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.

I would like to ask some Egoist questions before I make the purchase

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Comments

  • @supadom: cubasis works great with all SB apps. I just ran also Cassini, Nave, ThumbJam, Fiddlewax midi and audio and Egoiste all via IAA on Air, latest iOS. All routing is done by Cubasis. It's all good. Winter can come

  • I know what I'm getting for Christmas! ;) cheers Peanutface!

  • Ipad2, egoist sending bass midi to Magellan and audio from both recorded via AB in to Audioshare with no issues

  • @Peanutcram

    I think we should translate Winter can come into Latin (Hiems potest venire) and have it inscribed on our non-existent forum shield. Brilliant shorthand for 'fuck 'em all, I'm ready...' :)

  • So much joy you guys are getting out of this... I thought this wasn't the kind of app I would like but I may give it a try. In last resource.. Is it worth buying just for the sample import and mangling?
    What can you say to a guy that comes from audio design (for a few projects) and locks himself in his own bedroom for three days with loopy hd and a mic, just looping toys, kitchenware and tooth picks falling?

  • Get out more?

    :)

    As for the sound design/one shot aspect, I believe that's how I will use it mostly. Mangle a something and drop it into auria in the middle of something else...

  • Thanks. Just have to work how it will justify the twenty bucks. Not saying it won't. I'm out of Samplr anyway so I feel I may fall for this as an excuse.

    By the way; producing music or whatever and getting out doesn't always seem that compatible. Of course I noticed you have a family. But you also go to the gym!? When I grow up I want to know
    how to do it.

  • edited November 2014

    @Macao95 Go the gym, play racquetball, Ultimate (frisbee), run a business, thrash the kid when he needs it, make a mean roast dinner. The secret (for me) is about four hours sleep a night and deciding a few years ago to give up the sauce before it killed me. The latter (for me) probably being more important than the former :) Good luck, you've still got time....

  • @Macao95 said:

    So much joy you guys are getting out of this... I thought this wasn't the kind of app I would like but I may give it a try. In last resource.. Is it worth buying just for the sample import and mangling?

    It's worth buying for the sheer joy it's given me already in mucking about and having fun. I'm impressed with the quality of the drum sounds and bass, much better than anything else on my iPad, and it's not distorting my samples like Samplr does. Saying that I can still make a godawful racket with it:

  • edited November 2014

    I bought it yesterday, watched the 5 video tutorials and had a bit of a play for a few hours.

    I must say I wasn't as blown away as some.

    As with all 16 step type sequencers I found I quickly became quite sick of the loop going round and round. And I found it a bit limiting to only be able to have 3 things going at once: drums, bass and sample. Unlike, say Gadget, where you could throw a pad in or some fx sounds or whatever while jamming.

    I do generally author like that at the beginning of a project. Trying different loops together, switching them on and off. It's just that 3 seems quite limited here. And you can't have two samples playing at the same time. Or a vocal over chords or anything.

    So for complete song composition it feels a bit minimal to me. Certainly not in any way comparable to Gadget.

    However, I do like the slicer and I particularly like the Effectrix-like effects. The slicer is similar to the Abu gadget in functionality but just much nicer to use to quickly play with. Add in effects and you have a great way to feel out a nice sample driven 1 bar hook. Which I guess you then take into a 4 bar hook (although I didn't get that far).

    The thing I like about the drums and the bass is that they are both on the same screen. I often feel I should be timing my drums and basslines better together but normally (ie in Gadget or Nanostudio) they are sequenced in different places so you can't see visually, "ah, I have rythmn here I can play off with the bass" etc. I also like the bass step option that slides up or down into the note.

    So I can see myself doing a few things with this app:

    • Creating lead parts from samples (as I've done in the past with Samplr) for export.

    • Working out drum patterns and baselines that work together. (Then probably copying those parterns into Gadget or Nanostudio - wherever my track destination in) or using midi out to a synth and recording the output for use elsewhere.

    Need more time to explore the app though. Randomisation functions are nice.

    EDIT: it actually reminds me more of something like Figure or iKaosilator as a way of jamming ideas in loops. With the massive added advantage of being able to bring in your own samples and really mess with them.

  • Hey @Macao95 don't make a mistake of thinking of it as Samplr replacement or something similar. The slicer is quite different and the results are definitely different at least the way I use them. I keep forgetting how much time it took me to tame samplr and I feel it's going to be the same with egoist's slicer. It just seems to work better with certain samples more than others. Also the sensitivity slider is a bit of a hit and miss especially considering how little of the real estate it actually occupies. I'm not sure whether the window is resizeable on the PC but egoist is definitely too fiddly for the big ipad, can't even imagine what it would be like on the mini.

