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Comments
Right, so we all play guitarism the same way. No one uses reach around style eh? I sure don't.
@mmp The icon not appearing is actually due to the way apps cache icons I think. Unistalling and reinstalling the other apps should fix it, but is also a major PITA.
@Bootsy Nope, not right now.
@Ganthofer I like the idea of MIDI control for parameters.
@Fitz Oh me too.. I have mentioned it many times. :-P iPhone/iPad continuity probs again.
@syrupcore What? You wouldn't have any use to turn effects on and off on the fly?
I'm almost strictly an on the desktop player.
There is a bunch of wasted space on iPad where more chord boxes should be.
LoL I give up
I play with the iPad parallel to my body and facing away from me, which is what I suspect Ryan means by reach around style. I like to strum vertically, how I do on a guitar. Laid flat just doesn't feel right.
Reach around style is what Rhism did in his "Desire" video :-)
I play with with the iPad strapped to my back, I then reach between my legs and up to the surface of the iPad....super comfortable!
@ryan oh, I'd use them. I just mean that they are ancillary to the main function of guitarism - strumming guitar. So it's reasonable (to me anyway) to not have that feature in the main UI on the smaller screen.
Strumming speed, as it is currently, is limited to mid-tempo songs, due in part (I suspect) to the space between strings. It would be nice to be able to achieve good sounding faster strums for higher tempo songs and for funk rhythms.
Also, I know that this has been addressed before, but as things are, it is not sufficient--the muted string sounds are too low for certain rhythm styles that are popular. With the electric guitars, it is hard to hear the mute string sound at all when amped. Maybe a good solution would be to make a soft/medium/loud setting or a volume control for the muted strings sound. The loud setting volume of the muted strings sound needs to be on par with the actual sound of the strings when they are strummed fast.
Also, while we are talking about volume controls, the chord change sounds are too low when amped as well, and really would benefit from the same treatment as the muted string sounds. These little things are what add to the realism of a performance.
Also, the "Guitars and Effects" option needs to be moved to a separate button to the left of the "4P" button on the options slider. It makes more sense for an IAP that contains so much to be easier and faster to access. There is space for it on the bar too.
A whammy bar was mentioned by others, and I think that would be really useful, although I'm not sure at this time what method for incorporating it would be best.
I had another one that I wanted to mention, but it skipped my mind.....I hate that! It happens more and more all the time!
Oh, I just remembered! There needs to be an indicator to show which guitar sample set is currently selected. Maybe a bold red box can outline which of the four guitar sample sets is currently selected...
Overall, my suggestions are more refinements of existing features than new features... Except for the whammy bar suggestion. :-) As always, I love this app, and only wish to see it get better! :-)
Hey all - thanks again for the awesome response to the 'call to smackdown'! A ton of great comments here and I'm still processing all of it. It seems like most of these fall into a few categories:
1) More playing techniques: acoustic body hits, palm muting, harmonics, slides, whammy bar, shake-for-tremolo, note bends, wah pedal, auto-arpeggiator etc
2) Make some 'settings' live-configurable: effects stomp boxes, chords transpose button, key/capo change, 4p toggles, preset switching, midi bindings for all of these
3) "More chord boxes" and related layout changes: showing multiple inversions / secondary chords all directly on the main screen, locating secondary chords triggers below the primary chord boxes, adding chord modifier buttons like "7ths" and "9ths"
There was also a request for a nylon-string guitar (I want that too), an option to make smart strings locked in wide mode (I have some plans for this) and a set of comments from @audiojunkie which defy categorization and I'd have to address them in their own separate category named after him
Lastly there was some discussion around iPhone-iPad cross-compatibility, and how people hold their iPads when playing guitarism.
I'm assuming smart plucking falls under auto-arpeggiator?
I want to address those last points first:
iPhone-iPad cross-compatibility: it's true that I try hard to maintain this, but you're right that it'd be a shame to hold back the iPad version because of lowest-common denominator. So yeah I'll try to figure something out for iPad-only support for features if the don't fit on iPhone. But in general I'd first try to figure out a way to get them working on both
iPad 'on the table' vs 'reacharound': to be clear, so far nothing wrt layout / functionality has been intentionally gimped to support the 'reacharound' mode. In particular, the secondary chords triggers are not really usable for most 'reacharound' folks and are mainly designed (and laid out) for 'on the table' usage
So I'm interested to know why some of you feel that putting the secondary chords triggers below the main chord buttons (instead of to the side) would be a better layout. How would you anticipate placing your left hand / fingers on the device to use it in this way?
@PaulB Yep your smart plucking point is what I was calling auto-arp
Also just wanted to address @audiojunkie's points before I forget them since they're not listed above:
"would be nice to be able to achieve good sounding faster strums": can you give an example of what you want it to sound like and also a guitarism recording of how it sounds today? The "now" vs "goal" audio examples are critical towards addressing this kind of issue - I definitely want it to sound good at all speeds!
