Brakebills, Twang, Stuff!
Oh em gee. So much to report.
First, do you know Lev Grossman? He's an incredibly talented author who recently toured Portland. If you haven't read his book The Magicians, then stop whatever you're doing and procure a copy immediately. Without trying to spoil anything, the major college in the book is named the Brakebills College for Magical Pedagogy. Lev saw the Brakebills T-shirt that I designed for my sweetheart's birthday present:
Long story short, my Brakebills shirts are now officially endorsed by the author! Please buy twenty of them, or thirty if the spirit moves you. Zazzle's print quality is great. The colors are vivid, and the ink has survived many washings. Rabid fans are buying and even customizing them! I love the internet.
Lev blogged some of my other work, too ("the guy who does this has the enviably fake-sounding name of Zach Archer"). It's true, I have an awesome pro wrestler name.
Second, my new iPhone app has landed in the App Store:
Twang is a handheld guitar. It's easier to play than a real guitar, and is very expressive. Instead of using audio samples, Twang uses physical modelling techniques to create a more natural, dynamic sound. No two plucks are identical. Watch my grainy first video if you disbelieve.
In the next version of Twang, left-handed people will be able to switch Twang's orientation, and serious musicians can dampen or mute strings with their fingers. And probably more! This version is already in development, and may be submitted in a week or two? Follow Control Z, Inc on Twitter if you have a ravenous thirst for updates!
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Here Comes the Metal Mouth
My first iPhone app has been submitted to the app store for review! Metal Mouth is a text-to-speech synthesizer that mimics the talking devices of the 80's (Speak & Spell, "Wizard needs food, badly", etc.) The functionality is similar to my Synthetic Speech In Flash demo, but with many new features (male & female voices, auto-tune, pitch & time scratching) and a snappy interface with talking robots.
This took about 5 weeks to develop. Meanwhile, I've started another app, and I envision releasing Metal Mouth 2.0 in a few months, with more voices, and the ability to record audio.