I've been meaning to post on the latest addition to the minimusic range, but I wanted to be able to add a few extras to this post before I wrote about it.
I've enjoyed playing with the preview application. The interface is fantastic, but then nothing less than you'd expect from minimusic. It is a real fun app to work with and the full version is due out this month!
Here's what the minimusic site says about it:
AxisPad is a music instrument on your handheld computer. You can use the full touch sensitive screen to create sound gestures. Each axis (up/down, left/right) can be assigned to change different parameters of the sound. The preview lets you control pitch and volume to create sounds similar to a Theremin. Push the up control on your phone or handheld to change the settings, down to hide the settings, or use the left/right controls to change instruments.
The full AxisPad will offer additional controls, customizable guide-lines, support for MIDI output and sound cards on some handhelds, and support for older handhelds that cannot run our software synthesizer. AxisPad is our update of the Theremini/Theremidi application by Pete Moss.
The November 8th Preview 2 greatly improves performance on most handhelds, eliminating the "click" sound while changing the volume of a sound. It also adds support for basic sound on older handhelds (Palm OS 3 or 4, which cannot run our Krikit Audio Engine). We've also remapped the screen to adjust volume based on the we we perceive loudness rather than the linear amplitude changes in Preview 1.
The free preview only saves one patch. The full application will include several additional features and support a wider variety of hardware.
The current preview requires a handheld running Palm OS 3.0 or greater. Some features require the Palm OS 5 Streaming Sound Libraries. Usually, any OS 5 handheld with a headphone jack qualifies (with the exception of a few Sony Clie models).
AxisPad produces sounds reminiscent of a Theremin as heard in such films as The Day The Earth Stood Still, The Thing (From Another World), Ed Wood, Mars Attacks!, and Forbidden Planet. But AxisPad can do so much more. The full application will let you save multiple configurations, set custom colored guides, and on some handheld models AxisPad will send control changes to MIDI hardware like samplers, synthesizers and tone modules.
The free AxisPad preview can also be found at the miniMusic website and the full version will be available in November for $19.95.
I wanted to be able to show what AxisPad was like, so I enlisted the help of my children to make a little video about it. Here's our AxisPad duet.
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