might actually be a boon, because we will get a sound you havent heard from other amp sims, and its tuned to sound good, rather than to measured specs.

    Mr Kemper gave an interview on Anderton’s youtube channel where he talked about his methods, and he does things in a similar way. He said he hasnt got a single person in his company that knows how to build a tube amp. And they always go by sound more than measurements. The Kemper profiles are an automated way of “listening”, but the amp itself doesn’t use circuit models of any amps at all.

    For an IOS product (with limited resources) I think you're on the right path: Optimized code that's tuned in by the ear's of a seasoned musician. That also describes the ideal user who will also continue to tweak settings for a given input and add extra FX to achieve tonal perfection.

  • @Blue_Mangoo said:
    I am listening to recordings, plugging my guitar in and adjusting by ear.
    But after years of tinkering around with it I finally reached a point where I feel we can make something useful, and I hope the fact that we aren’t tearing apart amps and measuring them might actually be a boon, because we will get a sound you haven't heard from other amp sims, and its tuned to sound good, rather than to measured specs.

    For an IOS product (with limited resources) I think you're on the right path: Optimized code that's tuned in by the ear's of a seasoned musician. That also describes the ideal user who will also continue to tweak settings for a given input and add extra FX to achieve tonal perfection.

  • To my horror, i cannot install the Noise Gate on my iPad 9.7 Pro with iOS 12.4
    :o :o :o

    Is this restriction to iOS 13 strictly required, @Blue_Mangoo ?

  • Is that why it doesn’t even show in my App Store (Australia)? I’m on 12.4.1.

  • @tja said:
    To my horror, i cannot install the Noise Gate on my iPad 9.7 Pro with iOS 12.4
    :o :o :o

    Is this restriction to iOS 13 strictly required, @Blue_Mangoo ?

    @qryss said:
    Is that why it doesn’t even show in my App Store (Australia)? I’m on 12.4.1.

    It requires iOS 13.

    For new app releases, we only support the latest iOS version because we dont have enough iOS devices for every developer in the company to have several different operating systems available for testing.

    We ran into trouble with this in the past when customers bought our apps on an old iOS. They reported bugs and we couldn’t fix them because we couldn’t downgrade back to the old OS

  • @Blue_Mangoo said:

    @tja said:
    To my horror, i cannot install the Noise Gate on my iPad 9.7 Pro with iOS 12.4
    :o :o :o

    Is this restriction to iOS 13 strictly required, @Blue_Mangoo ?

    @qryss said:
    Is that why it doesn’t even show in my App Store (Australia)? I’m on 12.4.1.

    It requires iOS 13.

    For new app releases, we only support the latest iOS version because we dont have enough iOS devices for every developer in the company to have several different operating systems available for testing.

    We ran into trouble with this in the past when customers bought our apps on an old iOS. They reported bugs and we couldn’t fix them because we couldn’t downgrade back to the old OS

    I really wish you would reconsider. Very few devs are so aggressive in not supporting the last generation. Beta testers should be able to let you know if there are actually issues. A lot of people are hesitant to upgrade to iOS 13 due to some of the problems others have encountered.

  • @espiegel123 said:

    @Blue_Mangoo said:

    @tja said:
    To my horror, i cannot install the Noise Gate on my iPad 9.7 Pro with iOS 12.4
    :o :o :o

    Is this restriction to iOS 13 strictly required, @Blue_Mangoo ?

    @qryss said:
    Is that why it doesn’t even show in my App Store (Australia)? I’m on 12.4.1.

    It requires iOS 13.

    For new app releases, we only support the latest iOS version because we dont have enough iOS devices for every developer in the company to have several different operating systems available for testing.

    We ran into trouble with this in the past when customers bought our apps on an old iOS. They reported bugs and we couldn’t fix them because we couldn’t downgrade back to the old OS

    I really wish you would reconsider. Very few devs are so aggressive in not supporting the last generation. Beta testers should be able to let you know if there are actually issues. A lot of people are hesitant to upgrade to iOS 13 due to some of the problems others have encountered.

    I am not sure what the financial situation is at other app dev companies. As a manager I made some risky decisions over the past few years. I am trying to compensate for that and turn things around. If we are successful then in the future we will invest more money in extra iPads.

  • @Blue_Mangoo said:

    @espiegel123 said:

    @Blue_Mangoo said:

    @tja said:
    To my horror, i cannot install the Noise Gate on my iPad 9.7 Pro with iOS 12.4
    :o :o :o

    Is this restriction to iOS 13 strictly required, @Blue_Mangoo ?

    @qryss said:
    Is that why it doesn’t even show in my App Store (Australia)? I’m on 12.4.1.

    It requires iOS 13.

