Acid Pro
| Developer(s) | Sony Creative Software MAGIX Software GmbH (2016) |
|---|---|
| Stable release |
8.0.3 (Spring 2018)
|
| Operating system | Microsoft Windows |
| Type | Digital audio workstation |
| License | Proprietary |
| Website | Magix ACID Pro website[1] |
Acid Pro 8 is a professional digital audio workstation (DAW) software program developed by MAGIX Software GmbH. It was originally called "Acid pH1" and published by Sonic Foundry, which was later merged into Sony to create Sony Creative Software. On May 20, 2016 it was announced that MAGIX acquired the bulk of Sony's creative software suite, including ACID Pro. MAGIX first version of the software ACID Pro 8, was released in spring of 2018.[2] The update came with new modern features including an enhanced interface, support for 64bit, added samples, VST3 support, and more.
Acid Loops
ACID Loops is a technology used with the music making software originally from Sonic Foundry called ACID. Created in 1998, it refers to the repetition, and transposition of sound clips, to form a song. The ACID Pro program is now owned and distributed by Sony, and is on version 7. Sony also now sells a line of Acidized loop sample CDs to be used with ACID, as do many third party companies.
Similar technology was added to Cakewalk's Sonar (calling it Groove Clips) and Cubase (calling it Audio Warp). Although the phrase "ACID loops" technically is only associated with Sonic Foundry, some people use the term to refer to the technique even when used with other software packages.
Acidized loops contain tempo and key information, so that ACID can properly time stretch them when pitch shifted.
A website for budding musicians using Acid technology was set up, named ACID Planet.
History
Acid was first launched in 1998 as its own entity prior to its purchase to Sony, its home base at that time being in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. It was a loop-based music sequencer, where Acid loop files could be simply dragged and dropped and automatically adjust itself to the tempo and key of a song with virtually no sonic degradation.
It became very popular with composers, producers, and DJs, in the late 1990s and early 2000s, interested in quickly creating beats, music textures, or complete compositions and orchestrations, that would work with virtually any tempo or key signature, and these loops would adjust automatically. To be able to do this, Sony's Acid Pro uses specially prepared or "Acidized" music wave files which can be prepared using an audio editing tool such as Sony Sound Forge. (For more information on audio editing, see sound effect techniques).
Since then, this looping technique has been adopted by the majority of other digital audio workstations on the market, which can also use these acidized loop files. Acid Pro runs on PCs with all versions of Microsoft Windows since Windows 2000. It currently includes over 20 DirectX audio effects, employs the new Media Manager technology, the Beatmapper tool, and the Chopper tool, as well the ability to mix in 5.1 channel surround.
With Acid Pro 6 (released in Q3-2006), Sony introduced a full digital audio workstation which also includes MIDI and multitrack audio recording with full support for ASIO, VST, and VSTI audio, plugins, and music synthesizer standards.
Sonic Foundry sold the Vegas, Acid, Sound Forge, CD Architect, Siren, VideoFactory, ScreenBlast, and Batch Converter product lines to Sony Pictures Digital in July 2003.
In 2016 it was announced that the German software company MAGIX had acquired the majority of products in the Sony Creative Software portfolio. These include Vegas Pro, Movie Studio, Sound Forge Pro and ACID Pro.[3]
January 21st 2018, MAGIX officially announced their first version of ACID Pro (Acid Pro 8) to be released in Spring of 2018.
Other versions
- ACID Music Studio is a simplified, lower-cost version of ACID Pro. The latest version is ACID Music Studio 10.
