| 
  • If you are citizen of an European Union member nation, you may not use this service unless you are at least 16 years old.

  • You already know Dokkio is an AI-powered assistant to organize & manage your digital files & messages. Very soon, Dokkio will support Outlook as well as One Drive. Check it out today!

View
 

Copy of Copy of Alchemy Synth App for iPhone

Page history last edited by Lari Tanner 10 years ago

Alchemy Synth App Review

by Lari Tanner

Description

Alchemy Synth is an audio app tool made by Camel Studios.  It is a synthesizer for your iPhone and now for your iPad, and it has great sound quality. This is the mobile version of Camel Audio's award-winning Alchemy synth which can be heard on thousands of records by world-class musicians.  Here's the link to the iPhone page, you can see screen shots of the app. https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/alchemy-synth-mobile-studio/id432505977?mt=8

 

Access

There is a free download, and you can get it on iTunes or in the AppStore on your iPhone or iPad.  The actual software for computers cost around $250, so this is well worth it.  There are also free upgrades as well as additional kits/packets for a minimal cost.

 

Sample Usage

The app allows you to produce quality sound and music.  There are drums, piano, and string instruments just to name a few, here's a list from it's iTunes page:

Alchemy Synth is a powerful, expressive synthesizer

• Synths, basses, piano, strings, guitar, drum kits and more

• Incredibly high quality sound - hear it to believe it!

• Huge variety of sounds thanks to sampler, VA, granular and additive synthesis

• 4-Track Sequencer with mixer and solo/mute

• Drum Pads - create your own beats

• 8 Songs included - have fun remixing tracks

 

Tips, tricks, and tutorials

You do have to play with it to get the feel of it.  What I did find out is that you can make the keyboard bigger. You just need to pinch your fingers and move them outward to make the keyboard "grow," with that though you do have to scroll through the higher and lower registers of the keyboard.  I did find out Alchemy has instructional videos and tutorials at YouTube, here is one...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2WJzxtIiLpc

 

What the Tool Does Well

The site says it easily creates living, breathing instruments with the Remix Pad, I'm not sure if that's totally true but it's close.  I was able to do the following relatively easy and it was fun to try to create new sounds.  The sound libraries were helpful and a good jumping off point.  I actually just sat there and listened to all the libraries before starting.  It takes some practice but it is fun to create a whole song.  The one touch chords made it easy to create layers of music as well.  You can also:

• Morph between synth variations to create your own sound 

• Tilt and Inertia offer a fun physical way to control the synth

• 16 Performance Controls so you can easily tweak sounds to fit your music 

 

 

What it Does Poorly

I wish it had a tutorial section or an instruction screen on the app itself for beginners.  They have the instructions on Youtube, but it's not always easy to get to on your device, going back and forth on a iPhone from the app to Youtube. I had to wacth the YouTube tutorials, while having the phone in front of me.  It states that it is easy for beginners, but if you aren't a musician it can be difficult to navigate through or understand the jargon. There is support online, but I didn't try it.  I also wished the keyboard and other features were bigger, but with an iPhone one is going to be limited on space.

 

What happens when you...

You can hook up your phone to your computer and download songs you've created, but you will need the Alchemy software, also you can hook up the iPad version to a real electronic keyboard and save the songs to the computer and Keyboard if it has that feature.

 

Additional Resources

Here is the link that shows how to download sounds from the app to your computer and keyboard. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-cE5Xxzuq7k

I also found the actual Alchemy Mobile Manual here:http://www.camelaudio.com/AlchemyMobileManual/

There are other synthesizer apps out there namely: Animoog, Magellan, and Audiobus, There are more depending on the device and what you are wanting to focus on, most are free, and can go up on price from anywhere fro $4.99 to $15.00.

 

Comments (0)

You don't have permission to comment on this page.