We are thrilled to announce TOMiC 0.5 โ a monumental update that expands TOMiC Drum Synth from a dedicated sound design power-tool into a complete, self-contained modular groove workstation.
This milestone release introduces in-process CLAP effect plugin hosting in Standalone mode (complete with deep modulation routing), the intuitive new Sequencer Range Ring for lightning-fast loop sculpting and slicing, persistent UI scale and window geometry memory, smart multi-variant sample drag-and-drop, and full offline render integration.
Here is an in-depth breakdown of everything new in TOMiC 0.5:
๐ 1. In-Process CLAP FX Hosting in Standalone (With Full Modulation!)
For producers who love sound designing and performing outside the DAW, TOMiC Standalone now transforms into a full modular host environment for third-party CLAP effect plugins:
- 8 Effect Slots Per Channel & Master Bus: You can now insert external CLAP effect plugins on any of the 16 drum voices as well as on the Master bus. Simply click the new green "FX" tab in the Mixer/Channel panel, hit "+", and pick from your scanned plugins or browse directly.
- 8 Dedicated Modulation Lanes (
ClapMod 1โ8): This isnโt just static hosting โ it is deeply integrated into TOMiCโs modulation matrix! You can assign any internal LFO, ModEnv envelope, Marbles generator, or Macro control to modulate arbitrary third-party plugin parameters in real time. - Phase A/B/C Modulation Injection & Drift Protection: Features intelligent modulation injection with automatic base-value restoration, guaranteeing that plugin parameters never suffer from value drift or calibration offsets when modulations stop.
- Ultra-Safe Real-Time Audio Architecture: Ported from Omni's proven host architecture, tailored specifically for planar 64-sample buffer processing with zero dynamic allocations (
Vec/HashMap) on the high-priority real-time audio thread. - Soft Circuit Breaker Protection: If a third-party plugin hangs or stalls for more than 100ms, TOMiC's soft circuit breaker automatically silences and bypasses the slot instead of freezing the audio engine or crashing your session.
- Isolated Process Scanner: Plugins are discovered and validated via disposable child processes (
--clap-scan) with(path, mtime, size)caching, ensuring that misbehaving or incompatible plugins can never crash TOMiC during startup scans. - Full Session Persistence & Clean Rack Reset: All loaded CLAP plugins, internal states, and parameter maps save directly into your
.tomicsession files. Furthermore, opening a new song cleanly resets and restores all plugin slots automatically.
๐ 2. Sequencer "Range Ring" & Correlated Copy Range Workflow
Sculpting dynamic, evolving polymetric grooves and editing step patterns across your 16 drum tracks just became drastically faster with the introduction of the Range Ring:
- Interactive Lane Ribbon: A sleek, dedicated control ribbon is now rendered directly above the step matrix grid for any active sequencer lane (Trigger, Pitch, Velocity, Accent, Roll, Pan, Gate, Filter, etc.).
- Boundary Handles & Loop Shifting: Grab and drag the left or right handles to dynamically constrain the active playback window (
win_startandwin_len). Click and drag the center body of the ring to slide the entire loop frame across the 16, 32, or 64-step sequence on the fly! - Direct Correlation with Copy Range UI: The Range Ring is tightly correlated with the Copy Range interface (
From/Len/To). Instead of manually adjusting numeric spinners, dragging the Range Ring visually and instantly stages that exact slice of steps in the Copy Range controls. - Lightning-Fast Step Copy & Paste on the Same Channel: Duplicating, repeating, and varying step fragments within the same channel is now effortless. Simply drag the Range Ring to highlight a favorite 4- or 8-step rhythm or roll, hit Copy Range, shift or position the destination, and click Paste Range. You can clone intricate sub-step ratchets, pitch melodies, and velocity grooves across the bar in seconds!
- Double-Click Instant Reset: Need to return to the full pattern length? Simply double-click the Range Ring to instantly reset the active window to the full lane size.
- Full Engine & Playback Sync: Trigger loops, pitch contours, polymetric clocks, and Song Mode pattern progression (
cycle_ticks) strictly respect the active Range Ring boundaries.
๐ 3. Persistent UI Scale & Window Memory
We have completely upgraded how TOMiC manages display scaling and window geometry across your workflow:
- Saved to Disk (
ui_settings.json): Your preferred UI zoom scale (80%, 100%, 125%, 150%, or custom zoom) is now automatically persisted to disk in%APPDATA%\tomic\ui_settings.json. - Permanent Across Restarts: The interface remembers your chosen scale across restarts and DAW sessions, eliminating unwanted auto-fit overrides when launching the plugin or standalone application.
- Unified
requested_scalePipeline: Sizing requests now travel through a unified scaling pipeline, guaranteeing crisp, artifact-free window resizing across multiple monitors and high-DPI display setups.
๐ฏ 4. Smart Multi-Variant Sample Drag & Drop (AโD Tabs)
Building rich round-robin drum kits and layered acoustic/electronic percussion is now smoother than ever:
- Active Variant Tab Awareness: Dropping an audio file onto the Noise/Sample pad now intelligently detects which variant tab (A, B, C, or D) is currently selected in the Sample Manager (
sample_active_variant). - Effortless Layering: Dragging a new sample onto the pad seamlessly updates the active variant tab instead of always overwriting Slot A, saving you countless clicks when assembling multi-sample velocity layers.
โก 5. Offline Render Integration, UI Polish & Commit Hash Branding
We've made extensive under-the-hood refinements to ensure absolute consistency between live playback and exported audio:
- Offline CLAP FX Audio & Stem Bouncing: Exporting master WAV files, bouncing individual channels, or exporting MIDI tracks now properly instantiates and renders all active CLAP effect chains offline (
load_clap_racks_offline), guaranteeing that your exported stems sound 100% identical to your live mix. - Widened Mix/FX Channel Strips: Widened mixer channel strips provide ample room for CLAP plugin tabs, filter routing selectors, and modulation readouts without visual clipping.
- Expanded About Dialog with Git Commit Hash: The About dialog card has been enlarged and now automatically embeds the compile-time short Git commit hash (
Version 0.5.0 (<hash>)), making version identification and support diagnostics effortless.
๐ Get the TOMiC 0.5 Update
The TOMiC 0.5 update is available now for all users.
To update, simply download the latest installer and install it over your existing version. All your presets, sample libraries, and settings will remain completely intact.
- Standard Windows / Linux Installers: Download the latest 0.5.0 build from your user dashboard.
- Legacy CPU Build: If you are running an older processor without AVX2 instructions, download the dedicated compatibility build (
TomicDrumSynth-Setup-0.5.0-compat.exe).
Explore the updated capabilities on the TOMiC Product Page or get your license at the Purchase Portal!