    @Matt_Fletcher_2000 I feel you man. Power is nothing without control. Even if there's only 3 modules + effects, this thing can get very busy and overwhelming. I think Egoist has got a fairly narrow technoish scope but with a bit of skill it can be taken further. One has to resist the urge of mindlessly pressing those randomize buttons. It gets very choppy far too easily and too funky for its own good. For me the real strength is in pairing it with a daw like bm2 or cubasis but I can see its potential with a few controllers with loads of knobs paired with a large PA system. :)

  • edited November 2014

    I overcome the single sample playback by overdubbing in GarageBand, I prefer the additional control I have doing it that way anyway.

    I'm having to keep my fingers away from the randomise buttons, it can make things sound a bit samey if you use them too much, though the bassline randomise option produces some good results.

    After my initial purchase ecstasy I've come down and bit and am learning to work with the apps limitations. It doesn't do everything, and you do need to put in a bit of effort to stop each track sounding the same as the last one, but it's sitting very nicely in my music app toolbox, and worth every penny I paid for it.

  • @supadom said:

    Also the sensitivity slider is a bit of a hit and miss especially considering how little of the real estate it actually occupies. I'm not sure whether the window is resizeable on the PC but egoist is definitely too fiddly for the big ipad, can't even imagine what it would be like on the mini.

    This is a big deal breaker in my opinion. The user interface on any app is very important. Problems with buttons, sliders, and knobs takes you out of creativity and into frustration.

  • @mkell424 said:

    @supadom said:

    Also the sensitivity slider is a bit of a hit and miss especially considering how little of the real estate it actually occupies. I'm not sure whether the window is resizeable on the PC but egoist is definitely too fiddly for the big ipad, can't even imagine what it would be like on the mini.

    This is a big deal breaker in my opinion. The user interface on any app is very important. Problems with buttons, sliders, and knobs takes you out of creativity and into frustration.

    I don't see why it should be a problem. It's really easy to move the sample markers where you want them, and you have a bigger sample editor window than with Gadget.

  • edited November 2014

    What mongo said, there's nothing fiddly in regards to the slicer. I think some people think they need to hit markers, buttons, sliders etc with pinpoint accuracy. Just slab ur fingers on a controllers general area, drag shIt around, and get a feel for it all.

    As for how the actuall algos behind how the transients detection works, it's a linear progressive engine behind it. A good one, but ymmv as with any slicer that uses auto detection of any kind, and some manual adjustments here and there might be necessary depending on audio material, zoom level etc.

    Also, seen some people missing that the FX units are all big XY pads (you don't need to use the smaller controllers on the side). Just throwing that out there incase some people are still "fiddlin" with the sliders. :)

    It's all a very "put yer finger on here and drag shit around" oriented UI, and is consistent throughout the app. Except for the bass module perhaps, which ended up using a mixture of popup menu and drag gestures.

    I told Sugar Bytes that I absolutely hated Thesys UI, and if anything in Egoist was gonna turn out to be "Thesys Fiddly" I'd scream like a baby. And that's also what they wanted, a "brutally honest" opinion on the UI and user experience. There are some things that could have been done a bit different, but, there always are. You have to draw the line somewhere. I think they did a pretty good job on this, considering how MUCH FUN everyone and their mama have with this one.

    Anyways, they might pick up ideas etc from people and change things, continue to improve things. Who knows. I know that SB definitely are seeing and hearing all of us lowly user peasants though. :)

  • edited November 2014

    The main bits that are fiddly to me are the slice selector in the pattern and the A/D/Level controls. Tiny movements make very big changes in those. I'm not sure there's a way around it on an iPad with the current design short of doing the 'touch your finger and I'll give you a zoomed view to the side' sort of thing. Or maybe on one touch, it could put up/down increments above and below the control (or perhaps following the touch point)?

    Moving slice markers is fine.

    The algorithm is pretty magical. Thing is, without a way to manually add markers, you have to set it to pretty sensitive in order to get 16 slices. With longer samples, that leaves them grouped at the front of the sample. I'd like a 'put 16 slices up and spread them across the entire sample first and then back fill from there as needed' option. As it is now, I just slide it until it puts 16 up and move them myself but I'm missing out on the app's smashingly good transient detection that way.

  • Yup, just in case the Byters are keeping count, Syrunp-san's last paragraph is how I feel also. Especially:

    'I'd like a 'put 16 slices up and spread them across the entire sample first and then back fill from there as needed'.

