Sensomusic Usine is a Multitouch digital audio workstation

Digital audio workstation

A digital audio workstation is an electronic system designed solely or primarily for recording, editing and playing back digital audio. DAWs were originally tape-less, microprocessor-based systems such as the Synclavier and Fairlight CMI...

 used to manipulate, record and edit audio

Sound

Sound is a mechanical wave that is an oscillation of pressure transmitted through a solid, liquid, or gas, composed of frequencies within the range of hearing and of a level sufficiently strong to be heard, or the sensation stimulated in organs of hearing by such vibrations.-Propagation of...

 and MIDI in live situations.
Usine is developed in Delphi

Borland Delphi

Embarcadero Delphi is an integrated development environment for console, desktop graphical, web, and mobile applications.Delphi's compilers use its own Object Pascal dialect of Pascal and generate native code for 32- and 64-bit Windows operating systems, as well as 32-bit Mac OS X and iOS...

 by the French double bass player Olivier Sens, running on Microsoft Windows

Microsoft Windows

Microsoft Windows is a series of operating systems produced by Microsoft.Microsoft introduced an operating environment named Windows on November 20, 1985 as an add-on to MS-DOS in response to the growing interest in graphical user interfaces . Microsoft Windows came to dominate the world's personal...

.

The purpose of this software is to change a sound as it is being played in a loop. This software allows you to edit the sounds, instruments, or drum beats as they are being played back through the speakers. The ability to loop and edit sound in real time is very similar to the function of loop pedals. Loop pedals are under the artist’s feet. When they record something like a guitar riff, the artist can stomp on the pedal to make that riff a loop. They do that for each new sound they layer into the piece, until a full piece of music is formed. More recently, Usine has been modified to be usable on a touch screen laptop, which makes it easier to use.

Usine is often used to create Glitch music, which is based on sound effects and the random use of sounds. Usine's ability to change sounds immediately, loop them, and make a whole new melody makes it a great tool for artists looping their sound samples. There are many artists that use Usine with other programs in their live or studio audio setups. A glitch artist named Bartelby of Pance Party used Usine on a touchscreen to perform his electronic music piece “Morgasm”. Another artist named Paul Brousseau has used Usine to mix some of the 12 music albums he has worked on.

Usine exists in free and pro versions.

Overview

• Process sound modularly: create patches with modules and connect them by virtual wires .
• Analyse input or generated sound, for example pitch, peaks or dynamics to create adaptive effects which can modify any parameter in real time.
• Organize patches, sounds, and effects on a timeline with the sequencer mode. Create complex automation curves.
• Use the built-in virtual mixing table to mix the sound produced by different patches on each track (up to 32).
• Manage 32 external audio sources and apply different effects to any of them.
• Create flexible Surround projects: all audio tracks are natively 16.0. The output sound can be routed to any of the 32 available outputs, depending on the sound card.
• Route audio or midi from one track to another in an other host (VST version)
• Create insert patches on any input or output channel. For example a master limiter or a master reverb.
• Complete VST processing: Use any VST instrument or effect in patches and modify any VST Parameter in real time. Create simple front-end interfaces for VSTs.
• Complete MIDI automation: assign any Usine visual object to a midi controller with midi-learn command. Complete integration of motorized external controllers.
• Complete MIDI input/output management for VSTi instruments or external expanders.
• Load up to 512 patches in memory in a grid and activate them in real time.
• Synchronize patches and VST plug-ins with a master tempo. Use unusual and absurd tempos from 0! To 10000000000!
• Record creations directly on the hard disk in real time: separate tracks, inputs and outputs.
• All Usine functions are real-time, resample, modify, input sound on the fly.
• Save patches, complete setups, and configurations, for adaptation to different projects.
• Unlimited Undo/Redo.
• Use any sample rate supported by an Asio sound card. Usine has a 32 bit floating-point audio engine.
• Unlimited number of internal Audio, Data and Midi buses.
• Pascal-like scripting capabilities which allow for the creation of new audio and midi processing modules.
• Full Open Sound Control (OSC) compatibility to communicate with other computers connected to the network or Internet.
• C++ programmers can create new graphic and control modules using the SDK.
• Use the video tracker to modify sound parameters with a camera.
• Play videos and synchronize audio.
• Usine is fully touch and multi-touch enabled.