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Show HN: Tape It – iOS recording app for musicians

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Re: Show HN: Tape It – iOS recording app for musicians

#51

Post by 52-6F-62 »

earthnail wrote: post #42
subhro wrote: post #39

I am probably one of the few that use my iPhone more or less like a dumb phone, so pardon my ignorance. Is the iPhone mic able to pick the entire audible spectrum (and then some)? Does this mean companies like Neumann, Shure, Rode should feel someone is coming for their lunch?

Yes, they should. And they are already very worried about it. Only know that with certainty about Shure but I'd be surprised if the other companies weren't thinking in the same direction. My assumption is that we'll see the same development in the audio recording space as we saw it in the camera space. It's not 1:1 exactly the same - microphones have always been a lot more in the (semi-) professional area than camera…

Anything can happen.

Guitar pedal and amp modelling of some real quality and portability hit the market over a decade ago, but in that time the boutique analogue market for effects and amplifiers has exploded.

It'll be hard to model the variations possible in microphone configuration. There are some techniques that will just plain require multiple dedicated microphones—no matter the environment.

But other solutions like Zoom handhelds will definitely diminish in number. I used to rent something like that to direct from the soundboard so a former band could record our live sets. Now all you need is a line-in to your phone.

Same with just being able to jot down ideas—I'm totally excited to have recordings to my phone not end up compressed garbled messes—even possibly usable? Yes please!

That said, if everyone is done with their Neumann's, you can kindly deposit them with me for free!

Re: Show HN: Tape It – iOS recording app for musicians

#52

Post by n_sonic »

JanNash wrote: post #41
n_sonic wrote: post #36

Hello! So I was very excited to hear that this app made stereo recordings. I make field recordings to use in my own compositions, so the idea of an app that does this was intriguing (and there seem to be none currently on the app store, unless I'm missing them?) I'm not sure if I'm doing something wrong, but it's not recording in stereo? I verified by opening the file in Audacity (sent via AirDrop). I tried holding m…

High quality stereo recording is only available in our premium subscription (20$/year). The subscription comes with a one month free trial, which should give you some time to try it and see if you like it :)

So, I don't mind trials and subscriptions. And I will give this another go, however..

When I went to make my initial recording, the app asked me if I wanted to "try [Stereo HD]". I did this thinking that I could verify that stereo worked.

If you're not going to let me try it without committing, you may want to rethink the onboarding flow a bit?

But still, personally I'd consider giving users a proper taste of the power of the app, without commitment. Allowing them to try stereo for just the first recording would be a great introduction to the app. You could even time limit it to 10 seconds or something.

If you imply that the app is recording in "stereo" / "HD", but then exporting the audio results in a mono audio file, just makes me think it doesn't work. (The app even adds a [HD] label under the recording, which makes it even more confusing when you export it and it's mono.)

Apart from the above (hopefully constructive criticism) I'm looking forward to seeing this develop :)

Re: Show HN: Tape It – iOS recording app for musicians

#53

Post by jorgesborges »

JanNash wrote: post #41
n_sonic wrote: post #36

Hello! So I was very excited to hear that this app made stereo recordings. I make field recordings to use in my own compositions, so the idea of an app that does this was intriguing (and there seem to be none currently on the app store, unless I'm missing them?) I'm not sure if I'm doing something wrong, but it's not recording in stereo? I verified by opening the file in Audacity (sent via AirDrop). I tried holding m…

High quality stereo recording is only available in our premium subscription (20$/year). The subscription comes with a one month free trial, which should give you some time to try it and see if you like it :)

I assumed the parent was using the “try stereo” option. Does that button not record in stereo?

Re: Show HN: Tape It – iOS recording app for musicians

#54

Post by jamilbk »

Nice work! Congrats on hitting the app store. I’m excited to use this for our next hours-long jam session.

How does the instrument detection work? Does it do anything else besides change the icon for a tape?

It would be so cool to just show up at a jam session, hit record on my iphone, and get all that multitrack goodness without having to mic everything separately. But I realize that’s asking a lot from the AI gods :-).

Re: Show HN: Tape It – iOS recording app for musicians

#55

Post by 52-6F-62 »

This is cool. I use Voice Memos regularly to jot down ideas and it has its limitations, so work in this space is really welcome!

I don't have anything to contribute on the marketing front, so all I can say add is just keep it up! I really enjoy seeing useful cross-sections of music and software.

edit: Just downloaded it and gave it a try. Even on my iPhone 8 it's nice and snappy. Love the markers and the ability to set them _while_ recording. Great work! If I ever get around to upgrading my phone I'll definitely consider the stereo HD!

