Hi Paul,
The quick answer to your question about how I use the Thumbjam music app without running
into menu controls with VoiceOver toggled off is that I run this on my iPad. Even at
full extension my hand can't span anywhere near a diagonal reach of the four corners
where the control menu buttons are located, although I did once manage to hit the
"Loop" button for recording loops when I was going for very high notes on my
device I'm cc'ing this post to the macvisionaries list so I can find it and link to it
again if anyboday asks a question.
However, the more detailed answer to your question about using Thumbjam on an iPhone is that you can hide the buttons for the menu options. (I just looked this up under the
options for the "Edit" menu button in the bottom left corner.) Even when the buttons are displayed, they're kept out of the way of the main playing area. The key
control buttons can be switched off from the "Sound" menu button in the top left corner. (Thumbjam defaults to Portrait mode use, even on the iPad, so the top left
corner refers to holding your device with the "Home" button at the bottom). Double tapping the "Sound" button and then double tapping the "Key
Controls" button will toggle the key controls along the left edge of the screen on or off. This is a pretty thin strip -- if I run my finger down along the left side of my
iPad screen the key control buttons are only about as wide as my finger. While I'm thinking about this, although this is all nicely labeled for VoiceOver, it would be nice if the
four menus in the corner's were each announced with "button" afterwards, and it would also be nice if these toggles could be announced as "off" or
"on" or "selected", or something like that. (Just some notes for Scott to pass on to the developer). Anyway, with the key controls toggled off, the only
buttons are in the four corners of the device, and it turns out that you can hide three of them so that the only active button is the "Edit" button in the bottom left
corner of the device. Apart from that, you get the heading announcement of the instrument at the top of the screen, and the key announcement at the bottom of the screen, but
these don't activate anything.
So, what you can do to hide all the controls is first, hide the "Key Controls" that show up by default along the left side of the device by double tapping the "Sound" button in the top left corner, then double tapping the "Key Controls" button in the
"Sound" menu to toggle these off. That gets rid of all buttons except for the menu buttons for "Sound" (top left corner), "Loop" (top right corner), "Edit" (bottom left corner") and "Prefs" (bottom right corner). Then, double tap the
"Edit" menu button in the bottom left corner, and run your finger up past the buttons for "Sample", "Controls", "Effects", and "Save Preset" to the "Hide Menus" button, and double tap this button. At this point, the only active
button is one that VoiceOver announces as "Menu" in the bottom left corner. In fact, even simply double tapping this button won't activate anything -- if you flick left from this button after double tapping you get an announcement "Double tap to show menus". Now, that's
announced for standard gestures, so to unhide the menu buttons you're going to have to put your finger on the "Menu" button in the bottom left corner and do a double split tap -- e.g, touch the "Menu" button with one finger and do a double tap on the screen with another
finger. At that point the "Menu" button will turn into an "Edit" button, the "Edit" menu options will become active (and you can dismiss the menu), and the buttons in the other three corners of the app will reappear.
In the meantime, you can toggle VoiceOver off with all the app buttons but the "Menu"
button in the bottom left corner hidden, and play your music without fear of tripping any control
buttons. Evern if you manage to touch the "Menu" button in the bottom left corner you
won't activate anything until you do your double split tap. There are probably other people (like
Joseph who suggested this app on the Macvisionaries list), who can probably tell you more about
actually making music with the app.
HTH. Cheers,
Esther
On Aug 23, 2010, at 12:05 PM, Paul Henrichsen wrote:
Hi, Esther. I'll definitely save this message.
One more question:
How do you keep from hitting a menu when voice over is off and you are
playing music?
As I mentioned in another message, I found an interesting piano app, but if
one isn'g careful, you can end up in a menu so you have to turn VO back on
to get out.
I assume you are totally blind as am I?
If this really is accessible, it could be rather fun.
Thanks.
-----Original Message-----
From: [email protected] [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf
Of Esther
Sent: Sunday, August 22, 2010 10:07 PM
To: [email protected]
Subject: Re: musical instruments
Hi Paul, Florian, and Others,
Thumbjam is an app that was suggested a few weeks ago on the macvisionaries
list (by Joseph), and I have to say that although it's not free, it's the
best of the music making apps for the iPhone that I've tried to date, and
yes, it's accessible, or at least it has been for everything I've tried,
which is probably only a small subset of the incredibly rich set of
operations, but includes, changing instruments, changing keys, moving
octaves, setting the metronome, recording repeating loops -- got into this
by accident, downloading new instrument sounds, changing scales (major,
minor, pentatonic, chromatic, mixolydian mode, major blues, minor blues,
diatonic, dorian mode, and many more), I haven't had much time to play with
this. The main controls are in each of the four corners: Sound (upper left)
where you can change instruments, change your scale, toggle on/off the key
controls, download new samples and "Create" instruments; Loop (upper right)
where you can record and mix loops, and set up the tempo for the metronome;
Edit (bottom left) where you can set up Effects and Controls (like the
amount of reverb, or vibrato, tremolo, and volume), and Prefs (bottom right)
where you get help, options, fiddle with midi controls (if you have extra
equipment), wi-fi transfers, and all sorts of other things that I haven't
tried.
Mostly, they tell you to get started by just playing around with the app,
and it's very intuitive if you toggle VoiceOver off, and then run your
finger across the screen. The instrument that comes up when you start, is
the Electric Guitar, I think, and you can get various
effects by shaking or tilting the screen while you play the notes.