  • edited November 2014

    I'm thinking a "flick" gesture to incrementaly move various parameters in smaller steps (like the step sliders in the slicer sequencer), to get around some of the limitations/irritations a touch screen imposes. Korg have this amazing little gesture implemented throughout all their apps on basically any control/parameter, and it works wonders. It also completely removes the annoying "lift your finger from the screen and the controller moves a bit" thing that is present in basically all apps (except Korgs).

  • edited November 2014

    Ah yeah, forgot about that korg gesture. Would be perfect.

    There's also the Hokusai slider model that gives you numeric feedback and acceleration info. It's very very cool.

  • Any and all of the above please dear Byters!

  • edited November 2014

    @syrupcore said:

    Thing is, without a way to manually add markers, you have to set it to pretty sensitive in order to get 16 slices. With longer samples, that leaves them grouped at the front of the sample. I'd like a 'put 16 slices up and spread them across the entire sample first and then back fill from there as needed' option. As it is now, I just slide it until it puts 16 up and move them myself but I'm missing out on the app's smashingly good transient detection that way.

    I noticed that, I push the end slider as far right as it'll go, then I hit the randomise button - this tends to move them across the sample more evenly so it's quicker to move them into the correct position.

  • Nice one @monzo, thanks. Still missing the rather nice transient detection but if you're gonna do it by hand anyway, might as well start with them spread out like that.

  • @ChrisG in slicer mode they could have easily done away with the sliders and just leave squares with numbers that one can swipe up and down like they did with pattern selector in part mode. This would give much more space for the loop window with audition and - and + buttons. As far as transients are concerned I'd be much happier if there was a possibility to add and remove markers as in samplr so I wouldn't have to swipe the unneeded ones to the right or mess with sensitivity slider to absolutely never get the right amount. If you work with rhythmical samples things are easier but working with speech or random samples is much trickier than in samplr.

    As I said before though, it is a very powerful app that probably gives its best in a live situation with shed loads of knobs assigned to it. Just like the reast of SB stuff.

  • edited November 2014

    The interface elements on this one that I find most difficult are the tempo, (which is very difficult to set precisely unless I'm missing something) and the individual decay sliders. Both require a lot of careful nudging. Its almost easier to set up some templates than to go through all that again each time.

    I can't think of anytime SB has changed anything about their interface designs to improve usability after release with the possible exception of the zoom lock key on Thesys.

  • edited November 2014

    @supadom Yea, options available to accommodate different workflows and so on is obviously a good thing. I'll point Markus at SB to this thread and page, just to be 100% sure SB see and pick up all the good suggestions and things people brings up here (they do need to keep up with a lot of places/forums so..:).

    I'm speaking out of me arse now, coz I obviously don't know nothing about this. But, I got the beta for Egoist moons ago. Not long at all after the desktop release. So, I'm thinking perhaps when they thought up and created Egoist, iOS was already in there somewhere as well. Hence the much more iPad friendlier UI from the get-go. And also, that this allows a bit more room for developing some aspects of Egoist further or in a different direction. As opposed to their other apps, which are definitely "hardcore" desktop products. An uneducated educated guess is that, if SB develop more products (I'm sure they will), they'll have iOS/Tablets along in the planning stage, when it comes to UI and those kinda things. I mean, it does seem that they do very much like the platform (even tho it may not be the most lucrative one so to speak).

  • Yeah. Tempo. What is going on there? Once it gets a decimal point, I can't get rid of it!

  • Again, can't say I've had too much issues with the tempo. Short & slow movements does it. When I'm messing around with music creation on the iPad I hold it with my two hands infront of my face, and make noise with my two thumbs. I know people hated Gadget for being portrait mode only, tiny keyboards etc. Me? I absolutely I loved it. :) I'm thinking of starting a Two Thumbs Productions label...or not..It's prolly already taken.. Anyway, hold your finger on the tempo for a sec and you'll get a popup.

  • My tempo issues might have to do with my lemon of an iPad 3. I do want every app ever made in every corner of earth to all keypad entry of tempo though. It's a thing.

  • edited November 2014

    @ChrisG

    Anyway, hold your finger on the tempo for a sec and you'll get a popup.

    Trifficly Fab. In equal and direct amount I feel a schmuck for not having sussed that all on my lonesome. Leaves me in permanent fear of all the other things that are waiting there just below the surface of my dull self's understanding....

  • Few Easter eggs, like a hidden snake game. Some nudies scattered throughout. Just do - up, up, down, down, left, right, left, right, B, A, start - to reach those.

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