Re: Show HN: Tape It – iOS recording app for musicians

#56

Post by n_sonic »

jorgesborges wrote: post #53
JanNash wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

High quality stereo recording is only available in our premium subscription (20$/year). The subscription comes with a one month free trial, which should give you some time to try it and see if you like it :)

I assumed the parent was using the “try stereo” option. Does that button not record in stereo?

It didn't for me. The app does seem to imply that it will / did record in stereo. But, it didn't.

Re: Show HN: Tape It – iOS recording app for musicians

#57

Post by JanNash »

JanNash wrote: post #41
n_sonic wrote: post #36

Hello! So I was very excited to hear that this app made stereo recordings. I make field recordings to use in my own compositions, so the idea of an app that does this was intriguing (and there seem to be none currently on the app store, unless I'm missing them?) I'm not sure if I'm doing something wrong, but it's not recording in stereo? I verified by opening the file in Audacity (sent via AirDrop). I tried holding m…

High quality stereo recording is only available in our premium subscription (20$/year). The subscription comes with a one month free trial, which should give you some time to try it and see if you like it :)

Oh, sorry, my bad. Currently, you can do one recording in high quality stereo without having to subscribe or commit to anything. To do that, tap the "Try Stereo HD" button. It should then say "Trying Stereo HD" and the resulting recording should be in stereo.

Sorry for the misunderstanding, I hope I could clarify :)

Re: Show HN: Tape It – iOS recording app for musicians

#58

Post by lostgame »

subhro wrote: post #39

I am probably one of the few that use my iPhone more or less like a dumb phone, so pardon my ignorance. Is the iPhone mic able to pick the entire audible spectrum (and then some)? Does this mean companies like Neumann, Shure, Rode should feel someone is coming for their lunch?

I think a few people here are forgetting, importantly - that iOS supports external audio interfaces via the Lightning cable.

Anyone looking for solid semi-pro audio quality from their iPhone/iPad can spend around $100 and get a quite nice audio capture card with traditional XLR / 1/4" cable support; allowing them to directly plug a guitar, amp; or microphone into the device.

I have had a lot of success with this method - I wouldn't really suggest recording with the internal microphones on the iPhone if you are looking for any sort of notable quality.

I'm not sure how you could even effectively sing into it with a sense of actual response from the mic like I get with even a basic Shure SM58.

Not really a comparable tool. More for whole room recording, maybe; but even then you'll of course be missing a lot of the bass frequencies and get a bunch of garbage you don't want.

Re: Show HN: Tape It – iOS recording app for musicians

#59

Post by earthnail »

jamilbk wrote: post #54

Nice work! Congrats on hitting the app store. I’m excited to use this for our next hours-long jam session. How does the instrument detection work? Does it do anything else besides change the icon for a tape? It would be so cool to just show up at a jam session, hit record on my iphone, and get all that multitrack goodness without having to mic everything separately. But I realize that’s asking a lot from the AI gods…

Yep, you're asking a lot of the AI gods, but then again if you don't have big dreams, how is big change ever going to happen? :D

Yes, right now it only changes the icon for a tape, even though we actually track and save it at a per-second level. Obviously there is quite a bit room for more use of this in the future, but the icon is a start :-). Also notice, by the way, that the waveform is black for music and grey for speech - particularly handy in a jam session. You can see exactly when a take started and when it ended.

So called "blind source separation" (i.e. get multitracks from just one mic) is possible today, but with fairly audible artifacts. The most popular library in use today is Spleeter [1], which is based on Andreas Jansson et al.'s work at Spotify [2]. There are newer algorithms in academia, a good overview is provided at [3]. If you want to do something today, iZotope's RX is very good, and a great example that demonstrates how good old DSP engineering can dramatically reduce the unwanted artifacts even in new ML-based approaches.

Then again, my real question would be: why would you want a multitrack recording from your jam session? Is it to be able to further adjust the mix afterwards? Do you need the individual instrument tracks for practicing? Would be really interested in hearing your use case :-).

[1] https://github.com/deezer/spleeter

[2] https://scholar.google.com/citations?view_op=view_citation&h...

[3] https://sigsep.github.io

Re: Show HN: Tape It – iOS recording app for musicians

#60

Post by n_sonic »

JanNash wrote: post #57
JanNash wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

High quality stereo recording is only available in our premium subscription (20$/year). The subscription comes with a one month free trial, which should give you some time to try it and see if you like it :)

Oh, sorry, my bad. Currently, you can do one recording in high quality stereo without having to subscribe or commit to anything. To do that, tap the "Try Stereo HD" button. It should then say "Trying Stereo HD" and the resulting recording should be in stereo. Sorry for the misunderstanding, I hope I could clarify :)

Hi. Sorry, I missed this reply. That's exactly what I did do actually. So, maybe I've done something wrong? I'll double check Audacity again.
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