TOYBOX - the new modular toolkit for Reaktor Racks, with free pack!

[CinningBao]

I’ve been involved in beta-testing the new TOYBOX collection:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nWA5apWA99o

I stepped away from Blocks a while ago as I couldn’t be bothered with the annoying GUI arrangement stuff, but the Rack mode has made it a lot less clunky to actually build things quickly, and the ability to fix your blocks in position really appeals to me.

The TOYBOX Audio collection has a load of the things you’d expect from a modular component collection (oscillators, filters, sequencers, delays, reverbs, vocoders, maths devices) with some additional secret spicey-sauces I’ve not seen anywhere before including:

- ModPad (Designers Pack); inspired by the old Korg Kaoss pads - recordable puck movement which can convert the positional data into areas, XY values or corner values. Can playback your recorded puck movements at audio rate. And it will hook into TouchOSC on your mobile device.

- Multi Effects (Designers pack); an effect module with a hidden (but accessible if you really want) modular backend containing reverbs, delays, comb filters, pitch shifters.. with a carefully tuned morphing preset front end.

- Multi-Breakpoint Envelopes (FloorShakers Pack); as the name describes, many breakpoints, snappable, curve modulation, and will actually run as an oscillator in the right mode.

- Bit Shifter (free pack); I’m a sucker for just brutalising a signal, and that’s what this does, for both control signals and audio signals - bit reduction, sequencer mangling, messed-up distortions, pitch-tracked bit-shifting. it’s not a gentle or subtle effect.

- Macro Presets (free pack); this doesn’t make any audio, but I have found it really useful for managing local presets for any noise-making racks. assign up to 8 values to anything in the patch, each MacroPreset position can hold different values for each of the 8 out values.

- FM Synth (Synth Pack); this has a really interestingly powerful FM algorithm morphing function. Create your bespoke FM routing matrices, and morph between them! Had a LOT of fun with this. Not forgetting the well-considered internal modulation system either.

- Synth Pack; this whole pack is pretty good to be honest. Complete synth blocks with oscillators, filters (some have an included Low Pass Gate filter), envelopes, LFO and extensive internal modulation possibilities. And they all come with a bounty of usable presets.

I’d recommend everyone get the Free Pack and exploring the sequencers and Mini and regular Oscillators as a start.

https://www.toyboxaudio.com

[Deep Purple]

Is this affiliated with NI in any way? It's hard to tell from the website.

[CinningBao]

Hi Deep Purple, no - Dave and I are old friends, he started the project and asked me to beta-test for him late last year
We are 3rd-party developers.

[Deep Purple]

OK, thanks. I was wondering why there was no "About Us" type section on the page which most companies have, as that's where I would normally find that sort of information. You guys should update to provide some background in some way.

I'll check these out later. Thanks for the heads up.

[CinningBao]

Good call, we're on it!

[shonky]

Was wondering whether to get Voltage Modular but since the update, think Blocks might be a better bet. Thanks for the free set, look forward to checking them out.

[martinjuenke]

Following

[Deep Purple]

These are really good!

[ftech]

Haven't used Blocks that much, but just signed on for the free pack to see how I get on with them.
They certainly look nice!

[Rastkovic]

OK, thanks. I was wondering why there was no "About Us" type section on the page which most companies have, as that's where I would normally find that sort of information. You guys should update to provide some background in some way.

+1

It would be much more serious....

[Rastkovic]

Maybe i'm wrong, but it looks like somebody has taken a lot of "inspiration" from the Reaktor User Library....

https://www.toyboxaudio.com/pages/credits

[CinningBao]

We're sorting out the bio page today, so you can read who we think we are, and use that to work out if you want to try the product

Enjoy the free pack!

[David@TOYBOX]

Maybe i'm wrong, but it looks like somebody has taken a lot of "inspiration" from the Reaktor User Library....

Hi Rastkovic, yup, the user library is a brilliant and inspiring place to share knowledge with the Reaktor community. As a Reaktor ‘builder’ I have learnt a lot from dissecting user library ensembles and also shared a lot of my own stuff on there too, as is the case for all Reaktor builders.

All the toybox blocks are original builds but I have used a small handful of macros (small bits of code within the blocks) that I have gotten from other builders in the community (which is inevitable for any builder) and I've gotten permission to use them where possible.

I also felt it was important we did a free package of blocks, partly as a kind of exchange for all the knowledge and help I have gotten from the forums and the user library.

[Echoes in the Attic]

Thanks for the free pack. A coupple minor criticisms about that:
1) You might want to have Toybox in the name. It shows up in Komplete Kontrol/Maschine as "Free Pack", so it doesn't even say Toybox. I'd recommend calling it Toybox - Free Pack or something. Like Euroreakt free pack is called "Euroreakt - Free Edition". Otherwise "Free pack" is pretty generic and has no brand identifier.
2) There doesn't seem to be an image for the Komplete Kontrol/Maschine item in the menu.

[RobGee]

The sampling, effects and filter blocks look interesting...