Muted sounds and chord change sounds are too soft when amped: good catch - the electric samples for those sounds defintely need to be boosted. Added to my todo list
generally muted sounds need to be much louder and equal to the main sounds for fast strumming: I will look into this again too, I agree this is an important technique to support
guitars & effects should be a separate button like 4P, not a menu item: does it make that much difference? the 4P button is only visible when the menus are up, so they both show up at the same time. The only real difference is that 4P is visible when you're inside the inner menus (key/chords/capo/techniques/skins) but guitars & effects is not. the biggest issue with putting it as a button is that it'd need a much shorter name or an obvious image, and I can't think of a good short name or image that'd be non-confusing...
there needs to be an indicator wrt which guitar is currently being used: in the guitars & effects screen, the active guitar's name should show up in yellow whereas the others are in white. I guess that's not showing up very clearly? or did you mean something else...?
@Rhism Placing the the secondary chords triggers below the main chords, would feel more natural, as opposed to stretching your fingers to trigger, as is. Under the main chords to the right, I would use my thumb to do that, with my hand already in place, on one side. Also if you added other chord qualities, they could be on left side and triggered with pinky, while simultaneously tapping chord with other finger, then automatically released when lifting off chord.
There's so much free real estate on the iPad version that it seems strange not to pack the left hand side with more chords. I appreciate the desire to make the iPhone version as similar as possible, but this space is being wasted at the moment and it would be much more convenient if used than the current way to access secondary chords IMO.
@Rhism Thanks for listening!
If at all possible, I would love to see an option to stack the main chords in a column along the left-hand side, with secondaries alongside that. Maybe a bit like playing an accordeon but it would certainly be more convenient for tabletop playing.
I'm not familiar with the iPhone UI (my cellphone is just that, a phone) but If one can hit six (Smart-)strings individually on the iPhone, it should be possible to have six chordboxes along the left edge of the phone too?
Hey @Rhism, In response to your response on my comments.... ;-)
Categorize them under suggested refinements of existing features! Haha! :-)
Regarding faster strums... I will get some good examples to show, and post them. I was thinking maybe a way around it would be to refine the distance between strings (or make them adjustable), so that there is less distance between each string on the iPad, so that there is less distance for the finger to travel with each strum....just an idea...I'll find and post videos.....
Regarding muted strum and chord change sounds being increased.... Thanks! It will really help the style of music I do! :-)
Regarding a separate button like 4P for Guitar and Effects... No, this one is not very important. I was simply looking for ways to refine the current UI to make it more efficient and friendly. This one isn't necessary. :-)
Regarding the indicator of which sample set is being used...I honestly didn't notice the guitar name highlighted in yellow. I'll have to check that and see if I've missed it... :-) Maybe making it a more obvious color would be more helpful? Red or Green maybe?
If you want more details, let me know. I'll be happy to PM you offline if you want. :-) I'll get some examples for you of the fast riffing that I was referring to... Thanks!!!
The 6 chord limitation is all about making it playable "eyes-free" (for live performance scenarios), not about iPhone compatibility or screen space utilization. Even if it were iPad-only I'd probably still have limited it to 6. I basically made guitarism because I wanted something like GuitarStudio / iShred but with fewer chord buttons so I could play accurately without staring at the screen. It's always just been about that eyes-free playability.
There are many ways to have more than 6 buttons, and it kinda depends on the scenario. So I guess... talk to me about what you're usually doing (or wanting to do) when you're using guitarism and wanting more than 6 chords. Are you trying to play a song? Write a song? Something else?
@mgmg4871 Can you share a photo of how you position your chord hand on the iPad when playing guitarism? Here's how mine goes, so it'd be pretty uncomfortable for my thumb to try to reach secondary chord triggers if they were underneath the main chords. Same with the pinky trying to reach under the left side - very uncomfortable. Would be interesting to see how you place it.
Also @syrupcore wrt your comment about not holding the ipad like a guitar, I'd be interested to know specific things you'd want to see in the app to support the 'on the table' position
@Audiojunkie Yep I guess that's the right category
I look forward to the faster strumming examples...
Here you go @Rhism This feels comfortable for me. It's just a matter of bending the thumb and pinky joints.
@mgmg4871 Thanks so much for the pic! It's surprising to hear that you find that comfortable - your fingers and thumb are very close together which I expect would create constant pressure and tension in your hand / wrist muscles and joints. Can you elaborate on why you find this more comfortable than letting your fingers open up a bit more, letting your thumb stick out to the right as it naturally would and thus rest on the current location of the secondary chord triggers?
Sure @Rhism It's very hard to show, that basically the thumb would just be bending at the joint to touch the lower chord box, and it is very slight movement. There is absolutely no tension. The pinky is just bends downward at the joint. Again no tension. What the pic doesn't probably show, is the hand is semi cupped, so I'm not going from a stretched position to a bending position. Imagine holding a ball. Hope that helps.
