Albaltat

Abaltat has announced that it has added four new virtual bands to its Abaltat Band collection, adding options for minimal musi styles, reggae and percussion

A plug-in for its video-driven soundtrack composer, Abaltat Muse, Abaltat Band allows the user to specify and combine the genre, instrumentation, and performance style of music composed by the Abaltat Muse software. The new bands will be previewed at IBC2007 in Amsterdam and are expected to be available in early Q4 2007.”Abaltat Band is designed to extend control and creative range for users of Abaltat Muse, and we developed each of our new virtual band plug-ins to provide a particular style and sound that complements video and film production,” said Siun Ni Raghallaigh, managing director at Abaltat. “Soundtrack composition should definitely be about more than canned music or music loops, and the combination of Abaltat Muse and Abaltat Band offers video editors a selection of richly textured composition styles that complement and enhance their work.” Read more…

NAB: Abaltat announced that Abaltat Beat, a new software solution that works as both a beat calculator and a stand-alone rhythm machine, is now available for download.

Abaltat Beat reads and analyzes a cut picture’s edit decision list (EDL) using comparative analysis of beats-per-minute (BPM) and the edited rate of the picture to suggest a series of best-possible fits. This BPM can be played back in sync with the picture using a series of drum patterns included in Abaltat Beat. The time signature and tempo of the drum patterns can be adjusted (from 3/4 to 4/4, for example) to allow for a complete recalculation of the drum track to evaluate suitability of the music style to the edited video.

Abaltat Beat can export these results to a midi file, so the project can easily be sent to a musician for further composition work. It can also be sent as a QuickTime file with the audio in sync to the picture. Because the time is expressed in BPM, Abaltat Beat makes it possible to search music libraries for pieces using the desired BPM.

All BPM selections work with Abaltat Muse, a video-driven soundtrack composer.

Abaltat Muse represents a departure from traditional post-production tools, exploiting artificial intelligence to measure select elements of a moving picture and then composing music to match those elements. Designed specifically for video editors, Abaltat Muse uses a combination of picture window, timeline, and keyframes to compose music, leveraging a video editor’s skills — not a musician’s — to create music.

“The highly imaginative technology behind Abaltat Muse allows video editors to actually create original compositions tailored to their specific picture sequences,” said Siun Ni Raghallaigh, managing director at Abaltat. “The software actually writes the music to the picture and provides the editor with tools for refining or updating tracks at any point. The resulting music has the aural quality of a recorded band and can be altered in real time to achieve just the right sound.” Read more…