Yoozer

When you do everything by yourself, you're going to be a jack of all trades. Someone behind the faders in a real-world studio with enough traffic has been making damn good coffee for 2-3 years and usually has more experience mixing stuff; not only do they have to know their gear inside and out, they also know what to listen for. You will not pick this up in any other way than practice, practice, and more practice, and because you have to spend time on composing, learning your software etc, too, it'll simply take you longer. .wav is uncompressed and mp3 is of a lesser quality; just like a jpg file in a camera is not as usable as a .raw file with all the pixels intact. Neither says anything about the quality; it's just that you want to use the .wav as a source because it is not compressed. Try this: draw something in Paint. Save it as JPG. Open it in Paint. Add a few lines. Save as JPG. Repeat several times and see what happens with the original drawing. That's what happens with an mp3 file if you use it and compress it every single time. .mid files do not sound like anything. If you have to blame anything for them sounding like ass, blame any cheap on-board soundcard, because the "Microsoft GS Wavetable Synthesizer" is making that noise, and it's mainly to give people an idea of the melody (and to make GeoCities sites with included .mid files hell on earth). "Studio quality" to you is very simple; it means that the result is loud and that there's a "smiley" equalizer curve. This is easy to achieve, but again, it says nothing about the skill, because any plugin can do this for you. Whether you actually want this (no) or whether it teaches you anything (no) - that's a different matter. Just making it loud and making it sound good on cheap speakers is not studio quality. It's very simple; if you're expecting that kind of sound out of a single plugin, you're not going to find it. Let me illustrate this with an example: This is how a default plugin is going to sound: http://www.theheartcore.com/music/armin_communication_dull.mp3 This is what happens when you polish it: http://www.theheartcore.com/music/armin_communication_shiny.mp3 (Plugin: xhip, free VST. Reverb: built-in version in Ableton Live. Compression: Ableton Live's Compressor II and on the master, Endorphin (free). Delay: Ableton Live's Ping-pong delay). See what a difference the polishing makes?

y helo thar http://www.soundonsound.com/sos/allsynthsecrets.htm Start with part 1 at the bottom and start reading.

There's no tutorial for this. It boils down to this: - something to control your software with: a keyboard with USB and knobs, maybe even some pads. Doesn't need its own sounds. State your budget and how big you want it to be, that'll be all. - a sequencer: e.g. the "conductor" of all your instruments. Reason is pretty versatile, but FL Studio is a nice option too; lots of choice in this department and as long as it runs VST plugins nicely you're OK (Reason is self-contained mostly, but you can bother with that later if you want to). - plugins (again, Reason is self-contained so you get a lot of 'm with it already). There's a crapton of cheap and free synthesizers out there, add a sampler for your own noises and percussion samples and maybe something for the orchestral stuff, and you're good to go, too. - an USB/Firewire/PCI audio interface (that's a fancy word for a soundcard). Do you play another instrument or do you want to record vocals? If that's not the case, an M-Audio Audiophile 2496 or 192 will do, or an E-mu 0404 (both PCI). The latter has a software package as an extra (Proteus X) which gives you a nice sound library. - something to listen to your music (so-called monitor speakers) or quality headphones. They don't make your stuff sound good; but they make sure it'll sound good on most people's stereos, mp3 players, or whatever. Again, state your budget. That's all you need - and of course a fast computer. Graphics cards don't matter at all unless you have a laptop or a motherboard that uses up internal memory; in that case a modest graphics card will free up that memory (since it's used by the sequencer). It's also nice if you have a dualhead so you can use 2 monitors next to eachother. Whatever you choose, keep in mind that there is no specific hardware for this; only software, and even then an orchestral library may be good for more than just classical-like music, and a synth is versatile enough for any genre.

Hey, I know exactly who my dad is! . Anyway, ( Estoy seguro que esto sonará igualmente ridículo en español ) Soundclick no ofrece cada uno para descargar sus canciones. Deje a jueces escuchar su canción, Soundclick es bastante bueno. Si usted quisiera que la gente lo descargara usted debe hacer su propio Web site. Otra opción es un anfitrión público del archivo como www.rapidshare.com o www.putfile.com.

