Native Instruments managed to shoehorn a good section of Traktor Pro into the iPad and iPhone, and in doing so also brought some special sauce of its own. Now Traktor DJ 1.5 is here, and while the core functional hasn’t changed much, the new hotness is SuperSlicer.
There’s no PR, but this short list from the App Store details what is new:
- New SuperSlicer feature available for in-app purchase
- History Playlists remember what you play so you don’t have to
- Beat Grid improvements with pinch-to-zoom and magnetic snapping
- Some bugfixes for the browser
- Enhanced performance on latest generation devices
First, SuperSlicer
Slicer is already a part of Traktor DJ. But SuperSlicer takes things a few steps further, and in conjunction with freeze mode, the frozen section is not only sliced up into eight beats, but also into top, middle and bottom sections. You get three types of effects:
Turntablism: The top part applies a brake, the middle a baby scratch (yes auto-scratching), and the bottom is reverse.
Pitch: Top part speeds up, middle remains the same, and the bottom part slows down.
Loop: Top part is 1/2 beat, middle bar is half beat, and bottom bat is a single beat loop.
This is also multi-touch, and works from the first finger to the next. So you can for example press beat 1 to beat 8 and using the turntablism fx, apply the brake to the full bar, or scratch every beat in the whole bar sequentially. It’s very clever.
And then in-app purchases
It’s easy to only see the wow factor in the glossy demo, but the obvious new big thing is the enabling of in-app purchases. They don’t need explaining and show the way that software (and not just Traktor) is going. I love that for the price of a coffee, you can add some very cool functionality. Conversely, if the new hotness doesn’t appeal, you can save your money and wait for something that does float your DJ boat.
From a business perspective, these in-app purchases are not to be taken lightly. Traktor DJ has sold in the millions, and if even a fraction of the user base stumps up the 69p/£1.49, the development is paid for many MANY times over. The user gets great features and heaps of profit for NI to develop even more.