Companion Engineering & Design releases Intuem 4

Companion Engineering & Design has released Intuem 4 for Mac OS X, which is now a Universal Binary. Owners of a previous version can upgrade for $49. First time buyers can purchase Intuem 4 for $79 by electronic download or on CD-ROM. Those who purchased Intuem 3.5 after August 22nd, 2006 will receive Intuem 4 at no extra charge.

An extensive list of what's new in this version follows:

• Intuem 4 is a Universal Binary.
• Large audio compositions no longer take ages to save because Intuem now has integrated support for audio projects. When saving your composition you can now opt to save as an "Intuem Project" where audio files are saved in the folder alongside the composition instead of within it and those audio files are now available to be used with other projects. Opening and saving projects is much faster than a composition.
• Audio tracks can now output directly to another audio track, a so-called "Aux Track", so that you can mix a group of audio tracks as one and add AudioUnit effects to a group of tracks at once. You can also direct an AudioUnit based MIDI instrument to an audio track so you can now add AudioUnit effects to instrument tracks too.
• Intuem now has a full-featured playlist so you can queue up Intuem compositions, MIDI files and any audio file that Intuem can read for sequenced playback. You can loop and pause playlists and set a precise start time offset so the next song starts before the current one ends letting you avoid pauses between songs. You can save playlists for later use and have Intuem automatically open all the documents for you the next time you open it.
• Intuem also has full support for the Apple Remote that comes with Intel Macs. You can control the playlist with it to start/stop play, skip to the next or previous song, control the default audio output volume and can show/hide the playlist. When not using a playlist, you can use the remote to control a composition to start/stop play, fast forward/reverse and to record punch-in/out.
• If Intuem crashes, you're covered. Just restart Intuem and thanks to the new autosave features of Mac OS 10.4 your compositions, saved or not, will immediately reappear so you can continue working as if nothing happened, loosing minimal changes.
• Intuem now has comprehensive support for AudioUnit presets. Presets can be created from any capable AudioUnit (effect and instrument alike) and saved to the standardized locations. Presets can be reloaded again quickly and easily because Intuem checks your computer for all the available preset files and keeps track of them as you work. When you need an AudioUnit to load a preset, simply open its panel and use the new preset pop-up in the mini toolbar at the top of the window to select a preset--no searching for files or going through some convoluted process to get at your presets. Every AudioUnit window in Intuem has a special mini toolbar attached to make selecting and saving presets as convenient as possible, and you can make it disappear with one click. You can also use Intuem's Preferences to have an AudioUnit always start-up with a certain preset. Finally, current AudioUnit preset selections are saved with compositions so when you come back to your work, your AudioUnits are set up just as you left them.
• Intuem now records automation from AudioUnit panels as easily as from Intuem's mixer. Not only do you now have instant access to AudioUnit presets via the mini toolbar on AudioUnit windows, but you can also choose the automation recording mode.
• Intuem has a new darker appearance with new toolbar controls and a shiny new rectangular controller that intelligently follows the composition window to stay out of your way while editing.
• With the dark appearance come new controls to give you instant access to a tracks' chief parameters: On MIDI tracks you can now have a pop-up for the take, MIDI device, channel and program. On audio tracks you can have a pop-up for the take, one for the audio input device (with a play-through button beside) and one for the audio output device. Through Intuem's preferences you can select just which ones appear with the different track display styles to suit yourself.
• The pencil tool gets souped-up with several new modes available with the new dark appearance: linear-to draw straight lines; quadratic-to precisely draw steep curves; cubic-to precisely draw more rounded curves and sinus-to draw natural transition curves. Since Intuem uses discrete events for each control change to let you see exactly what you'll be hearing, you can also set the event density for these new tools.
• Editing, viewing and drawing tempo data has become much easier with a new graduated scaling display where you only see as much tempo range as your composition uses so you can see subtle changes more clearly. You can also use the new pencil tools to create gradual changes in tempo.
• Entering notes has become much easier with Intuem's new keyboard entry features. You can now type in a manuscript using your computer keyboard to indicate pitch, duration and octave, and clever use of the shift key to enter chords. You can assign any key to any of the functions you like in Intuem's Preferences and can use the new toolbar octave view for help knowing where you are on the keyboard. Keyboard entry is integrated into the quantise palette and quantise toolbar items so note durations are shared by both operations.
• Step recording is new and shares the convenience of keyboard entry except that you can use a MIDI keyboard to indicate pitch. The note duration will come from the keyboard entry/quantise settings. To enter chords, simply hold down your first note until you've entered everything you need.
• The Inspector has been expanded to give you access to every audio file your composition uses in one simple list. You can now find the location of audio files used with projects and can assign replacements, edit the name and choose whether to not save the cached representation in your composition to speed up opening and saving.
• The event list inspector has been enhanced so that if you double-click any kind of event, note or audio clip in the composition window the Inspector will automatically appear, the event list will be selected and the event will be opened for immediate editing. You can also now edit the next/previous event in the list with handy buttons on the sheet. Finally, audio clips now list the file path for clips saved outside the composition in project folders.
• Note velocity can now be edited on a per-note basis via the document window.
• Intuem now has full support for MIDI devices that identify programs and bank select controllers as numbered from 1-128 instead of the true MIDI values of 0-127. Everywhere programs are shown in Intuem will appear to match the panels on your MIDI gear--with one important exception: the event editor always shows the true MIDI value.
• You can now optionally set Intuem to automatically stop playing a composition at its exact end.
• Intuem now saves your chosen automation mode with the track so it remains the same whether the mixer is open or not.
• Recording program changes has become a bit more sophisticated. You can now choose to have incoming program changes applied to the current program change for the scrubber's position--a good way to change the program over a section of a composition instead of inserting as you play or insisting on one program change for the entire duration of the track.
• The metronome note duration can now be edited in Intuem's Preferences allowing you to customise the sound, and more importantly, overcome a problem on some MIDI devices where the metronome could not be heard at all because of too short a duration or sounded inappropriately because of too long a duration.
• The splash screen now gives you a progress bar when there are AudioUnits to assess at startup to show you it hasn't died, but has some work to do.
• The tools menu has been expanded to give you quick access to the Audio MIDI Setup application.
• Editing large audio files is much, much more efficient--no more long pauses or slow performance after performing a large audio operation. Progress shown during multiple audio operations is more indicative of the duration of the total of all operations.
• Choosing offline ReWire devices on a track will now not only open the device, but will set the track to use that device as intended. Working in a ReWire environment has also become more efficient after eliminating the pauses that occur when adding a new track.
• Issues related to selecting notes and scrolling while selecting have been eliminated. Furthermore, automatic scrolling has been improved with more sensible positioning.
• Problems with AudioUnit windows not appearing properly have been resolved.
• A problem with the tempo toolbar item not being properly up-to-date has been repaired.
• A problem preventing Intuem from importing particular compatible audio files has been fixed.