Choose a different name. This one is too easily bastardized to "Poopsmashertrance". Summarized problem: You're lazy. Solution 1): Get someone else to do it, then drug them and upload it under your own name. Drawback: you can do this only once. Solution 2): Get someone else to do it, but try to score points as "collaborator". Drawback: it's not just your own name in the spotlight. Solution 3): Choose something else, perhaps the bleeps of Space Invaders. Not only are those a less-milked-out theme than anything Final Fantasy, you don't have to do as much work either. [23:34] <Dyne> Wow yoozer, way to pwn the noob. [23:34] <yoozer> i don't call it "pwning the noob". i call it "applying intellectual pressure to cause introspection"

Yeah, what about it? What about airline foo- oh wait, let's not go there. No, seriously. It's a studio monitoring solution. No, that's the Presonus Firebox. Sound Blaster converters are the most vile, cheap pieces of shit this side of a Covox and the plugs have enough noise to satisfy Merzbow for 3 centuries. He needs more surface area but with the same dimensions, so I don't know if that means bigger walls or smaller ones.

I've got Adam A7s and I'm not as cool as analoq but cool enough to get my own birthday thread. They're very neat. Anyway, room size is more a logistical issue most of the time; can you cram all your stuff in there and reach it properly? Nobody'll bash you for that, because putting money towards that is generally a sane action. Eh, reflection is a property of the wall, not of the speaker. If you want that fixed, you need basstraps (not the cheap pointy foam; that's only for high frequencies).

mein eyes! mein eyes! thank you both

Here's an example that's hopefully helpful: excerpt from original - Jurassic Park, SNES, "Ocean" track http://www.theheartcore.com/music/snesjp_ocean_orig.mp3 remix: http://www.theheartcore.com/music/snesjp_ocean_remix.mp3 Notice what happened? I left some bits away, chose different instruments, and altered parts of the melody a bit.

Yoozer was on a 2-week holiday . The Micro X and X-50 both have the Triton LE sound engine, but they've got a different soundset, with the Micro X being more dancey. I don't know if they've got different source samples too - Korg has had expansion boards for the Triton, so they might've used some of the Dance board for the Micro X (which is what the description on the Korg site suggests). Compare the Yamaha CS6x and S30 - same soundset, only the CS6x is more aimed towards electronic (dance) music. The Micro X has more programs (640 as opposed to 512) but those are just preset locations. Both have 64 mb of sample memory. Good deal? Well, it's an LE in a cheaper package minus the sequencer and a different display (Color-wise. Same resolution, it seems). The actual "synth-only" synths are the Radias and the R3, which don't have samples (well, they do, but not in the way the X-50/Micro X have).

Doesn't matter. Start with the hooking up part first - if it doesn't have an USB port, you're going to need a USB-MIDI cable. If that's alright, then the software still doesn't matter; start shopping around with what you have as a budget. The rest is pretty much a matter of personal preference, and you can find out what yours is by downloading trial versions of the major sequencing programs (Ableton, FL Studio, Reason, Reaper, EnergyXT, Sonar, Cubase, whatever) and checking which of 'm 1) fits in your budget and 2) allows you to work with it easily. If by SFX you mean the sounds - like rain, waves, thunder, etc - "effect sounds", you can record them with your computer, and then use a software sampler (or one of the pieces of software mentioned above) to play them back. If by SFX you mean an effect applied to the sound - e.g. a "Hall" or "Room" or "Chorus" effect that makes the "dry" sound different, then no. Those are pretty horrible . In that case the major undertaking is to make the software as mentioned above recognize that there's this cable attached - it is not mentioned under that name. Try to get the FL Studio trial - lots of tutorials to find - go to the MIDI setup menu - http://www.flstudio.com/help/html/envsettings_midi.htm - and see if you can get the cable to work under "Input" - it probably has the name of your (on-board) soundcard. Also, keep in mind - the cable's MIDI IN goes into your keyboard's MIDI OUT (Cliff's notes: MIDI signal OUT of the keyboard goes IN the computer and vice-versa). This in case you can't get it to work. Just see if you see the MIDI lights blinking and you'll be able to work with it.

Compression is an effect of processing, not usually something that's included in the sample itself (unless it's a loop, of course).

