But today, a good friend of mine told me about udio, and I have to admit I am deeply impressed. I asked the AI to generate a song in German (my native language and a tough one) about the Libertarian Party (FDP) and how they obstruct the climate and mobility transition with their fairy tale arguments of avoiding debts and relying on the self-regulation of the market, in the style of a famous German punk rock band.

First, udio recognized the band and derived the genre mix from it: punk, rock, ska, alternative. Then it generated two ideas, each 30 seconds long. From here, you can go different ways: extend the song (add sections before, after, intro, or outro), remix it, or publish it. I chose to extend the version I liked more, and again two versions were generated. After some time of listening, comparing, rehearing, and generating, I had a solid 2:30 song, with lyrics that make perfect sense 99% of the time, and I’d even say 5% of it is really good.

Afterward, you can decide to publish, remix, extend, or download the song, and even generate a video.

AI has come a long way, and it’s changing the world rapidly. I’m really curious to see where this is going.

Here’s the song I created (as mentioned before, it’s in German).

And here’s the link to it: https://www.udio.com/songs/d12anEL76bPCNavkY8ntap

Everyone working in the fields of (web) design and/or marketing may have heard of Figma. Figma is a cloud software that is perfect for designing websites or apps, and even print layouts. However, the killer feature of the software undoubtedly is the community. The number of widgets, plugins, and templates for the tool is unbelievably huge. Compared to the big players, such as Adobe (who wanted to buy Figma last year), Figma comes with affordable pricing. However, that is directly connected with a drawback: you can only upload and use custom fonts in the premium package.

While looking for alternatives, I discovered Penpot when it was still in alpha. Now it’s officially version 2.0 and is a very competitive alternative to Figma. Of course, the community is not as big as Figma’s due to the fact that it’s rather unknown.

If you have already worked with Figma, you’ll be ready to work instantly with Penpot. Plus, you can upload your custom fonts without any pricing plan.

While Figma has a desktop app (and a somewhat less useful iOS/iPadOS App), Penpot is still working on a desktop app, but it also works pretty well with Safari on the iPad. Also a file exporter from Figma to Penport is currently being developed.

Considering the software is free, you’ll get a highly professional piece of software.

When I read through the instructions, I wasn’t sure whether this might be a bit too nerdy for me or not, but I gave it a try. And it was totally worth it. I followed the video tutorial step by step and was unbelievably happy when the game eventually launched.

It worked great, and I was so grateful to dive into the world of Aperture Science once again.

Check out the tutorial here: