I’ve been working on this app for some time now and decided it is finished enough to share ;-).
Ultomaton is a generative effects processor built to provide live electronic accompaniment for any acoustic improviser. It uses John Conway’s Game of Life to trigger events. These events are reflected in changes of Ultomaton’s effect parameters. Although the Game of Life is at the very core of this application, Ultomaton feels very much like a game of chance, which can be controlled by the performer to a great extent. As different settings have a considerable influence on the auditory result, Ultomaton provides a myriad of electronic backdrops to improvise with.
Introduction:
Quick Start:
For those with a 256 grid, I included a hidden feature: click the icon in the top right corner to play the Game of Life on your grid.
Well, that was certainly easy to set up. Already running some prerecorded audio through it. The randomness of the microloopers works great. Now I want a dozen foot pedals.
Just downloaded and fired it up: acoustic guitar >> Strymon TimeLine >> Ditto Looper >> Ultomaton.
This is beautiful!! Easy to set up and I’m already in the midst of a blooming, buzzing swarm of sound. Currently playing with stutter in the left channel, freeze in the right.
It has a built in recorder on the top left. If for some reason you didn’t want to use that, audio hijack would work well, or you could use something like soundflower to pipe the audio into your DAW.
@ithkaa just played with this for half an hour, super fun. Definitely going to explore more seriously down the road. Thank you for sharing and all your hard work!
Loaded up no problems (did get a “no disk in drive” warning, but was able to click through) — looks and sounds so good. Looking forward to spending some time with this. Thanks for sharing!!
