Sound Reaktor Documentation

Installation

Installing the Add-on

The installation process is the same across all operating systems:

Sound Reaktor relies on NumPy and SciPy for its audio analysis capabilities. NumPy handles the numerical computations, while SciPy provides the signal processing algorithms (FFT and onset detection) that make frequency analysis possible.To be able to open MP3, OGG, OPUS, FLAC, M4A, and AAC audio files, it uses the PyAV library. This is the reason why there is a version for each operating system and why the ZIP files are so large. Each of them includes those external libraries (SciPy and PyAV) compiled for each system. To ensure compatibility with Blender 5.1, there is a specific version of the libraries for the newest Blender release(s).

Starting with version 2.0 of Sound Reaktor, it is no longer necessary to install any dependencies. Sound Reaktor is now a Blender extension and therefore includes all required dependencies by default.If you have installed, or plan to install, version 2.0 or later of Sound Reaktor, you only need to install the correct build for your operating system. If for any reason you want to install an earlier version, the legacy installation method can be found at the end of this documentation.

Quick Start

This guide will get your first animation running in under a minute. We'll make a cube pulse to a kick drum:

Your cube should now be scaling up and down in sync with the kick drum. The animation keyframes have been automatically generated across the entire audio duration.

Viewing Analysis Progress

For longer audio files, you may want to monitor progress. Open Blender's System Console before clicking "MAKE IT DANCE!":

The console displays detailed progress information including frames processed, frequency bands analyzed, and any warnings or errors.

Interface Reference

The Sound Reaktor panel is located in the 3D Viewport sidebar (press N) under the "Sound Reaktor" tab. This section explains each control in detail.

Audio File Settings

Audio File

Select the audio file to analyze. Sound Reaktor Pro supports WAV, MP3, OGG, FLAC, OPUS, M4A, and AAC files. Sound Reaktor Lite supports WAV and MP3 only.

Note: The optimal format for working with Sound Reaktor is WAV. While the other supported formats will work perfectly, it's important to keep in mind that some of them, such as MP3, are lossy compressed formats. The human ear may not notice a difference, but the data that Sound Reaktor uses for its processing will be degraded by this compression. In addition, decoding these audio formats adds some extra time to the analysis process.

Add to Sequencer

When enabled, Sound Reaktor automatically adds your audio file to Blender's Video Sequencer, allowing you to hear the audio during playback. The audio strip is named with an "SR_" prefix for identification.

Replace Existing Audio

When enabled (recommended), removes any previous audio strips added by Sound Reaktor (identified by "SR_" prefix) before adding the new one. Keeps your sequencer clean when experimenting with different audio files.

KEYFRAME MODE

The default mode of Sound Reaktor is "Keyframe mode". In this mode, the addon analyzes the audio using the selected parameters and then creates keyframes on every frame throughout the animation, setting the timeline length according to the duration of the loaded audio file in the process. This mode is ideal for distributing the .blend file with the generated animations to users who do not have the addon, or for rendering on a render farm. The process is slower than in "Drivers" mode, which will be discussed next, although with update 2.4.2, keyframe creation is between 50 and 100 times faster than in previous versions.

The big button executes the entire Sound Reaktor pipeline. When clicked, the add-on:

Important: You don't need to clear anything before re-running. Sound Reaktor automatically replaces existing keyframes, so you can experiment freely by adjusting parameters and clicking again.

Driver Mode (Pro Only)

By default, Sound Reaktor bakes animation as keyframes, one keyframe per frame, permanently stored in the .blend file. Driver Mode is an alternative workflow: instead of generating keyframes, Sound Reaktor analyzes the audio into memory and applies Blender drivers that read that data in real time during playback.

The toggle between the two modes is located in the main panel, just below the audio file selector:

Switching to Drivers changes the main button label from MAKE IT DANCE! to ANALYZE & DRIVE.