@mgmg4871 "Imagine holding a ball" this explains it well, though I'm trying it and definitely getting wrist tension in that position, which goes away if I open my hand up. Have you tried opening your hand up more and letting your thumb access the bottom half of the secondary chord triggers? Curious to know if/why that doesn't work for you.
Also, to go back to the other requests:
1) More playing techniques: acoustic body hits, palm muting, harmonics, slides, whammy bar, shake-for-tremolo, note bends, wah pedal, auto-arpeggiator etc
I've been wanting to do many of these for a while now so it's great to hear this validation. Which of these are more vs less interesting for you guys?
Specifically wrt acoustic body hits, do you guys see yourself using this frequently? The big issue here is that to do this the "right" way the app needs to be able to handle a variety of hit types (i.e. hit with your palm, fingers, nails etc). Since this is impossible to detect on the glass screen, it ends up becoming "hit at different spots on the wood" which is a lame approximation of the goal. I don't know of any apps that even take it that far - they mostly just have one spot where you hit and you get a random thud sound and that's it, which doesn't seem useful enough to be more than a novelty feature. Thoughts?
Also, when you guys talk about "slide" are you referring to a "fretted slide" i.e. play a note and then slide your fretting finger to another fret, or "slide guitar" style fretless slides?
@PaulB For the smart plucking thing you mentioned, any examples of apps that do this? Is it basically an arpeggiator function you're looking for, perhaps with some built-in smarts around how to arpeggiate depending on the strings held?
@Rhism Here's one with hands backed off screen a bit so you can see thumb position. This is last one, I promise. Lol
"talk to me about what you're usually doing (or wanting to do) when you're using guitarism and wanting more than 6 chords. Are you trying to play a song? Write a song? Something else?"
1) Play a song that has more than 6 chords. I generally write Verse/Chorus/Bridge type of songs that nearly always have more than 6 chords. The secondary pages are great but they require constant touch to remain on that page unless I am missing a settings somewhere.
2) Compose. A real guitar has of course has many different possibilities that make coming up with new chord progressions rather immediate. Having 12-15 chords on the primary page as well as the secondary pages would get the app closer in that area.
I normally play the app on my lap strumming with my right thumb or finger and change chords with my left thumb. If I need to go to a secondary page then I will use the left thumb for the triggers and use a finger to change chords.
@Rhism said:
I should first explain how I use Guitarism because a) personas are handy, b) I don't think that my way is the right way - it's just the way that would work for me, c) if I say what I'm trying to accomplish better implementation ideas than mine will likely surface.
I play the guitar. I mostly play to create my own music. I use Guitarism to write songs. When I choose Guitarism over my guitar it generally has to do with convenience or my environment. Either I'm lazy or it's late at night (volume) or I'm on the bus or I don't have mics set up or... Anyway, I open it and I noodle about a bit with chords and strumming (and now sounds).
Often, I get something going that I like, then reach for the next chord in my head and it's not on the screen! In order to get it there, I have to brain about a lot. My memory is shit so by the time I get to braining about the original riff or the next chord is gone.
That was a lot of intro for this: The 6 chords and their alts up top on the screen make a lot of sense if you are a) holding the device like a guitar, b) on the iphone or c) playing other people's tunes and have a chance to set up your chords and their alternates in advance. I want to see that whole chord area blow up so that when I'm writing songs with Guitarism, I can always (or usually?) get to the chord I hear in my head.
I don't have a solid suggestion for how to use that space to better achieve that goal, but that's my goal.
My inclination would be to implement something like Chordion. Chordion has a couple of things to consider, I think. First is the layout of the chords - that shape is very natural to play (look at the arc of the fingertips in Morris' fetching hand model photo). Second, because it's presumed to be flat on the table and not held while blasting through Jane Says on the street corner, the chord areas are smaller - indeed, they can even be split in half. This isn't at all difficult to play. Third (and I would love to see this even if the UI doesn't change to have more chords) is that it sets the chords up based on a scale and root key (triggered by your right hand). The right hand triggering is out for Guitarism but selecting "C" and asking Guitarism to generate a grid of chords would be wonderful.
I didn't mean to stir trouble with my original question about holding vs tabletop and certainly didn't mean to be rude in asking it. I appreciate all your work Adil and very much appreciate the fruits of it. You had mentioned earlier in this epic thread that maintaining 'reach around' (can't believe you didn't get a single comment on that!) was very important to you and Guitarism. I reckon that's evidenced by the chord positions at the top (bottom?) and the consideration you put into the placement for the Alt chord switches on the iPad version. Like I said, I don't play Guitarism this way but I think that's a pretty awesome goal. But, and I suppose this is why I asked in the first place, if a lot of people are playing it flat on the desktop/lap, maybe there is room to consider a 'desktop' mode toggle, freeing you of those constraints.
Cheers,
Will
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