Apple turned heads last year with the unveiling of their new MacBook Pro, featuring a brand new Touch Bar that added clearer indication of functionality for certain apps and an extra degree of user friendliness.
As helpful as the Touch Bar is for OmniGraffle 7, Sketch, QuickQuad, and a bunch of other apps, many other apps have yet to be given full compatibility with the Touch Bar. However, Apple has now updated both its consumer level and professional music editing suites to fully integrate the Touch Bar.
GarageBand 2.2. features a slew of new improvements, such as multi-take recording, advanced vocal, pitch and distortion effects, as well as the inclusion of the Alchemy software synthesizer.
Alchemy was previously available in Logic Pro X, Apple’s professional music editing suite, which has also been updated to include Touch Bar integration and a bunch of other features. Touch Bar users can now see a timeline of their projects, as well as access volume control and select different instruments with a simple tap.
The update also adds easier file-sharing between both apps. Before the update, you could easily import a GarageBand file over to Logic Pro, but you couldn’t open a Logic Pro project in GarageBand. This has now been remedied, promoting greater synergy between the two apps via iCloud.
These updates are all free of charge if you already own the software, and new users can pick up Logic Pro for $200. GarageBand comes packaged for free on newer Mac products and costs $5 on older models.