When to use Driver Mode

Use Keyframes when…	Use Drivers when…
You want the animation to work without Sound Reaktor installed	You want to tweak parameters and re-analyze without rebaking
You're delivering the .blend to someone else	You're using Spectral Bins (requires Drivers)
You need accumulative rotation	You want lighter .blend files (no stored keyframes)
You're rendering on a farm with no addon access	You want to combine multiple analyses in one GN graph

Workflow

1. Select an object and configure your analysis settings as usual.
2. Switch the toggle to Drivers.
3. Click ANALYZE & DRIVE. Sound Reaktor analyzes the audio and stores the result in RAM. Drivers are applied to the target property immediately.
4. Press Space to play the animation. The object responds to the audio in real time.

If you want the analysis to persist after closing Blender, enable Bake to Disk (see below) before clicking ANALYZE & DRIVE.

Bake to Disk

Analysis data loaded into RAM is lost when Blender closes. Enable Bake to Disk to save the analysis to a .npz cache file on disk. The cache is stored in a subfolder next to your .blend file:

my_project/
├── my_scene.blend
└── blendcache_my_scene/
    └── SR_cache_[hash].npz

When you reopen the .blend, Sound Reaktor automatically reloads the cache. Drivers work immediately without re-analyzing.

Important: Bake to Disk requires the .blend file to be saved. If the file has not been saved yet, the option is disabled.

If analysis parameters change (audio file, frequency range, method, etc.), the existing cache is invalidated automatically and a new one is written on the next ANALYZE & DRIVE.

Driver Count Indicator

The panel displays the number of active Sound Reaktor drivers on the selected object. This is useful when combining multiple analyses on the same object. For example, a Spectral Bins node group plus a Custom Property driver.

Bake to Keyframes

Once drivers are applied, you can convert them to standard keyframes at any time using the Bake to Keyframes button. This processes all Sound Reaktor drivers on the active object at once and removes them after baking, leaving behind a regular keyframe animation that works without the addon.

Use this when:

• Sharing the file with collaborators who don't have Sound Reaktor installed.
• Sending to a render farm.
• You're done tweaking and want to finalize the animation.

Remove Drivers

The Remove Drivers button removes all Sound Reaktor drivers from the active object without converting them to keyframes. The analysis data in RAM (and on disk, if Bake to Disk was enabled) is preserved. You can re-apply drivers at any time with ANALYZE & DRIVE.

Limitations

• Accumulative Rotation is not supported in Driver Mode. The option is grayed out when Drivers is active. Use Keyframes mode if you need accumulative rotation.
• Spectral Bins is only available in Driver Mode and cannot be switched to Keyframes mode directly. To convert Spectral Bins to keyframes, first route individual bin outputs to properties via Custom mode, then use Bake to Keyframes.
• Analysis data stored in RAM only (Bake to Disk disabled) is lost when Blender closes. If you reopen the file without the cache, drivers will be present but inactive, re-run ANALYZE & DRIVE to restore them.

Analysis Preview

The Analysis Preview panel shows a quick statistical summary of the last baked analysis. It shows Floor (minimum), Peak (maximum), Average, and P95 (95th percentile) values across all frames. Use it to understand the dynamic range of your audio signal before animating.

The cost of Analysis Preview is zero. Sound Reaktor analyzes the audio to display the values, so when MAKE IT DANCE! is pressed, it will use the cached values from the audio analysis preview.

Pre-Filter (Pro Only)

Before the audio reaches the analyzer, you can run it through a high-pass, a low-pass filter or both.

This is useful when your frequency range selection alone isn't enough to isolate what you're after: a high-pass removes low-end rumble that might skew the analysis upward, while a low-pass cuts the high-frequency content that can introduce noise into bass-focused animations.

Frequency Range

The frequency range determines which part of the audio spectrum Sound Reaktor listens to. Different instruments and sounds occupy different frequency ranges.

Preset Mode

Nine carefully tuned frequency ranges covering the most common use cases:

Custom Mode (Pro Only)

For precise control, specify any range between 20 Hz and 20,000 Hz. Some useful custom ranges:

Analysis Settings

Controls how Sound Reaktor interprets your audio. Sound Reaktor 2.0+ features six analysis methods: FFT, Onset, RMS, Centroid, Flatness or Rolloff Frequency.

