Nutritious

What program are you currently using? Are you looking for free software, or a commercial release? Any editing program should be able to compress your video, you just need to download and install the codec (i.e. divx) that you want to compress it in and configure it via the editing program. You also should be able to encode audio (I'd recommend LAME mp3) in most editing programs, but I've personally only worked with a few programs myself.

Man, I've got no inspiration from this one so far. I guess it would help if I had played the game, but my last Zelda game was LttP (3d zelda never really appealed to me for whatever reason). Hopefully something will come to me eventually.

Ok, this sounds a heck of a lot better than the original and while your volume level isn't quite as loud as the original, I definitely think it's reasonable at this level. Heard some distortion on the rhythm guitar from :58 - :59, right when that ride cymbal comes in. Not sure what's causing it because it's nearly identical to 1:14-1:15, but there's no distortion the second time. Might want to check if a sample got doubled up or something or the guitar. I think it's still a little hard to pick out sounds from each other in the mix - which is why some panning would probably help you out here (not extreme right/left, but minor to at least separate the meat of the sounds). Up to you though, you're making good progress.

Yeah, there's a huge difference between your two examples. The second sounds a heck of a lot better (no more audible clipping or heavy distortion), but now we need to get the volume up. Here's a few tips that I hope can help: -Pan your sounds: it sounds like everything is in the center, you can alieviate some of the muddiness between the instruments by giving them a little room on each side, just don't go overboard. (might have added some in the second version it sounds like) -EQ: it's hard to tell, but it seems like many of your instruments are occuping the same frequency range (mid range seems really heavy). Try gradually toning down the frequencies that aren't vital to each specific instrument. For example, tone down the higher frequencies on the kick & bass (or low guitar, it's hard to tell). This will also open up some more space for your samples to breathe. -Compression (it's not always about the master track). Sure, you can squash your sounds against a compressor on the master, but that can lead to a muddy sound, especially in a genre like metal where you're really pushing the volume. Get some good compression on your drums individually and maybe lighter compression on other instruments as needed. Then, use a compressor on the master just to catch any stray clipping issues that may hit you. I'm definitely not the most experienced person here at production, but those basic tips should help you out.

Guitars! Got most of the guitar work recorded a couple days ago and I've been mixing them in. I don't want to give away too much, so I'm posting the beginning section: http://nutritiousmultimedia.googlepages.com/ShowdownSample.mp3 Trying to get some good balancing on the guitars and other instruments in here, so any feedback would be great.

I like a lot of the ideas Scott's got going here, especially for an early mix on the site. What really detracts from the song for me, though, is the distortion in the mix when the drums come in, especially with the kick. It sounds like it's either digital clipping or it's been slammed hard against a limiter. Anyway, it's not enough to keep this song off my playlist though, still good stuff.

I really like what you've got started here. That's a pretty bright piano, but I guess that's a matter of taste. Groove at :32 is really nice, solid backing. You've got a good base here, I think you'll just need to develop this with more ideas and material before I can say much more .

Well, first of all I want to say, you've picked a really tough song to remix (Ice Cap). Not because of technical difficulty, but simply because it's been covered so many times it's difficult to come up with an original take on it. That said, I'll try and give some tips on what you've got so far. Overall, it sounds like you're going for a laid-back feeling take on the original. Right now, though, the piece is very sparse with a solo piano covering most of the material. I think this needs a lot of development with other instruments. Perhaps some backing pads, something else to cover some of the lower descending notes, more percussion, etc. Starting out, you've got a piano layered with a bell and a simple synth string. Each are playing the same descending pattern very mechanically, then repeated a couple times with additional chords on the strings. I think it's really important at the beginning of your song to start with something that's going to capture the attention of the listener. Not trying to be mean, but this starts out very dull and basically follows very closely to the original. I'm not too crazy on the synth strings you're using, but I guess it depends on what feel you're going for. Next comes a piano basically playing alone with the original almost verbatum, then repeated with a little more complexity, then repeated yet again with slightly more added. It's hard to help with something like this, but I'd say that you need to come up with an idea of how you want to interpret the song in an original way rather than just cover it with a few embellishments. How you decide to do that will really impact the direction of your song. If you do continue to use a lot of piano, try adjusting the timing and velocities of the notes so it doesn't sound so rigid. Try and picture how someone performing the piano part would emphasize certain notes over others and wouldn't be playing every note exactly on time. At this point, I think it would be helpful for you to listen to some other music from genre's that are similar to what you are trying to accomplish with this piece. Notice the instrumentation used as well as how the piece flows - not a melody line once, repeated several times adding a few more notes each time, but different instruments/synths playing different parts and dynamic (loudness) changes. Sorry for the long post, but I hope this helps you develop your music further.

