Hey everyone, Simon here. It’s been a busy few months since our last update, and I’m excited to share what we’ve been up to and give you a sneak peek at what’s coming next.
What’s new since our last update?
RX 11 has arrived
We’re delighted to introduce a major upgrade to our audio repair toolkit with the launch of RX 11. It includes intelligent real-time dialogue isolation as well as new loudness tech for music. For example, mastering engineer Dale Becker used RX 11’s industry-first Loudness Optimize to help Billie Eilish’s new album, Hit Me Hard and Soft, sound its best on streaming platforms. Our teams have been working really hard to deliver a meaningful upgrade from RX 10, and they’re pretty proud of the new features we’ve been able to ship.
New additions for Plugin Alliance and Brainworx
We also added a couple of amazing new tools to the Plugin Alliance stable. First up is Wunderlich, a masterpiece from NEOLD – the creators of U2A and Warble – combining rare analog components into a one-of-a-kind plugin that’ll drench your mixes in vintage textures not heard since the 1930s. And sonic pioneers Unfiltered Audio are back with Battalion – an innovative, hybrid tool that combines classic synth sounds with modern drum machine sampling.
We also have a new Brainworx plugin out. bx_glue is a really slick glue compressor that combines the warmth and punch of 1980s British VCA compressors with modern multiband capabilities – perfect for adding cohesion to mixes.
And hot of the press from NI
Our latest Play Series instrument, Glaze 2, is now available. As the name suggests, it’s the follow-up to one of our bestsellers and comes with 150 brand-new vocal instrument presets plus dozens of custom chord sets that let you create lush vocal harmonies with just a touch of a key. And our new Drum State Expansion offers a range of absolutely iconic kicks, claps, hats, and more from one of the world’s most beloved drum machines.
An upgrade for subscriptions
We recently evolved our existing subscription service, Komplete Now, into something new: NI 360. NI 360 offers everything you need across the music creation workflow – instruments, creative effects, and world-class mixing and mastering tools from the whole family of NI brands, including iZotope and Brainworx. With three tiers – Essentials, Plus, and Pro – you can choose the plan that fits your needs. And don’t worry, perpetual licenses are here to stay, and you can always access your sessions, even if you cancel your subscription. We’re rolling 360 out gradually, and you can join the waitlist here.
Reliability, performance, and compatibility
The reliability and performance of our software are an important foundation for everything we do. If you’re going to choose NI products to power your pro workflows, you need to know our products will work when you need them most. We’ve been investing more capacity into this area in the last few months, and, while there’s more to do, I’m pleased with the progress we’ve made.
In Kontakt, we’ve shipped several improvements that will significantly reduce DAW project file sizes for some users and that dramatically speed up instrument loading times in Logic. We developed and shipped a workaround for people who were having issues with a particular version of macOS Sonoma. And we’ve also worked closely with Apple to fix crashes in Logic affecting users with Kontakt and Kontrol S-Series MK3 keyboards; these issues are resolved in the new version of Logic Pro 11.
Maschine and Kontakt are both now Sonoma compatible, and our teams are getting ready to make our products work on the next version of macOS, expected to be announced by Apple in June. While the time it will take to make our products compatible depends a lot on the changes Apple decides to make, we hope to ship compatibility updates faster for this version than we did for Sonoma last year.
Lastly, we also added a new homepage in Native Access, which makes it easier to see updates, your products, and helpful tips all in one place. We’ve had feedback that it can be hard to know where to start if you have access to a lot of NI products, so we’re working on ways to make it easier for new users to get up and running with their NI software.
What’s next?
Artist collaborations
We’ll soon be releasing a new instrument developed in partnership with a legendary artist who was behind one of our best loved and most-used plugins. This time, we’ve teamed up to bring you the sound of their personal electric piano – a truly one-of-a-kind instrument. I won’t say much more just yet, but stay tuned – the launch is just a few weeks away.
Traktor and Maschine
As I mentioned last time, we’ve got some meaningful software updates coming later this year to Traktor and Maschine. Our teams are hard at work on these right now, and Traktor customers don’t have long to wait to get their hands on some highly-requested features: flexible beatgrids and stem separation.
Kontrol updates
Several updates to Kontrol S-Series MK3, including MIDI Templates and Play Assist, are hitting beta soon, with MIDI Templates launching later this month. This will be followed by new accessibility features, making Kontrol even more versatile and user-friendly for everyone.
Ozone components
People love Ozone, but we’ve heard feedback that some folks want to get started not with Ozone Elements but with some of the specific modules in Ozone Standard or Advanced. We want to make it possible to access these components individually to better suit your needs, so you’ll soon be able to buy individual modules of Ozone as standalone plugins. This means you can pick and choose the functions that are most useful to you without needing to purchase the full suite.
Brainworx’s first-ever reverb
Brainworx is well known for their compressors and EQs - but what happens when we let those engineers and sound designers take a crack at something else? I’m very happy to say that Brainworx is going to be branching out very soon with a new reverb plugin, combining their analogue expertise with innovative reverb technology.
Kompanion – an experimental AI sample generator
We recognize the potential for AI to empower creators in new and exciting ways. However, we also understand concerns around unethical uses of AI in music creation, and we want to use this powerful new technology to truly benefit producers and musicians. That's why we've signed on as supporters of the AI for Music initiative, adhering to their principles for developing AI products responsibly and in a creator-friendly manner.
One such effort is Kompanion, an experimental AI-powered sample generator we've been working on. Kompanion allows you to generate unique, royalty-free samples simply by describing the sounds you want through text prompts. This novel synth uses three different AI models, trained on a curated subset of our vast sound catalog, to produce novel sounds you won't find anywhere else.
While Kompanion is still in its early development stages, with results that can be hit-or-miss depending on prompts, the potential is exciting. We're iterating all the time with updated synth engines to improve audio fidelity. Eventually, we want to make it easy to integrate these samples into your tracks using Kontakt.
We don’t expect technology like Kompanion to ever replace classic sample and synth-based creative approaches, but we think it’ll be another valuable tool in the toolbox for people looking for new ways to create sounds. To ensure we get it right, we're carefully refining it based on user feedback. If you’re interested in joining the Alpha test group and helping shape the future of this project, sign up here. We’d love to hear your feedback.
And finally
Superbooth
I recently got back from Superbooth in Berlin. It was my first time attending, and it was a great opportunity to meet customers, partners, and a few NI employees who I’d not yet met in person. If you’ve not been before, Superbooth is a wonderful mix of trade show, music festival, and community event – and I came away with even more passion for what we as an industry (and as an organization) are building.
Girls Day
We were thrilled to host our #GirlsDay event in April, welcoming 14 talented young female producers to our Berlin office. They met our staff and gained hands-on experience with our hardware and software. We’re truly grateful to all the attendees for really inspiring us with their enthusiasm and creativity. For more details and a great video of the day, check out our LinkedIn post here.
Stay tuned for more updates
That’s it for now, but I’ll be back soon with another update. In the meantime, let us know your thoughts below.