Choosing Your Analysis Method

FFT (Fast Fourier Transform) analyzes continuous energy in your selected frequency range. It measures "how loud is this frequency band right now?" at every frame, producing smooth, flowing animations that follow audio energy.

Onset Detection looks for sudden changes in the audio: the attack of a drum hit, the pluck of a string, the start of a vocal phrase. It identifies discrete moments where something "happens" creating snappy, rhythmic animation that reacts precisely when beats occur.

RMS Energy (Root Mean Square) measures the overall loudness of the audio at every frame. It's not focused on a specific frequency range, but the total volume of the signal. Think of it as a "master volume meter" for your animation. It's the simplest and most intuitive of all methods: loud = high value, quiet = low value. Great starting point if FFT feels too complex.

Spectral Centroid tracks where the "brightness" of the sound is at any given moment. A low value means the audio is bass-heavy (rumbles, low drones), a high value means it's treble-heavy (cymbals, high-pitched synths). It's particularly effective for animating color, light intensity, or any property where you want the animation to reflect the tonal character of the music rather than just its loudness. Spectral Centroid is slightly more advanced than RMS, FFT or Onset. Results depend heavily on your frequency range settings.

Spectral Flatness distinguishes between tonal sounds (musical notes, sustained synths) and noise-like sounds (cymbals, distortion, white noise). Values close to 0 mean the audio is pitched and harmonic and values close to 1 mean it's noisy and unpitched. Useful for triggering effects that should behave differently during melodic sections versus percussive or noisy ones. For example, a material property that changes character when a distorted guitar kicks in. Flatness is an advanced method and requires some experimentation to get useful results.

Spectral Rolloff tracks how much of the audio's energy is concentrated in the lower frequencies versus spreading into the higher ones. A low value means most energy is in the bass and a high value means energy has spread across the full spectrum. It's a good indicator of the overall harmonic richness of a sound at any moment. Like Flatness, Rolloff is and advanced method. It works best for subtle, slowly-evolving animations that follow the tonal complexity of the audio rather than its rhythm or loudness.

FFT Parameters

Sensitivity

Controls how the animation responds to different volume levels. It applies dynamic compression to amplitude values:

Smoothing

Reduces rapid fluctuations by averaging each frame's value with previous frames:

Noise Filter

Eliminates tiny fluctuations below a threshold, preventing jitter during quiet passages:

Normalization

See the next section.

Onset Parameters

Sensitivity

Controls how easily a beat is detected:

Attack Strength

Determines how much the animation moves when a beat is detected:

Decay Time

Controls how quickly animation returns to rest after a beat (in seconds):

Min Time Between

Minimum interval between detected onsets, preventing duplicate triggers:

RMS Parameters (Pro Only)

Sensitivity

Controls how the animation responds to different volume levels. It applies dynamic compression to amplitude values:

Smoothing

Reduces rapid fluctuations by averaging each frame's value with previous frames:

Noise Filter

Eliminates tiny fluctuations below a threshold, preventing jitter during quiet passages:

Normalization

See the next section.

Centroid Parameters (Pro Only)

Sensitivity

Controls how strongly the animation reacts to shifts in tonal brightness. Since centroid values tend to change gradually, higher sensitivity can help make subtle shifts more visible:

Smoothing

Centroid values naturally evolve slowly. Smoothing reinforces this behavior:

Noise Filter

Prevents the centroid from jumping erratically during near-silent frames, where the calculated center of mass becomes unreliable:

Flatness Parameters (Pro Only)

Sensitivity

Controls how strongly the animation reacts to changes between tonal and noisy content. Since flatness values often cluster toward the lower end for musical audio, higher sensitivity can help bring out more variation:

Smoothing

Flatness can change abruptly when audio transitions between pitched and noisy content. Smoothing controls how sharply those transitions appear in the animation:

Noise Filter

Prevents near-zero flatness values during silent frames from causing unwanted baseline animation:

Rolloff Parameters (Pro Only)

Rolloff Threshold

Sets the percentage of total spectral energy used to calculate the rolloff frequency. This is the primary parameter for tuning the method's behavior:

Sensitivity

Controls how strongly the animation reacts to changes in harmonic spread. Rolloff values tend to evolve slowly, so higher sensitivity can help surface gradual shifts:

Smoothing

Rolloff values naturally evolve slowly. Additional smoothing reinforces this but can reduce responsiveness to faster harmonic changes:

Noise Filter

Prevents erratic rolloff values during near-silent frames where the energy distribution becomes unreliable:

Normalization (Pro Only)

Sound Reaktor produces amplitude values in the range 0.0–1.0. Normalization controls how raw audio energy is mapped to that range. Two modes are available when using FFT, RMS, or Spectral Bins analysis.