    For new app releases, we only support the latest iOS version because we dont have enough iOS devices for every developer in the company to have several different operating systems available for testing.

    We ran into trouble with this in the past when customers bought our apps on an old iOS. They reported bugs and we couldn’t fix them because we couldn’t downgrade back to the old OS

    I really wish you would reconsider. Very few devs are so aggressive in not supporting the last generation. Beta testers should be able to let you know if there are actually issues. A lot of people are hesitant to upgrade to iOS 13 due to some of the problems others have encountered.

    I am not sure what the financial situation is at other app dev companies. As a manager I made some risky decisions over the past few years. I am trying to compensate for that and turn things around. If we are successful then in the future we will invest more money in extra iPads.

    I understand being hesitant to not invest in tons of devices.

    But what is the danger in having beta testers test for iOS 12 compatibility and releasing the software as iOS 12 compatible if no problems emerge? With the pro audio market, it is pretty common for people to wait to upgrade the iOS. When I was developing audio software (20+ years at a tiny tiny company) we couldn’t afford all the configurations we supported, but being careful during development (as I know you are) we were able to consistently support a generation or two backwards and at least 30% of our revenue was from people not running the latest OS version.

    Just a thought.

  • @espiegel123 said:

    @Blue_Mangoo said:

    @espiegel123 said:

    @Blue_Mangoo said:

    @tja said:
    To my horror, i cannot install the Noise Gate on my iPad 9.7 Pro with iOS 12.4
    :o :o :o

    Is this restriction to iOS 13 strictly required, @Blue_Mangoo ?

    @qryss said:
    Is that why it doesn’t even show in my App Store (Australia)? I’m on 12.4.1.

    It requires iOS 13.

    For new app releases, we only support the latest iOS version because we dont have enough iOS devices for every developer in the company to have several different operating systems available for testing.

    We ran into trouble with this in the past when customers bought our apps on an old iOS. They reported bugs and we couldn’t fix them because we couldn’t downgrade back to the old OS

    I really wish you would reconsider. Very few devs are so aggressive in not supporting the last generation. Beta testers should be able to let you know if there are actually issues. A lot of people are hesitant to upgrade to iOS 13 due to some of the problems others have encountered.

    I am not sure what the financial situation is at other app dev companies. As a manager I made some risky decisions over the past few years. I am trying to compensate for that and turn things around. If we are successful then in the future we will invest more money in extra iPads.

    I understand being hesitant to not invest in tons of devices.

    But what is the danger in having beta testers test for iOS 12 compatibility and releasing the software as iOS 12 compatible if no problems emerge? With the pro audio market, it is pretty common for people to wait to upgrade the iOS. When I was developing audio software (20+ years at a tiny tiny company) we couldn’t afford all the configurations we supported, but being careful during development (as I know you are) we were able to consistently support a generation or two backwards and at least 30% of our revenue was from people not running the latest OS version.

    Just a thought.

    I'll consider it.

  • @Blue_Mangoo said:

    @espiegel123 said:

    @Blue_Mangoo said:

    @espiegel123 said:

    @Blue_Mangoo said:

    @tja said:
    To my horror, i cannot install the Noise Gate on my iPad 9.7 Pro with iOS 12.4
    :o :o :o

    Is this restriction to iOS 13 strictly required, @Blue_Mangoo ?

    @qryss said:
    Is that why it doesn’t even show in my App Store (Australia)? I’m on 12.4.1.

    It requires iOS 13.

    For new app releases, we only support the latest iOS version because we dont have enough iOS devices for every developer in the company to have several different operating systems available for testing.

    We ran into trouble with this in the past when customers bought our apps on an old iOS. They reported bugs and we couldn’t fix them because we couldn’t downgrade back to the old OS

    I really wish you would reconsider. Very few devs are so aggressive in not supporting the last generation. Beta testers should be able to let you know if there are actually issues. A lot of people are hesitant to upgrade to iOS 13 due to some of the problems others have encountered.

    I am not sure what the financial situation is at other app dev companies. As a manager I made some risky decisions over the past few years. I am trying to compensate for that and turn things around. If we are successful then in the future we will invest more money in extra iPads.

    I understand being hesitant to not invest in tons of devices.

    But what is the danger in having beta testers test for iOS 12 compatibility and releasing the software as iOS 12 compatible if no problems emerge? With the pro audio market, it is pretty common for people to wait to upgrade the iOS. When I was developing audio software (20+ years at a tiny tiny company) we couldn’t afford all the configurations we supported, but being careful during development (as I know you are) we were able to consistently support a generation or two backwards and at least 30% of our revenue was from people not running the latest OS version.

    Just a thought.

    I'll consider it.

    That would be great. Thanks for considering it.