Absynth has a forte in screwed-up sounds, long, ambient soundscapes and just wild, unrecognizable effects. It's got some stuff in there that can score an entire J-horror movie just by holding a single key. But, eventually, it's all variations on the old "hey, let's scare people by playing high, jarred notes on a violin" in - but because synths don't care about physical limitations (ow my arm gets tired), you can draw out its duration and let it spend its jolly time on a crescendo. It can do "regular" sounds too, but most owners would ask you why you wanted to do that - you have "regular" synths for that .Anyway, modern game soundtracks are tougher; mostly because there's a lot more storage room for the music. This means that the recognizability of the theme isn't there so much (unless it's a movie adaptation which usually has a number of distinct themes and melody "hooks"). Second point is of course that the music is no longer bound to a particular soundchip. On older consoles, you had to do everything with the limited number of voices or sample storage, and there aren't any tools like effects (reverb; chorus can be faked) or dynamic treatment (compressors). That, plus the limited memory means that music had to get to the point pretty fast (no elaborate introductions), but also not bore you to tears when playing it for a long time. As for your sound palette: - one plugin/module/keyboard for realistic sounds. It's called the "bread & butter" - basically you have a reasonably big library with pianos, strings, brass, etc. - one plugin/module/keyboard for non-realistic sounds. This can be done by Absynth - but a lot more options are available. - one sampler (or any plugin/module/keyboard specifically geared towards playing back your own recorded sounds or samples). The difference with the first one is pretty much nothing anymore nowadays; it's just that samplers usually didn't have libraries included (except for some factory sounds) while the first is switch-on-load-up-go. This sampler will handle the percussion and effects sounds. That's it, basically. The reason people have more of 'm? Very simple; you can split up the bread & butter in various libraries. Something like this here: http://www.luxonix.com/home/en/products.html?id=ravityS - that's all thrown in one. To split this up, you'd buy: http://www.ilio.com/vienna/index.html - for all the orchestral sounds, http://www.native-instruments.com/index.php?id=akoustikpiano_us for the piano, B4 for the organ (since this is modeled it won't slurp up absurd amounts of room). It just depends on it how crazy you want to make things; splitting up is converting cash to added realism. Don't underestimate the bread & butter; it's very useful. It's also something Absynth generally won't do for you (exception: some programmer with wayyy too much time could make a beautiful-sounding violin on it; just don't ask for other instruments). Then there's the problem of stalwart genres. Older sound chips just sounded like nothing else at the time; a modern soundtrack sounds like everything else, because a composer has everything at his disposal. So, per scene or level or whatever part of the game, you get a soundtrack that fits best; it discerns itself more by the instruments used than by the pace and melody. As a composer, you want to convey atmosphere; as a remixer, you want to take a look at the piece of music on its own and change the atmosphere to your own liking; since it's no longer attached to a certain phase of the game. Or you just want to replace the arrangement with more realistic instruments. Rob Hubbard (Commodore 64 composer and pretty much god, along with a few others) once said about a certain remix that it sounded exactly as he imagined it should, if he didn't have the limitations of the SID-chip. On the other hand; if he didn't have it, the tune wouldn't have sounded like that at all.

For SNES sounds, it's simple; the sound is just a lower quality sample of what you're supposed to hear. For the NES and Megadrive, you have to imagine what the sound's supposed to represent. All composers draw on their knowledge of real instruments and have to deal with the unrealistic or completely different sounding version on the console. Worse, their entire array of tricks doesn't work. On most NES games, this is hard; squarewaves are the easiest to do, but the result is that every instrument in the track sounds similar. Still, it leaves you with discernable portions of the bass, the padding and the lead. Replace it with something similar that fills this role until it clicks - sometimes it's indeed just that.

If this were a buddhist monastery I'd slap you and tell you to go sweep the temple courtyard. Twice. With a toothbrush. For asking the stupid, wrong question that keeps you away from nirvana. Start with the really simple stuff. Use a keyboard with a piano sound. I don't care if it's a cheap Casio or an awesome graded hammer-action board. Just get that in front of you. Then, listen to the melody of the original song. Then play it. Repeat it. Try different styles; put a different emphasis on the notes. Add some swing. Substitute chords. Transpose. Play faster, slower, try to cram it in 3/4ths. Improvise over it. Add a counterpoint. Eventually you'll find something that sticks and sounds different. You're halfway done; after this, you'll get out of the rest of the instruments, and fill in stuff.

http://www.ocremix.org/forums/forumdisplay.php?f=12 Click Guides and Tutorials: http://www.ocremix.org/forums/forumdisplay.php?f=29 Click Mixing for Free http://www.ocremix.org/forums/showthread.php?t=1468 Read. What do you already have? (computer, speakers, keyboards, soundcards) What can you spend (amount of currency in actual number) Is this just for trying stuff out or do you really want to go for it?

You've got to be kidding me, but okay, this is understandable. See, a music production studio is not something you buy all at once - like a house or a car. You buy it one part at a time. The advantage? You won't have to figure out everything at the same time. If you want that, take an internship at a studio; and even then, you learn things one step at a time. Dare I say... Reaktor? Well, there you have it! You could've started with the audio interface and shitty speakers, and then upgrade once you were 100% sure you wanted to continue this ordeal.