Per-Band Peak (default)

The loudest moment in the analysis is set to 1.0. Every other frame is scaled relative to that peak.

A track where the kick barely reaches half the energy of the chorus will have its kick mapped to ~0.5 .The full 0–1 range is used only if the target frequency band actually gets loud at some point.

Good for:

• Single-property animation (Location, Rotation, Scale, Custom Property).
• Getting the maximum animation range out of quiet or narrow frequency bands.
• Situations where you want the object to hit its full Range value at least once during the track.

Watch out for:

When using Spectral Bins, each band is normalized independently. A quiet high-frequency band will still reach 1.0 . It will animate with the same range as a loud low-frequency band even if the actual energy difference between them is large. This flattens the natural loudness relationships between bands.

Global

All frequency bands share a single reference scale, the 99th percentile of the full spectrogram. Bands that are naturally louder reach values closer to 1.0, bands that are naturally quieter stay lower.

This means the relative energy differences between bands are preserved. If the bass is three times louder than the highs in the audio, the bass output will be roughly three times higher in the animation data as well.

The 99th percentile is used instead of the absolute peak to avoid a single transient spike dominating the scale and compressing everything else.

Good for:

• Spectral Bins: preserves the natural loudness hierarchy across the 9 frequency bands. The animation "feels" like the audio bass moves more than highs when the bass is louder.
• Scenes where the relative difference between multiple simultaneous analyses is meaningful.
• Tracks with a consistent loudness profile throughout.

Watch out for:

• Quiet or sparse frequency bands may produce very little animation movement. They stay low because they are genuinely quiet relative to the rest of the track. Increase Sensitivity or Range to compensate.
• Tracks with a very loud intro followed by a quiet body (or vice versa) may produce unexpected scaling, since the global reference is computed across the full track.

Choosing Between the Two

	Per-Band Peak	Global
Each band fills 0–1 range	Yes	Only the loudest band
Relative energy between bands preserved	No	Yes
Best for single-property animation	Yes	No
Best for Spectral Bins	No	Yes
Quiet bands still animate visibly	Yes	Not without Sensitivity boost

Animate Property

Determines which property of your object responds to the audio: Location, Rotation, Scale, Custom Property or Spectral Bins.

Location

Moves your object through 3D space in response to audio.

Rotation

Spins your object based on audio amplitude.

Scale

Makes your object grow and shrink with audio. The classic "pulsing" effect.

Custom Property (Pro Only)

Custom mode is the most powerful and versatile animation target in Sound Reaktor because it breaks the boundary between audio-reactive animation and the rest of Blender.

 While Location, Rotation, and Scale are limited to object transforms, Custom mode lets you drive any numeric property in the entire application: shader node values, geometry node parameters, light energy, camera focal length, modifier inputs, constraint influences, shape key weights, compositor node values, and more.

 This means Sound Reaktor is not just an object animation tool: it is a universal audio-to-parameter bridge for anything Blender can express as a number. A single analysis pass can make a material's emission strength pulse to the kick drum, a displacement modifier react to the bass, or a depth-of-field blur open and close with the vocal track, properties that have no equivalent in transform-based animation modes.

 Custom mode also becomes the entry point for routing any of Sound Reaktor's six analysis methods into a Geometry Nodes or Shader graph, making it the foundation on which the most sophisticated audio-reactive setups are built.

Animate any numeric property in Blender: material values, light intensity, modifier parameters, camera settings, Geometry Nodes, Compositor Nodes and much more.