Do you have the Soundfont Player plugin? There are tons of free soundfonts on the web for just about every type of instrument. Try hammersound.net and sf2midi.com. Also, you should probably check out this thread.

Alright, only minor changes this time: -Worked with the drums a little more, replaced the shaker with a hihat for the most part, did a little EQing on them -Brightened up the strings a little with some EQing -Fixed some wrong notes in bridge section Same link as above. I'm hoping I can get together with my guitarist to get this recorded either tomorrow or Friday.

Well, it's actually a shaker, hence the more static sound. I'll experiment with some other sounds or hats to see if anything fits well. That was actually intentional experimentation - but yeah, I don't think it sounds good either. Will be fixed. So, more dynamics with the rest of the sounds when the drums build up? Yup, the section after the bridge where the guitar is playing alone (now with bells) is exactly for that. Should turn out pretty nice.

Updated song, same link as above. -I worked on the drums as you suggested and I think they're coming along pretty well. The bridge section turned out a whole lot better with this type of beat, I think, so thanks for the tips -I had planned originally to use the chimes from the beginning again later in the mix, but had forgotten as I was working on the song. Added now, thanks for the reminder -There are a few clashes/distortion areas that still need to be fixed

Hey guys, this is a remix of the Last Battle track from Cave Story. It's a great original tune, perfect for that point in the game, so I definitely felt like it deserved some coverage: http://nutritiousmultimedia.googlepages.com/ShowdownCaveStory.mp3 Original: http://nutritiousmultimedia.googlepages.com/31FinalBattle.mp3 The electric guitar synth is a placeholder for now - a good friend of mine who's a professional musician is going to lay down some electric guitar tracks for the finished song. It's also missing from the end as this will be an ad lib section for the guitar. I've still got some work to do to clean up some strings (a few goofs and conflicting notes), drums (variety in middle section) and EQing, but thought I'd share it here with everyone. Hope you enjoy.

Thanks for the bump, ToN . I actually have had this on the backburner for a while. I was having trouble coming up with additional ideas for the song and I think I was about at the limit of my ability at the time. Been working on a lot of music since then and I've just recently gotten some new ideas for this one. I have another track I'm planning on (actually, finally) submitting to ocr soon, and this one will probably follow that once I finish it.

Heck no! The wooden spoon will be mine!

Two entries and 0 votes so far with 1 day left

Bump for voting

I've been having the same problem lately and it's been driving me crazy. I've just ended up adding an extra measure at the end of each clip just to make sure it doesn't cut off. I don't remember when this started happening, but it may have been with FL Studio 7. EDIT: I think I found the answer (on the fl studio forums, imagine that). Try turning off Smart Disable for the track you're rendering. Apparently, it cuts off the track after a certain amount of time rather than letting long reverbs hold out.

I've been working on some Homeworld mixes lately, so I figured I'd try and get some feedback to improve them. Basically, my premise is to take some of the tracks from the game and rearrange them with "real" instruments (orchestral, guitar, drums) rather than electronic or ambient genres. One I've been working on is a remix of the tracks in the game that deal with the Kadesh: http://nutritiousmultimedia.googlepages.com/HomeworldKadeshiRemixV3.mp3 This remix covers several tracks in the game. Level ambience for the Garden of Kadesh level from :00 - 1:04 (Track04), meeting with the Kadesh Ambassador from 1:04 - 1:45(Track23), and Kadesh Swarmer Battle from 1:46-2:53(Track15). Just cuts off for now at the end as that section hasn't been developed a whole lot yet. Also, I haven't decided yet if I'd end up submitting this to OCR, but I'd like to improve it nonetheless.

If I remember right, there is a "TV safe" viewing area that you can work with when creating videos. I'm not sure if this applies in this case, but when I was using Premiere, it gave you an overlay showing what portion of the viewing screen would be viewable on a television. I'm not familiar with Nero Vision, but it's the only thing I can think of that would cause the picture to be cut off if you're already using 4:3 ratio. Have you checked whether or not the top of the screen is also cut off when using 4:3? Or is it just the sides?

Awright, my entry is up. There's still another day left to enter, so hopefully we get some more people in here.

Thanks Doul

Would it be possible to get an extension on this one? Maybe a day or so? I've finally got some ideas flowing, but haven't had enough time to work on it yet.

Well, I was going for quality of the original tune rather than popularity of the original game, but I guess it didn't go over too well . Hope you pick a good one, Joe.

You probably already tried this, but did you patch it up first? It didn't work until I patched it AND used compatibility mode.