Introduction

Mixtikl is a powerful generative music lab with support for user entered text, music visualization and tap play. It includes an underlying 12 track mixer / arranger / performer 4 with central content cells per track, together with an integral multi-synth sound generator incorporating powerful live FX. It is the culimination of 20 years of experimentation, experience and passionate development at the nexus of mobile music making, generative music and messaging. Although it is quite unique, it has a fast growing user base.

It's been designed to run on both touch screen and non touch screen devices, as well as mouse/keyboard driven computers (e.g. Desktop). It can run in portrait or landscape mode on iPad, iPhone and iPod touch, and the Desktop Mac and Windows versions allow for dynamic screen resizing. There are Plugin versions for VST/AU and web browsers, and Android versions are in final testing. It is a true multi-platform system.

With the release of Mixtikl 5, the new Visualizer and Message & Visualizer Display Settings screens are now the heart of Mixtikl. These make it easy to create great sounding new mixes which can include personal messages, and many may find that they frequent the Mixer screen less. When it comes to creating great sounding new mixes with messages, most of the work can be done in these two screens.

However, Content Cells are still at the core of the music generated by Mixtikl, and are accessible via the powerful mixer/arrranger accessible in Mixtikl Full. If you want to customise the music, arrangement, FX or tap voices in your mix, you are going to need to use the Mixer. You load into Content Cells the generative content (parts) and audio or MIDI loops you want to mix. You can only have one content cell active (playing) at a time in a track, and that cell can also be silent or empty. A part's sounds, FX, root, pitch offset and rules can be customised on a per cell basis.

Tracks can be set for their content cells to do one of 4 things: play once and then move to the next cell in the track (Sequence cell), play forever (Looping cell), play once and only when triggered (Spot cell) and tap play when in the Visualizer screen (Tap cell). You can temporarily turn a sequence cell into a looping cell by selecting it and applying a cell loop. Tracks can also have FX applied, be muted/soloed and have their volume and pan changed.

Lists are also core to Mixtikl, as it is through lists that you select content/paks and FX presets, some options and menu items.

Mixtikl is a product in continuous development, meaning that it is being improved and extended all the time. If there are features or improvements you would like to see, let us know.

OK, let's get going and install Mixtikl, as the purpose of this guide is to give you information on each of the interface elements in Mixtikl, and how to use them.