Quality matters because otherwise you get a shit-ton of crap. They're there to help you. If two instruments occupy the same frequency space, you use the equalizer to trim then down a bit and remove the flabs. If you can't help them occupying the same space, you use a compressor to tone 'm down. Cut, not boost. Don't dump a comp on every channel unless it needs one. In a lot of cases, it's polish - but it can't save a crappy mix. The "I'm looking to create music like X" doesn't help. EQ and compressors have settings that depend on the type (clean or smearing), instrument, personal preferences of the producer and a crapton of other factors that mean you can't carbon-copy their settings and be done with it.

Yeah, because that's exactly the argument I made. No. Basically, everything you name there except Reason supports VST plugins. That means that the quality of the synthesizer or the effect is everywhere the same; the plugin won't magically do something else. Furthermore, there's the summing engine myth; don't bother, because they've done the actual tests on that, and the engine doesn't make a difference. All do their number-crunching exactly the same way. What matters way more is outboard; the quality of your microphones, or if you use an analog summing box (don't bother with that), or if you put it through outboard compression (don't bother with that either; a plugin sounds better than an Alesis 3630). As for the $50, I think EnergyXT and Reaper would like a word with you, and Ardour or Renoise or Skaletracker too. They're different from the regular "hay guys let's play with Lego blocks only these make sound!" ones because they support plugins in the first place. Something like Magix Music Studio isn't aimed at someone who wants to make their own stuff; Garageband comes with a metric ton of loops. Why? Because these are about letting non-musicians make music (or at least, make 'm think they are making music). GB is basically the free heroin so that those who are interested in more will buy Logic or Logic Express. The DAW you have has a certain philosophy behind it. Cubase 4 has for instance, support for video files and surround sound, and advanced dithering algorithms. This is something you pay extra for - generally because you -need- it. If you're working with FL, you choose for a different interface, but you also choose for not having to work with video or surround, which is fine because we still don't have 6 ears. So, if you'd buy Cubase 4 - sure, why not, go ahead - you're paying extra for options you're most likely not going to use, plus you have to completely re-learn your way of making music at all, and it won't make you a better musician. The built-in plugins aren't as spectacular as actual money can buy - they're just capable replacements for in the meantime. Doesn't mean they can't be good - in fact, Logic has some pretty nifty built-in stuff - but you're not limited to them either. It is however its main strength and the fact that one chooses ProTools over another DAW - hardware support for truly zero-latency monitoring. I don't think Nicholestien (or for that matter, I or most people here) can afford a full Digi rig, so PT LE or M-Powered or the Digi 003 interfaces would be the other choice; and the 003 costs 2200 bucks. Alright, the M-Box is cheaper. Now, that's a good argument, but this guy is gushing over piano rolls . What's your budget? Mid-field or mainfield is about 2-4 meters away from you, and those are a -lot- bigger; you need near-fields because you're not going to build them into a wall. It means that there are separate amplifiers for both the woofer (big, low-mid frequencies) and the tweeter. (small, high frequencies) No, you just have to learn the jargon.