Getting the Data Path

Although the method below of manually copying and pasting the datapath is valid, starting from version 2.2.0 there is a faster and more direct way to do it. Simply choose the ‘Send to Sound Reaktor’ option in the context menu of the property you want to animate, and the addon will handle the entire process automatically.

The add-on validates your path immediately. A checkmark means the path works.

Supported Property Types

Works: Light energy, shader node values (emission, roughness), modifier parameters, Geometry Nodes, camera settings, constraint influences, shape key values, Compositor Nodes.

Does not work: Integer properties(*), boolean properties (checkboxes), enum properties (dropdowns), string properties (text fields).

Value Range Controls

Base value is the lowest point in the animation and Base Value + Range is the highest point.

Although Sound Reaktor does not directly support integer parameters, there are cases where they can still be used with the help of Geometry Nodes. In the following video, a method is shown for animating the subdivision level, which is an integer parameter, of an object using Sound Reaktor.

Spectral Bins (Pro Only)

Spectral Bins splits the audio frequency spectrum into 9 independent bands and animates all of them simultaneously in a single analysis pass. Instead of generating keyframes, it works exclusively in Driver Mode . The analysis data is stored in RAM (and optionally cached to disk as a .npz file alongside your .blend).

On first use, Sound Reaktor automatically generates two node groups: SR Spectral Bins (Geometry Nodes) and SR Spectral Bins Shader (Shader nodes). Each group exposes 9 float outputs, one per frequency band, ranging from 0.0 to 1.0. You can plug these outputs into any property in a GN modifier or material, displacement amount, scale, emission strength, roughness, or anything else that accepts a float. The node groups are shared across all objects in the scene, so adding the same group to multiple objects costs nothing extra, they all read from the same in-memory data store.

 Normalization follows the same dropdown as FFT mode: Per-Band Peak (default) normalizes each band independently to its own peak amplitude. Global uses a single 99th-percentile divisor across the full spectrogram, preserving relative energy differences between bands so that a quiet high-frequency band stays quieter than a loud bass band.

Limitations: Spectral Bins requires the .blend file to be saved if disk cache is enabled. Unsaved files keep the data in RAM only, which is lost when Blender closes. The node groups are generated once and reused; if you delete them manually, use the Regenerate Node Groups button to rebuild them.

Warning: Spectral Bins cannot be baked to keyframes directly from the node group outputs.

One of the most powerful features of Sound Reaktor 2.4.2 is that, in practice, it allows for up to 11 different outputs within a Geometry Nodes graph or a Shader. Spectral Bins generates a node group with 9 outputs in FFT mode, corresponding to the 9 presets available across the different analysis methods. In addition to that, it is possible to expose two other types of analysis, one in keyframe mode and another in driver mode, by using, for example, a Value node to store them.

SR Animation Info Panel

This collapsible panel appears below the main panel when you select an object that has been animated with Sound Reaktor. It provides a summary of all animations applied to that object, including:

Sound Reaktor 2.0 stores a complete snapshot of every bake parameter alongside each animated property, far more than what the Animation Info panel displays. Fields such as smoothing factor, noise filter settings, high-pass and low-pass filter configuration, onset envelope parameters (attack, decay, minimum time), rolloff threshold percentage, per-axis base values, frame start, frames-per-second, bake timestamp, and both absolute and relative audio file paths are all recorded silently in the background. This extended metadata is the foundation for Re-Reaktor All, an upcoming feature that will allow Sound Reaktor to re-bake every animated property in a scene in one click, restoring the exact same settings used in the original bake, without the user having to reconfigure anything.

Legacy Install (version 1.x)

This part of the documentation corresponds to the installation of versions prior to Sound Reaktor 2.0 and is retained only for convenience in case someone wants to install a legacy version.

Important: If you're about to install Sound Reaktor 1.x, keep reading. At this point, the add-on is installed but not yet functional. You'll see a message indicating that dependencies are required. Sound Reaktor needs three Python libraries (NumPy, SciPy and PyAV) to perform audio analysis. Since version 1.9.2, Sound Reaktor uses the NumPy library included with Blender by default, making SciPy the only required installation. PyAV is optional but recommended, as it allows the use of audio files in MP3, OGG, OPUS, FLAC, M4A, and AAC formats.

