AudioTheory Guitars News

AudioTheory Guitars version 1.9.0 introduces a new view mode for the main interface. This replaces the chords with a set of note options to fully configure the guitar tuning and then uses the extra space to display a larger fretboard diagram.



The new view mode is swapped to using a new double-arrow button found on the right hand side on the screen. Pressing this closes down the chord box, filling this space with a wider fretboard and a row of note options to customise the tuning of each guitar string.

There's also a few bug fixes and technical improvements since last time. This includes support for additional aspect ratios (5:4, 4:3 etc.) although admittedly I put this out in a patch as soon as it was ready so it's actually been part of AudioTheory Guitars for a few weeks now. Plus the capo setting is now only managed by directly pressing the note numbers underneath the fretboard (the plus minus icon that did the same thing in the settings cog has been removed).



That's all for today. Thanks for reading and keep practicing.

Fraser

AudioTheory Guitars version 1.8.0 introduces shifted guitar tunings. This means the fretboard and chord diagrams can now display relative to any systematic increases or decrease of standard E tuning, with an option to lower (or 'drop') the 6th string as required.



There's a couple more changes also making their way into this update, but let's talk a little bit more about tuning first. It's long been my goal to support full tuning customisation in AudioTheory Guitars, and following on from the previous Drop D update this is now step two.

Shifted tunings means support for any tuning where all the strings are tuned by the the same interval relative to E tuning (EADGBE). Combined with the option to lower the 6th string (as in Drop D, Drop C tuning etc...) this means a total of 24 tuning options.

In terms of using these new tunings, they can be found in the 'guitars' tab in the settings. As for chords, open chords are still selected by relative chord shape (not sound) from the mini pop-up. I'm looking at options to choose by both in a future update.



So what else is new?

Well, there's a new and improved method for setting a capo. Now you can click on the desired number on the fretboard and... ta-da! When a capo is applied there is a new capo icon that appears below the open strings that can be used to remove it. At least for now the existing plus/ minus selector still exists (although relegated to the settings cog) however I'm thinking about removing it in the future.

I'm also pleased to report that numerous code optimisations go live with this latest update, in part to support the new tuning settings and in part to improve general performance of the application. I pleased to inform you that AudioTheory Guitars is running better than ever.

Thanks for reading and keep practicing.

Fraser

Today’s update includes a few miscellaneous bug fixes and two brand new features – exact chord playback and play buttons on the full screen scale selector to preview how each scale sounds.



Exact Chord Playback

Version 1.5.0 introduced octave fretboard playback; note highlighting at the specific octave on the fretboard. This has been extended to cover chords, and renamed in the settings simply to 'playback' to reflect the change. The two options for this are as follows:

Global

All instances of a pressed note are highlighted across the diagrams

Exact

The specific instance of a note is highlighted across the diagrams. For the keyboard/ fretboard this will be the note at the selected octave. For chords, this is the note at the point it is played within the chord. This is great for understanding exactly how a chord is to be played, as you can use the 'play' button net to each chord to see an exact visual representation of it highlighted on the fretboard.



Scale Playback

There is now a play button next to each scale preview on the fullscreen scale selector. Press this and the set of scale notes will play through in order, providing an audio preview for how the scale sounds.



Thanks for reading and keep practicing!

Fraser

Our latest update introduces the option to save and load presets, allowing you to store and quickly swap between different layouts.

A saved preset contains all information about the current layout (chords, scale, settings etc.) in a .txt file. These can be shared/ swapped between users and loaded back into the application.

Two new buttons have been added to the configuration – Save and Load. Everything else is handled using your operating system's inbuilt file manager, which you can use to select your own location for saving and loading files.

Presets are stored as human-readable text. You can modify a saved preset using a text editor if you so desire, although do bear in mind that when loading these the line numbers are referenced to map the fields. This means that if you modify these then the file probably won't load correctly! For any line with a disallowed value, a default value is instead loaded into the application.

One final thing is the left handed setting – this is the one setting not stored within the text preset. The idea here is that left and right handed users can share presets and not overtire their existing application setting when loading one of these.

And that concludes today's update. Thanks for listening and keep practicing.

Fraser

Today's update includes two new features for the price of one. Well, technically two for the price of zero ːsteamhappyː. With AudioTheory Guitars version 1.5.0 we've got octave-specific note highlighting and support for Drop D (plus Drop Db) tuning.



Both of these are accessed from the options menu, which is toggled using the cog in the top right of the screen. As the number of available settings has expanded I've split these into two tabs – fretboard playback lives in the 'config.' tab whilst the tunings are located in their own 'tuning' tab.

Drop D

When using a Drop D tuning the rest of the application adjusts to ensure your diagrams and chords are Drop D appropriate. The full list of related changes are as follows:

Open Chords – The open chords have been reviewed for playability and modified where required to use Drop D appropriate variations. Some of the E and G variants are still a little awkward, unfortunately there's no way around this.

Power Chords – Probably the biggest appeal of the tuning, these are now a set of the easy-to-play power chords where you barre the top three strings.

Barre Chords – These have been replaced with a more-suitable set of sus2 chords



Octave Specific Playback

There's a new setting found under the heading 'fretboard playback' and it's got two options; 'global' and 'octave'. Here's what they both do:

Global – This setting keeps playback as it was prior to today's update. When you press a note either on the keyboard or fretboard, all instances of that note are highlighted.

Octave – Our new alternative playback mode. When you press a note (keyboard or fretboard) it is only highlighted in instances where it exists at the same octave.

Octave playback is a really useful setting for getting an exact match between what you are playing on the guitar relative to the keyboard (or vice versa). Do bear in mind though that the octave settings you can apply might result in notes playing back outside the visible range on the keyboard. If the notes you're playing aren't coming up, you probably need to review the octave setting you're using, and unless you're working with the highest guitar notes, it's best to use an octave value of '1' with this setting.



Thanks for reading and keep practicing!

Fraser