Cubase and Logic have the most tools in terms of MIDI editing (and editing afterwards), but gushing over the piano roll is uh. Not practical? It's just a way of viewing the notes, editing can be done better if you learn how to play. *EEEEP* stop. Having a lot of experience with all the programs is rather uncommon, unless you work in a music store, and even then you have to specialize. PICK WHAT WORKS FOR YOU - THEY WON'T MAKE YOU A BETTER MUSICIAN. While Cubase may be excellent in MIDI editing (and it's got an amazingly kick-ass arpeggiator, too - very deep), SX3 sucked compared to just dragging and dropping effects (chain can be any length) or synths (built-in combinator, how cool is that) in Live. Which told me at least that I should go the Live way. No, it isn't. Mostly because you're never going to touch it; you're going to work with Pro-Tools LE or Pro-Tools M-Powered (which are compatible in terms of projects, so you could use it at a small studio and then bring everything over to the big one and load it up directly). The big plus of PT (non-LE or non-M-Powered) is that is offloads certain things to hardware, and the latter two don't have that hardware so it's your computer doing the crunching. Anyone pointing to professional producers using it shouldn't be trusted (for you're not going to get that unless you're prepared to plonk down several thousands); anyone working with it in a project studio telling you should should keep your scope in mind - if you're not recording an entire band and just layer your tracks one by one, it won't be much more useful. The RTAS stuff can be solved by a wrapper, by the way, so you can still run VST effects. Which is good in MIDI editing, but it depends if the workflow fits with you - Cubase is rather conservative after all and expects you to think in a certain way that relates to the hardware studios. If you have to ask, you're doing it wrong. Search for a comparison chart. SE3 and SX3 are no longer supported. In fact, when I asked tech support that I wanted to sell SX3 and maybe had to fill out some forms, it wasn't necessary. SE3 + extras = Studio 4. Uh, yeah, why wouldn't you? Whatever they say about 4, sign up as a beta tester or wait until 4 is actually released, or demand hard screenshots of existing features explaining step by step how things are done. Don't buy on the basis of promise - "oh, that'll be there in an update" is not worth it. Ableton Live, but its piano roll is rather minimal. It's got the MIDI thingies mainly in the shape of MIDI effects processors. What Cubase does with the quantizing in the menu, Live solves in another way. Quantizing has to be done manually, though. The "how" will last 5 years, the "why" will last you forever. Don't frack around too much with the tool; if FL works for you at the moment, nobody else can decide for you that it's not professional enough.

Yes, and I should read better. Sorry! Where does it hang up?

A MOTU 828 mkII is not a sound module. It's an audio interface. Sound module is the name for a Roland JV-1080 or Motif Rack - it's a synthesizer minus the keyboard. Why get it? Well, usually they have better drivers which means your audio gets a lower latency, and they have far better input/output possibilities and other connections besides the minijack in/outputs. Which is the biggest bullshit I've ever heard. "Optimized" doesn't mean anything else than checking the box with "Best performance of background processes" and choosing hardware that has at least beta drivers instead of no drivers at all. With XP, you should be just as well off. Howto? If you have Vista Business or Ultimate, you have the full right to "downgrade" to XP. If you don't have those, you should get yourself XP (an older copy or a new one). Stick in the disc, tell it you want to format your C-drive (of course, after you've backed up everything), and follow instructions. XP doesn't have out of the box support for RAID drives, so you should have a disc or floppy handy with those on it - it'll tell you when to take action during the installation.

here we go again http://www.soundonsound.com/sos/allsynthsecrets.htm

Don't try to tackle several genres at once. First of all, you must've noticed that there can be several versions of a track - radio mix, club mix, etc. These differ; a club mix is not simply a radio mix with verse-chorus copied. One advice I give to people to get themselves a piece of 5 x 5 mm grid paper, landscape, and start drawing. From left to right is the progress of the song. From bottom to top are the sounds - bassdrum on the bottom, vocals on the top. Get some magic markers. Try to draw during listening; every time you hear 4 beats passing by you color a block on the bassdrum "line". When you hear a snare drum roll, you draw that on top of the bassdrum line. When the bass kicks in or one of those sequenced sounds starts, draw it on top of that. Bonus points: a snare roll is a gradual gain in volume. Draw that as a triangle, lowest volume left, peak volume right. The end result, with careful listening and drawing and rewinding and paying attention - that's the "map" of the song. That's 50% of the entire art. This is not something that can be explained easily; you have to develop some feeling for it. You have to think in blocks of 4, 8, 16 or 32, or oddball numbers (never odd!) like 6 (with 2 blocks as a break or snare roll or filtering or dropping the volume of the bass). Make 3 of these maps of radio mixes of songs you like. Do the same for club mixes. What you see there is essentially the same you see when you'd zoom out in Cubase/FL Studio/Reason/whatever - it shows where elements of the song are introduced. Since dance music is not that top-heavy on melody, it has to find other ways to captivate the listener, and that's by building up. Then, use those maps to imprint your own ideas on it; use the same buildup, only with your own drums and your own melody. After you've done that for a few times (and you'd be surprised how different a song can sound, even if it has the same build up if the instruments and melody differ!), try to meditate why a producer decided to introduce or leave away elements at that place. Ishkur's guide is good - the text may be ass but the samples are good, and it's a single point of reference you can link people to. Learning synthesis is useful, but try to start with some presets first; if you have to, buy a sample CD like Vengeance Essential Club Sounds; it can be used as filler while you're learning how the knobs work, and you won't be futzing around in the dark with plain 909 kicks. Then, when you have the building up/breaking down thing down well, learn how to choose and modify your percussion.

Congratulations, you're now the first result in Google for StutterEdit.