The instrument is labeled at the top and the key is labeled at the bottom.
Your scale runs high notes at the top to low notes at the bottom. I think
that by default key controls are turned on (one of the Sound menu options),
which means that along the left side of the screen there will be controls
for changing the key (first option below the "Sound" button, or raising the
notes played by octaves (left middle -- VoiceOver announces the abbreviation
for Octave as "October", but double tapping the "+" button above this will
raise all notes by and octave, and double tapping the "-" button below this
will lower all notes by an octave.) You can also change how many notes fit
into the screen with the "span" control "+" for more or "-" for fewer, or
else use the "split" control above it and set to "normal" -- which seems to
be the spacing for the iPhone, or not -- which seems to put in twice as many
keys in the same space -- maybe for the iPad, but possibly just depending on
the instrument you've chosen -- since drums
and percussion instruments don't have the same division by scales.
There's also a metronome along the bottom left, but the tempo and detailed
settings of beats per bar are set up in the Loop control menus at the top
right -- about two levels down in to the menus.
I think that's enough to get you started. (I prefer classical music, so I
immediately changed instruments. They also keep adding new instruments in
the download samples.) You can also read the app description for more
details. It's really impressive on the iPad, where the output sound is
better, and you have more area to play around in.
Thumbjam ($6.99) by Sonosaurus:
http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/thumbjam/id338977566?mt=8
Here's and excerpt from the beginning of the (long) description:
<begin excerpt>
ThumbJam is a powerful musical performance experience. You get over 30
high-quality real instruments multi-sampled exclusively for this app.
Hundreds of included scales allow you to effortlessly play in any style from
rock to classical, whether you are a musical novice or a seasoned
professional.
---====---
Jordan Rudess, the world-renowned keyboardist for Dream Theater says:
"ThumbJam stands at the very top of the overcrowded music app world.
The sounds included absolutely rival those found in pro instruments and
making music on the app is a total joy. The only problem I have with this
app is that I did not make it myself! Luckily, I'm able to work with the
developer and offer a few good feature ideas as well as some choice sounds
from my personal collection!"
Two signature sounds from Jordan are featured in the application!
---======----
Even if you've only played air guitar, ThumbJam lets you sound like a pro.
Pick an instrument and jam -- with all the scales to choose from you'll
never hit a wrong note. The high quality instrument samples will make you
sound like you just skipped years of music lessons.
For the performing musician, this app is awesome for soloing on an
instrument you didn't bring along. Play in any key, any style -- go from a
string ensemble to a wailing guitar. ThumbJam was developed and tested by
musicians to feel and sound like a real instrument. You'll be surprised at
how expressive it can be, make sure to check out the videos and audio at
thumbjam.com.
ThumbJam makes use of tilt and shake to add vibrato, tremolo, note bends,
and volume swells for more realistic and expressive results. It supports up
to five simultaneous touches and up to 16 voice polyphony.
Delay and lush stereo reverb add depth to the sound. Put on your headphones
or plug in to your home stereo and prepare to be blown away.
<end excerpt>
Cheers,
Esther
On Aug 22, 2010, at 17:39, Paul Henrichsen wrote:
I wonder if thumb jam could be played by a totally blind person. It
appears from the description that you can select instruments as well
as scales.
With VO off, that might be difficult.
I tried a piano once, but I kept hitting the menu when I went to near
the top of the screen.
$6.99 is a bit steep hoping that the app is accessible.
I'd want to know for sure before laying down that much cash.
I bought moxi two only to find it really wasn't accessible. The screen
is far too busy to be played easily.
I gave it to my sighted wife who likes it.
At least I was only out $.99.
-----Original Message-----
From: [email protected] [mailto:[email protected]] On
Behalf Of Ben Mustill-Rose
Sent: Sunday, August 22, 2010 4:08 PM
To: [email protected]
Subject: Re: musical instruments
Its more or less essential that you turn vo off before you try and
play most of these instruments; not doing so results in nothing
happening as some people have experienced here.
Also, all the ones that i've tried run in landscape, although you can
just open the app with vo on to find out the orientation of the device
and then just tripple click home to quit it.
On 23/08/2010, Paul Henrichsen <[email protected]> wrote:
Is it accessible?
-----Original Message-----
From: viph...@googlegroupscom [mailto:[email protected]] On
Behalf Of Chris Moore
Sent: Sunday, August 22, 2010 3:03 AM
To: [email protected]
Subject: Re: musical instruments
Thumb Jam is very good, but its not free.
On 22 Aug 2010, at 10:54, Florian-achtige wrote:
Hello list,
I've been zipping around the store trying out stuff, here are my
findings.
I've found an app called Touch Xyllophone which is pretty much
accessible. The phone goes into landscape mode and the keys are
along the edge so they can be found easily. If you, like me, hold
the phone upside down you're going to click an ad so maybe its smart
to first locate the leftmost button with vo enabled before turning
it off.
Another app i tried was Uflute lite, but i didn't have much success
with that one. I think it could be accessible if i knew how the
screen looked because i only played about 3 different notes and hit
the settings and calibrate buttons a few times in the process ...
Do you guys know any other, preferably free, accessible instruments>
Thanks,
Florian
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