Important update: On the order page after purchasing the add-on you will see, in addition to the standard add-on file named sound_reaktor_1_x_x.zip (~40 KB), another version called sound_reaktor_wdeps_winx64_1_x_x.zip (~70 MB). This latter version includes the dependencies but is compatible with Windows only. Do not attempt to install this version on Linux or macOS, as it will not work. If any issues arise, the recommended approach is to revert to the official version and install the dependencies directly from within the add-on.

Installing Dependencies (deprecated on v2.0)

Sound Reaktor relies on NumPy and SciPy for its audio analysis capabilities. NumPy handles the numerical computations, while SciPy provides the signal processing algorithms (FFT and onset detection) that make frequency analysis possible.

To be able to open MP3, OGG, OPUS, FLAC, M4A, and AAC audio files, it uses the PyAV library, which can be optionally installed if that functionality is needed.

Windows

Windows users benefit from automatic installation directly within Blender:

Troubleshooting: If installation fails, check that your internet connection is active and that no firewall or antivirus software is blocking the download. Running Blender as administrator may help. The Blender console (Window › Toggle System Console) will display detailed error messages.

Linux

Linux installation requires manual steps through the terminal. The process depends on how Blender was installed on your system.

Blender Downloaded from blender.org

If you downloaded Blender directly from the official website, it includes its own bundled Python interpreter:

Blender Installed via Package Manager

If Blender was installed through your distribution's package manager (apt, dnf, pacman), it typically uses the system Python. Installing NumPy and SciPy to a user-specific location is recommended:

macOS

macOS installation follows the same process as Linux when Blender is downloaded from blender.org. The Python executable is located at:

Navigate to that directory in Terminal and run:

Restart Blender after installation completes.

Roadmap

Sound Reaktor is actively developed with new features planned for future releases.

Near Term

Medium Term

Have an idea? Feature requests are welcome through SuperHive Market's messaging system or via support email.

Changelog

Version 2.4.2

• Add: Shader node group for Spectral Bins ("SR Spectral Bins Shader") . Use frequency data directly in materials. Both node groups are auto-generated on first use.
• Add: Drivers mode UX improvements. Main button shows "ANALYZE & DRIVE" with a dedicated icon, dynamic tooltip describes the active mode, SR driver count is shown in the panel, node groups regenerate in-place preserving existing references in the node editor.
• Fix: 50–200× faster keyframe baking! Scale, Location, Rotation and Custom Property now inject keyframes in bulk instead of one by one.
• Fix: Custom data path refactoring to use as a function with keyframe and driver mode.
• Fix: Custom driver not animating shape keys.
• Fix: Custom path parser: modifier names with brackets, shape key driver target, shared parser between keyframe bake and driver apply.
• Fix: Sound Reaktor driver detection and removal missing shader node tree, material, and shape key animation datablocks.
• Fix: Extend Sound Reaktor driver detection to object data, data node tree, lights and cameras animation datablocks.
• Fix: spectral centroid now respects the user-selected frequency band (previously computed over the full spectrum, ignoring Frequency Range).
• Fix: Driver frame offset no longer collapses frame_start=0 to 1 due to Python falsy semantics.
• Fix: Analyze_fft_bins replaces its O(bins × frames × columns) nested loop with a precomputed frame→STFT-column mapping for a significant speedup on long tracks.
• Fix: Timeline frame bounds now use proper numeric limits instead of hardcoded values, preventing edge cases with very long audio files.
• Fix: Spectral Bins tooltip now correctly mentions both Geometry Nodes and Shader node groups.
• Fix: Old cache files on disk are now purged before writing a new one, preventing stale .npz files from accumulating.
• Fix: Accumulative rotation toggle is now grayed out in Drivers mode. Accumulative rotation is not supported with real-time drivers.
• Fix: Custom property driver mode now works for all target types.
• Fix: Custom path parser now correctly handles modifier names containing brackets.
• Fix: Shape key drivers now target the Key datablock instead of the individual KeyBlock.
• Fix: Sound Reaktor driver detection and removal now searches all relevant datablocks.
• FFT and Spectral Bins drivers can now coexist on different objects using the same audio file.

