Mazetools offers a unique approach to music and creativity, providing an experimental gateway to explore sounds in a novel way. Through the use of gestures, users can visually experience and alter sounds, melodies, grooves, and songs.

It is important to note that Mazetools prioritizes the process of music-making over the final outcome. At present, there are two Mazetools available:Mutant and Soniface.

The story of Mazetools began in 2011 with the animated experimental short movie “Geometric Poetry” by Stephan Kloss. The following year he did prototype an audiovisual synthesizer called Maze with the intention to incorporate aspects about geometry, cymatics and the phenomenon synesthesia as well as contemporary digital music creation processes. Together with his company they found Ectoplastic Laboratory and the practical application energized the development. Although the team focused on bringing Maze -tools- from a prototype status to an app, accessible for anybody. The release of Mazetools Soniface 1.0 was in May 2017. In this way Mazetools became a brand for experimental cross-platform audiovisual music creation software distributed by Ectoplastic UG.

An explaining video you can find here.

Getting influenced by visuals while making sound or music may have a positive impact on your process of creation. The basic principle of Soniface is an animated grid. Each line is linked to a note. You can find an explaining tutorial here.

Before you start Soniface Lab, you need to change the speaker configuration in the sound settings of your computer to 4.0, 5.1 or 7.1. After this, you can start the app and it will run in surround.

When you work in surround, the soundscape sampler will work different, as in stereo (if the Maze is on the left side of the display, it’s fading to the left speaker…). If you’re using surround sound, you can place a sample into the room. That means, if you place the Maze point on your display to the top left, the sample will be played mainly from left front speaker.

If you place a Maze point on the bottom right, the sample will be played mainly from your right rear speaker. In this way you can build arrangements and atmospheres easily in surround sound and combine it with animations, like the circle animation, to let a sample move through the room. If you got a multi channel recording setup, you can record in this way soundscapes in real-time for example for a movie.

Mobile & desktop versions of Soniface provide a native 2nd screen output. After you did plugin your video cable, you have to extend the screen in your display settings. After this, you can start the app and it will use the 2nd video output. The desktop versions offer up to 3 screens.

There is an in-app stereo main mix recording as well as a mic recording function in the Soniface and Soniface Pro. On desktop you can record the sound natively up to 7.1 WAV, if you choose this audio setting within your sound card. Currently it saves the files to the local app folder.

• Android (you might need an extra file browser to enter folder) Open your disk manager, follow this path: disk/Android/data/ com.MazeTools.Soniface/files
• Windows C:/Users/USER/AppData/ LocalLow/Ectoplastic UG/Mazetools Soniface Lab
• Mac (Steam) /Users/username/Library/ Application Support/com.Mazetools.Sonifacelab iOS Open Mazetools Soniface app folder in Files app
• Mac (AppStore) /Users/username/Library/Containers/com.Mazetools.Sonifacelab/Data/Library/Application Support/com.Mazetools.Sonifacelab

You can contribute to our efforts by sharing your thoughts, providing feedback, or leaving a review on the store. Moreover, you have the option to support our development and enable us to offer a free app globally by making a donation via Ko-Fi. We appreciate your support!

https://ko-fi.com/mazetools

Like the microphone and main mix recordings, all Mazes and Set files will be saved to your local app folder. So, you can just copy the *.mazes and the *.sets files and paste them into another local Mazetools Soniface app folder on another device. All files you did on your mobile can also be played on your desktop. Please note, that you need to copy custom samples as well.

Have a look on our Youtube channel: https://www.youtube.com/@mazetools

Beside all connectivity issues and improvements, we’re working on new features for Soniface. Currently we updated to version 4. We are working on a new Mazetool called Botany. You can follow us on instagram or Youtube to get the latest information about the development.