Michael Butler and Sam Levin visit the guys who make Looptastic for the iPhone

About Looptastic:

Mobile Mashups Made Easy Looptastic is the performance remix tool for the iPhone and iPod Touch. Tear apart tracks with your fingertips. Crossfade and filter. Play live through headphones or speakers. It’s a party in your pocket.

Looptastic Producer was featured in the What's Hot section of the App Store.

"Looptastic Producer offers l33t music producers the most bang for their buck." wired.com

"You'll be mixing like a pro." Fox News "A cool and intuitive remixing environment" Electronic Musicia

"What an amazing app. The tempo / stretch control is completely seamless. This app has gone from strength to strength and I hope it keeps on going." Palm Sound

"Its so easy to perform different mixes in real time that saying it is smooth is a total understatement. A real winner! Good work guys!!" KeyWiz

"Deep [yet] easy to use." AppCraver.com

• Import your own loops in AIFF, WAV, or OGG format using an intuitive web interface. Importing requires a Wi-Fi connection to a PC, Mac, or Linux machine.
• Automatic beat synchronization makes loops of different tempos play in sync
• Manipulate the sound with any of 9 effects, including fliters, delay, repeater, bit crusher, and flanger.
• Apply effects to part or all of the mix
• Load up to four minutes of CD-quality loops per set.
• Comes with 260 loops packaged as 26 remixable tracks. This includes the complete set of Electro and Progressive loops. *** Requires that you download the Electro and Progressive sets from the Loop Store at no charge.
• Multitouch volume control with three zones and crossfader
• Record your mix for future playback on the device
• Export your mix to Mac or PC via Wi-Fi
• Tempo control using timeshifting algortihms. The pitch stays the same--only the BPM changes.
• Play up to 20 loops at the same time and mix and match between built in loops and your own loops.
• One Shot mode plays samples without time-stretching -- ideal for sound bites
• Manually trigger loops using a waveform display Tips & Tricks Looptastic is easy to use, but surprisingly deep. Here are some insider tips for creating more exciting performances.

Quick Mix
You don’t need to wait for all the sounds to load before starting to mix. As soon as a loop icon lights up, you can drag it to the playing field and begin your performance. You can even drag unloaded sounds there; they’ll start to play as soon as they’ve loaded. (This technique works best with percussive loops.)

You don’t have to wait for loops to load before starting your performance.

Hello, I’ll Be Your Fader

Play the Extremes
The Looptastic crossfader is a lot more expressive than you’d think. Tap the extreme right and left edges of the fader on the beat to create DJ-style transform effects. (Try tapping the filter screen on offbeats, too.)

Cue & Evolve
Move the fader all the way to one side, cue up some loops in the silent zone, and then snap the fader over to the silent side on the next downbeat. That will transition to a new section in your song. Repeat this left-right, cue-and-snap movement to keep the mix evolving.
Instant Breakdown
Put all the loops except a vocal into one side zone, and then quickly crossfade to the other side to solo the vocal. (Keeping a subtle hi-hat pulse going in the center zone — which always plays — helps propel the mix along.) Now drag loops horizontally from the silent zone into the center zone, one by one, to start building up your track again.

Right now, only the vocal (right zone) and hi-hat (center zone) are playing. Dragging loops horizontally from the silent zone (left) adds them back to the mix, creating a build.
No-Stress Recording
Unlike most music apps, in which you click Record and then pray you perform something good, Looptastic is always listening. In Looptastic, you hit Record after you’ve played something great, knowing Looptastic has already captured it. This retro-recording design eliminates the “red light jitters” so many performers get.

Producer’s Cut
With the flagship Looptastic Producer app, you can really personalize your mix by importing your own sounds over Wi-Fi. (We call it Mashup to Go.) Looptastic automatically time-stretches your loops so they play in sync, but there’s also a hidden sound-bite feature: Before import, change the mode to One Shot on your computer. That disables the time-stretching so your sound bite plays normally. By setting the loop length, you can control how often it repeats.

Set sound bites to One Shot mode and Looptastic Producer will play them at the original speed. Control how often the phrase repeats by picking a bar length.

Export Control
One of our biggest customer requests was for a way to export recordings as high-res audio files. That’s now possible in all versions of Looptastic. (Except the free one, although even it captures your performance moves, so you can still record the iPhone’s analog output.) You can burn exported files directly to CD.

Got a hot tip? Send it in! We’ll feature the best ones here, along with a link to your site or YouTube demo.

Support How do I restore Loop Sets I purchased on another device or on the same device?

If you previously bought Loop Sets inside Looptastic Producer, you can download them again at no charge. Simply go through the steps of purchasing the loop set(s) again. You will not be charged a second time. You will also receive a confirmation message that you have previously purchased the item.

I’m having trouble uploading; what should I do?

It is important that your device have a valid Wi-Fi connection and be on the same Wi-Fi Network as your computer.

If your device is saying it is unable to establish a connection, try restarting it using the following steps:

1. Hold the power button at the top for 5 seconds
2. Swipe the "slide to power off" slider.
3. Wait for the device to power down.
4. Press the power button again.

You may want to try setting up an ad hoc Wi-Fi network between your computer and your device. On the Mac, the steps are as follows:

1. Click on the Wi-Fi icon on the menu.
2. Choose Create Network. Choose a name for your network and click OK.
3. On your device, open the settings. Choose the network you created in step 2.
4. Open Looptastic and press the Import/Export button.
5. On your computer open a browser with the address shown on the device screen (for example, http://169.254.237.89:8080). At this point you should see the Looptastic web page.

I don’t hear the sound. What’s wrong?

1. If you are running iPhone or iPod OS 3.0, make sure you update to the latest version of Looptastic. We have fixed the incompatibility in version 2.1.0 of Looptastic.
2. Make sure your iPhone is not in silent (vibrate only) mode.
3. Make sure the volume is turned up.
4. Make sure that you have moved the loops (colored squares) to the top of the screen so that they play at full volume.

I’m having trouble with audio breakups or the application closes by itself. How do I fix this?

Try restarting your iPhone or iPod Touch to free up memory:

1. Hold down the power button.
2. Swipe the slide to power off.
3. Wait for the unit to power down and then press the power button again.

What is the best way to create loops for Producer?

There are several good ways to create loops. Both Ableton Live and Sony Acid allow you to export tracks individually. This is very helpful for creating separate parts at the same length and tempo.

You can also use Apple GarageBand to prepare loops for Looptastic. The key is set up a 4- or 8-bar section and use the looped playback feature to set a range. Then, solo one track and export your mix to a AIFF file. Repeat for each track in your arrangement.

Here are some freeware loop editors that may help:

Mac:
Loop Editor
Audacity

PC:
Wavosaur (Tutorial)
Audacity

The tempo is off; what do I do?

For best results, use loops that have a similar or identical tempo. Also, use loops that are 1, 2, 4, 8, 16, or 32 bars in length. Looptastic Producer will do its best to line everything up automatically. If all else fails, make each track the same length.

Where can I get some loops?

Here are three demo sets developed by Adam Smith Kipnis that you can download and use with Looptastic Producer.

Operator
Kickit
Electric

Still having problems? Email us: support@soundtrends.com

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