Version 2.4.1

• Fix: Stereo-to-mono conversion in the WAV loader now correctly averages channels before casting, preventing integer overflow with 16-bit files.
• Fix: Butterworth pre-filter no longer crashes when the cutoff frequency is at or above the Nyquist limit.
• Fix: Warning shown in Frequency Range panel when the minimum frequency is set higher than the maximum.
• Fix: Driver engine NPZ file handle is now properly closed after reading, preventing file lock issues on Windows.

Version 2.4.0

• Add: Animate Property resets to Scale automatically when switching from Drivers to Keyframes mode, preventing invalid state.
• Add: Audio File label and file picker merged into a single compact row.
• Add: Normalization dropdown in Analysis Settings (FFT, RMS and Spectral Bins) with two modes: Per-Band Peak (default, legacy behavior) and Global (99th-percentile of the full spectrogram).
• Fix: Analysis Settings and Animate Property panels are now collapsed by default for a cleaner initial UI.
• Fix: Driver Mode UI refactored. Radio buttons for mode selection, inline cache info, SR Data sub-panel removed.
• Fix: FFT normalization no longer destroys inter-band amplitude differences.
• Fix: RMS normalization suffered from the same destructive min-max pattern and is now corrected, with the new dropdown available in RMS mode as well.
• Fix: Spectral Bins normalization pipeline corrected.
• Fix: STFT overlap is now matched to the project FPS, eliminating jitter artifacts at high frame rates (60fps+).

Version 2.3.0

• Add: Driver Mode. Analyze audio to RAM and apply real-time drivers to object properties. Drivers can be removed or converted to keyframes at any time.
• Add: Disk cache for Driver Mode. Save analysis data to .npz file alongside the .blend for persistent playback across sessions.
• Add: Spectral Bins. Animate 9 frequency bands simultaneously using a single analysis pass. Generates a Geometry Nodes group ("SR Spectral Bins") with one output per band.
• Add: Bake to Keyframes. Converts all Sound Reaktor drivers on the active object to standard keyframes and removes the drivers.
• Add: Remove Drivers. Removes all SR drivers from the active object without baking.

Version 2.2.1 (Updated: 2026/03/26)

Version 2.0.1

Version 2.0.0

Version 1.9.3

Version 1.9.2

Version 1.9.1

Version 1.9.0

Version 1.8.3

Version 1.8.2

Version 1.8.1

Version 1.8

Version 1.7.1

Version 1.7

Version 1.6

Version 1.5

Version 1.3.1

Version 1.3

Version 1.2

Version 1.1.1

Version 1.1

Version 1.0 (First Private Beta)

Version 0.9

Version 0.8

Version 0.7

Version 0.6

Version 0.5

Version 0.4

Version 0.3

Version 0.2

Version 0.1 (Initial Alpha Release)

Credits

Sound Reaktor was developed by Yatima.

Third-Party Libraries

Sound Reaktor depends on the following open-source libraries:

NumPy

NumPy is the fundamental package for scientific computing in Python, providing support for large, multi-dimensional arrays and matrices, along with a collection of mathematical functions to operate on these arrays.

SciPy

SciPy is a library for scientific and technical computing, built on NumPy. Sound Reaktor uses SciPy's signal processing module for FFT analysis and onset detection algorithms.

PyAV

PyAV provides Pythonic bindings for FFmpeg libraries, offering direct, high-level access to video and audio streams.

The BSD 3-Clause License permits redistribution and use in source and binary forms, with or without modification, provided that copyright notices and license terms are retained.

Contact and Support

If you encounter issues, have questions, or want to suggest features, there are two ways to reach support:

blenderartists.org Thread

To discuss Sound Reaktor, follow updates, or get general support, there is also a thread on blenderartists.org forum.

Email

For technical support, bug reports, or feature requests:

support@yatima.xyz

When Reporting Bugs

Please include the following information to help diagnose issues quickly:

Tip: Detailed information helps provide effective solutions faster. The more context you provide, the better we can assist you!