Even on Mac, the new Kontakt can use the memory you’ve got installed. On Windows 64-bit, Kontakt (and Battery, too) can use memory beyond … well, what you’d even imagine installing. Native Instruments has updated its sampling engine, releasing beta versions 3.0.5 for its Battery drum sampler and 3.5.0 final for the flagship Kontakt sampler. […]

SuperCollider, super fast: UK-based experimental musician mcldx has produced a 60-second intro to SuperCollider. Naturally, you won’t learn SuperCollider in one minute, but what’s nice about this is it does explain the very first steps you would take to get SuperCollider running – and because SC doesn’t have a single-window, “do everything here” interface, that […]

Mac users luck out when it comes to managing audio files, with exceptional choices like Snapper from AudioEase and the all-powerful AudioFinder, not to mention – if your needs are light – features like Leopard’s QuickLook. Windows users, by contrast, have been mostly left out. But good news: we’ve got a lovely solution for you. […]

Sequencers by definition traditionally lock musical patterns into repetitive, unchanging blocks of time. But a new generation of generative sequencers can instead form organic patterns that change and transform. Nodal is a totally free-as-in-beer (closed-source) sequencer for composing music. (A license is needed for commercial use.) As the name implies, it uses a matrix of […]

Ah, those crazy Linux-using, Deviant Art artists. Someone has created an anaglyph theme for the GNOME (Linux) desktop. Don some red and blue-tinted glasses, and watch your desktop pop out of your screen. After all, it’s not as though all this Vista Aero glass and drop shadow and flying windows and such makes it really […]

Projection tools in the wild: relief projection lab at Bit Teatergarasjen; photo (CC) hc gilje. Projection mapping has been a running theme here, as visualists are dying to get their projections onto objects other than flat walls. If you’re ready to experiment and develop new material but have been intimidated by figuring out how to […]

Touchscreens are often compared to the ground-breaking – if imaginary – designs of Star Trek: The Next Generation. But Brazilian Paulo Egidio Silva must be a real Trekker. His elaborate touchscreen panel configuration really looks like the LCARS computer system simulated on the TV show. Of course, that isn’t to say this isn’t a practical […]

Rain Recording make audio-ready notebooks – that is, they’re pre-tested to function well with audio software, with Windows tweaks, driver selection, and configuration all chosen and tested for music and visual production, and no crapware installed. They’re one of a handful of music-friendly vendors that does that (see also: PCAudioLabs, etc.). Given that the PC […]

Cubase 5 includes under-the-hood improvements to performance, but many of the new features – like the unusual LoopMash loop masher upper instrument – come in the form of instrumental add-ons. LoopMash is interesting, but it’s more a bundled instrument than a truly integrated feature. The big traditional DAW announcement at this NAMM show was Steinberg’s […]

Speaking of extra heads, I recently completed a music video – Fail With Me – with collaborator Edward Guglielmino, for the album Late At Night. Edward Guglielmino – Fail With Me from Jaymis on Vimeo. A continuation of the Quick, Single-Shot philosophy I espoused and we discussed 6 months ago. I think this integration is […]