  • I'm still on 12.4, which is why I've not been able to purchase the plugin. I'll probably update to iOS 13 at some point next year - I'm waiting to see if Line 6 are going to fix the Sonic Port which is currently bricked on iOS 13.

  • @richardyot said:
    I'm still on 12.4, which is why I've not been able to purchase the plugin. I'll probably update to iOS 13 at some point next year - I'm waiting to see if Line 6 are going to fix the Sonic Port which is currently bricked on iOS 13.

    I think we ought to support the latest two iOS versions with new releases. But we are short on hardware at the moment.

  • @richardyot said:
    I'm still on 12.4, which is why I've not been able to purchase the plugin. I'll probably update to iOS 13 at some point next year - I'm waiting to see if Line 6 are going to fix the Sonic Port which is currently bricked on iOS 13.

    Same for me, I have to admit.
    iOS updates have recently had enough quality issues to become super-careful too.
    Breaking what currently works and being unable to go back is something I can do without very well.

  • @Blue_Mangoo said:

    @richardyot said:
    I'm still on 12.4, which is why I've not been able to purchase the plugin. I'll probably update to iOS 13 at some point next year - I'm waiting to see if Line 6 are going to fix the Sonic Port which is currently bricked on iOS 13.

    I think we ought to support the latest two iOS versions with new releases. But we are short on hardware at the moment.

    That's understandable, hopefully I'll be on iOS 13 in time for your saturator/amp sim plugin when it comes out.

  • I understand the reasoning and also that a developer cannot have a bunch of different devices with different iOS versions.

    But otherwise, lots of Apps work perfectly well down to IOS 9 or even 8!

    Beta testers could sure help with that and maybe a mentioning that support for older iOS versions is only basic.

  • edited December 2019

    @tja said:
    I understand the reasoning and also that a developer cannot have a bunch of different devices with different iOS versions.

    But otherwise, lots of Apps work perfectly well down to IOS 9 or even 8!

    Beta testers could sure help with that and maybe a mentioning that support for older iOS versions is only basic.

    The problem is that every few months a customer sends an angry email saying that he just bought your app, which you advertised as supporting iOS x.x and the app is crashing. Its crashing because we made a change to fix a bug in the new iOS. If we updated all our test devices because we only have one Ipad and one iphone for each dev on the team and they needed them On the latest version to fix bugs in the new iOS then now we havent got an iPad available to test, and our only recourse is to exclude iOS x.x from the list of supported OS, effectively leaving all customers who are using that OS stranded, because they paid for our app, and it used to work, but now it doesn’t anymore, and we cant fix it. The customer can’t downgrade back to an older version because the app store doesn’t allow that. So we just apologise and take a few one star ratings on the store.

    This doesn't need to happen if we support only the last two iOS. Because we should be able to keep at least one iPad on the previous OS. But this time with iOS 13 we got into a situation where all our devs were working on iOS 13 to fix all the bugs that appeared with that update.

  • @Blue_Mangoo said:

    @tja said:
    I understand the reasoning and also that a developer cannot have a bunch of different devices with different iOS versions.

    But otherwise, lots of Apps work perfectly well down to IOS 9 or even 8!

    Beta testers could sure help with that and maybe a mentioning that support for older iOS versions is only basic.

    The problem is that when a customer sends an angry email saying that he just bought your app, which you advertised as supporting iOS x.x and the app is crashing, because you made a change to support the new iOS that just came out and now you havent got an iPad available to test, then your only recourse is to exclude iOS x.x from the list of supported OS, effectively leaving all customers who are using that OS stranded, because they paid for your app, and it used to work, but now it doesn’t anymore, and you cant fix it.

    This doesn't need to happen if we support only the last two iOS. But this time with iOS I updated our last iPhone to iOS 13 by mistake. Eventually I hope we will buy more iOS devices. There are ways to make it work without breaking the bank. We just didn’t manage it well with this iOS 13 release.

    If you have a number of beta testers with iOS 12, I think you are unlikely to have many os-related surprises. if they put the app through its paces without running into issues, you can be pretty confident. Your apps have a well-defined enough functionality that OS-related issues are likely to show up in beta testing.

    And you will almost certainly gain more happy customers than unhappy ones.

  • edited December 2019

    @espiegel123 said:

    @Blue_Mangoo said:

    @tja said:
    I understand the reasoning and also that a developer cannot have a bunch of different devices with different iOS versions.

    But otherwise, lots of Apps work perfectly well down to IOS 9 or even 8!

    Beta testers could sure help with that and maybe a mentioning that support for older iOS versions is only basic.

    The problem is that when a customer sends an angry email saying that he just bought your app, which you advertised as supporting iOS x.x and the app is crashing, because you made a change to support the new iOS that just came out and now you havent got an iPad available to test, then your only recourse is to exclude iOS x.x from the list of supported OS, effectively leaving all customers who are using that OS stranded, because they paid for your app, and it used to work, but now it doesn’t anymore, and you cant fix it.

    This doesn't need to happen if we support only the last two iOS. But this time with iOS I updated our last iPhone to iOS 13 by mistake. Eventually I hope we will buy more iOS devices. There are ways to make it work without breaking the bank. We just didn’t manage it well with this iOS 13 release.

    If you have a number of beta testers with iOS 12, I think you are unlikely to have many os-related surprises. if they put the app through its paces without running into issues, you can be pretty confident. Your apps have a well-defined enough functionality that OS-related issues are likely to show up in beta testing.

    And you will almost certainly gain more happy customers than unhappy ones.

    Beta testers can inform us when there is a problem, if we have enough of them. But in order to fix a problem you usually need to have a device on your desk that is actually exhibiting the bug, otherwise you’re just guessing like a shot in the dark and can go back and forth for weeks with the beta testers without identifying the problem.

    This isn’t just a hypothetical situation. Right now, all iFretless apps and Drum Session currently have support tickets out for unresolved bugs that we are unable to replicate and cant debug.

  • As I said, I can understand.

    But with all the shit from Apple, all developers face that same situation.
    And still, this is the first App that I cannot install on my main musical device!

    And that device is on purpose on iOS 12, because of that same shit from Apple.

    And as I transfer projects between devices, I can only use Apps that also run on iOS 12.
    Can as well delete the App from my other devices too ... :|

    For me, this is a worse situation than having bugs on an older iOS.
    And this may get you 1 stars ratings from people in this situation too (not from me).

    All of this is Apple's fault and cannot be solved... only by closing eyes and accepting whatever remains working on the next iOS version and also update any and all devices.
    I hate this world.

  • @Blue_Mangoo said:

    @espiegel123 said:

    @Blue_Mangoo said:

    @tja said:
    I understand the reasoning and also that a developer cannot have a bunch of different devices with different iOS versions.

    But otherwise, lots of Apps work perfectly well down to IOS 9 or even 8!

    Beta testers could sure help with that and maybe a mentioning that support for older iOS versions is only basic.

    The problem is that when a customer sends an angry email saying that he just bought your app, which you advertised as supporting iOS x.x and the app is crashing, because you made a change to support the new iOS that just came out and now you havent got an iPad available to test, then your only recourse is to exclude iOS x.x from the list of supported OS, effectively leaving all customers who are using that OS stranded, because they paid for your app, and it used to work, but now it doesn’t anymore, and you cant fix it.

    This doesn't need to happen if we support only the last two iOS. But this time with iOS I updated our last iPhone to iOS 13 by mistake. Eventually I hope we will buy more iOS devices. There are ways to make it work without breaking the bank. We just didn’t manage it well with this iOS 13 release.

    If you have a number of beta testers with iOS 12, I think you are unlikely to have many os-related surprises. if they put the app through its paces without running into issues, you can be pretty confident. Your apps have a well-defined enough functionality that OS-related issues are likely to show up in beta testing.

    And you will almost certainly gain more happy customers than unhappy ones.

    Beta testers can inform us when there is a problem, if we have enough of them. But in order to fix a problem you usually need to have a device on your desk that is actually exhibiting the bug, otherwise you’re just guessing like a shot in the dark and can go back and forth for weeks with the beta testers without identifying the problem.

    This isn’t just a hypothetical situation. Right now, all iFretless apps and Drum Session currently have support tickets out for unresolved bugs that we are unable to replicate and cant debug.

    I think it is important to distinguish bugs that are unreproducible because they are configuration dependent and bugs that are unreproducible and not really connected to something like the OS version. If you have a decent pool of beta testers, you will get a sense as to whether users of OS versions just one generation back are encountering more problems than others.

    You can then use that data to determine whether the incidence of unreproducible issues is higher with a particular OS and make the decision at that time whether it is worth supporting or not. (Btw, my job for 30-something years was helping developers figure this stuff out).

    I appreciate your caution, but my opinion is that it would be worthwhile for you to do some real-world assessment in beta as to whether there are actual OS-related compatibility issues before choosing not to support iOS 12. My suspicion is that OS-related issues will be readily apparent between iOS 12 and iOS 13 and would be related to features (like Dark Mode) not present in iOS 12.

    Even if you restrict your sales to iOS versions you have in-house, you are going to encounter bugs you can't reproduce. Your beta pool can help you determine if OS version significantly changes this.

    Maybe, I should be posting this via PM. If that is the case, let me know and I'll remove it from the thread.

  • @Blue_Mangoo - hey, I very much like this for more subtle stuff as well as over the top gating on drums. Great job!

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