Can someone shed some light on the whole MP3 making process?

[MikeViper]

I want to turn a song of mines from midi quality, to MP3 quality, but I have no idea where to start. I've heard that you can use real samples, to make your midi sound more MP3 quality, but I really have no idea how to use samples. Firstly, what exactly are samples? Second of all, how can you use these samples? Third of all, what program would you use to compose samples, and put them together into a song? And those are pretty much my only 3 questions. If I use the term "Sample" incorrectly, please forgive me, I really know nothing about the whole process.

[Splunkle]

I suggest you read Wikipedia's entries on both Sample and Sample-based-synthesis.

Most Midi actually uses samples, it is just that the samples aren't very good. To use better samples, I suggest you get yourself a good sequencer. Check out the various stickies, particularly the mixing for free and Zircon's tips and tricks. Also, if you come across a term you don't know what it means, Wikipedia it. Wikipedia isn't always right, but it will almost always give you an idea of whats going on.

EDIT: the forums url linky thing doesn't liek the brackets in the wiki article link. I assume you can copy/paste, though.

Good luck!

[klm09]

You're talking apples and oranges, there. Think about MP3 this way:

Let's say you have a text file made in Word. If you copy and paste that into Notepad, the text is still going to be the same, but you might lose some formatting tags that Word embeds in the text. So if you're using some special font or if you have some fancy tables in there or something, you're going to lose them. At the same time, the file size will probably be smaller, because it's just "plain text" afterwards. The content, for the most part will be the same, but if you copy paste back into word, you will have lost those formatting tags. So the filetype isn't going to make you Shakespeare, or make your spelling and grammar crap either.

It's the same with MP3. If you have for example a WAV file, you can encode that into MP3 and get a smaller file in terms of filesize, which sounds basically the same. But what's it's doing is stripping out some frequencies or "information" from the signal, and even if you convert it back to WAV, some information is permanently lost. But the trade off, a smaller filesize for something that sounds almost identical, is often worth it.

So MP3 has nothing to do with the quality of your music.

[OverCoat]

A virtually created song usually consists of two elements - samples and virtual synths

Samples are .wav or .aiff [or .pcm... or .xi, the list goes on] recordings of instruments or sound effects. You can actually do a lot with samples in any program, sometimes even right out of the box. FL Studio, for example, can let you do all kinds of shit to a sample - slice, granulize, distort, tremor, vibrato, pitch shifting - the list goes on. The only thing it can't do very well is edit the actual sample. I fucking HATE FL's sample editor. But that's beyond what I'm trying to tell you. Any good DAW can do this, just a lot differently [and maybe you'd prefer it that way!].

Virtual synths are a bit different. They're basically a synthesizer on your computer, as opposed to hooking up a hardware one via midi/audio input. These are all inherently editable, depending on their features. Not all music software supports VSTi, but anything GOOD does! A VSTi looks like this:

You can almost reach out and touch it! You're kinda halfway there if you already have a midi controller.

All these are things which, in a DAW environment, can take your existing midi and turn it into AWESOME. And after you convert your old midis, you can start working on some ORIGINAL CONTENT and abandon the .mid step entirely, unless you want to still release in .mid format.

P.S. I'm not sure since both their messages are pretty cryptic, but klm09 and Splunkle seem to have missed the point of your questions.

P.P.S. Once you figure out how to export .wav from your software, I recommend converting to 96-192kbps VBR .mp3! You could also go with 160 kbps CBR. I just hate it when people go over 192 though.

[klm09]

P.S. I'm not sure since both their messages are pretty cryptic, but klm09 and Splunkle seem to have missed the point of your questions.

I just wanted to point out that the idea that MP3 files are inherently of higher aural quality than midi files is false as they're two completely different things. I couldn't be bothered to think and actually answer the questions put forth, I just wanted to point out their factual inaccuracy.

[Splunkle]

P.S. I'm not sure since both their messages are pretty cryptic, but klm09 and Splunkle seem to have missed the point of your questions.

I think its more of a case of me trying to answer his first question, and you answering his second and third. Regardless, your response was the better. Its always hard to determine just what to tell a newbie to point them in the right direction - its not like we can sit hear for hours typing up lectures on the subject of music making.

[Yoozer]

I want to turn a song of mines from midi quality, to MP3 quality

What you want is to replace the shitty wavetable of your on-board soundcard with (software) instruments that sound more like the real thing.

but I have no idea where to start.

The first thing is that you should get rid of every single idea you've put in this topicstart; none of 'm match up with reality . There's no such thing as MIDI quality and you can certainly not compare it with MP3-quality, whatever that may be (what would CD quality be, then?)

I've heard that you can use real samples, to make your midi sound more MP3 quality

If those are real samples, what are fake samples?

but I really have no idea how to use samples. Firstly, what exactly are samples?

A sample is nothing more than a digital recording of anything.

Anything.

The quality of the sample depends on the resolution. Compare it with a picture; the better the lens and the more megapixels you have, the better quality your picture will have (provided that you do not suck at photography). It's exactly the same thing with sampling. You take a digital picture of a sound. There are some great photographers who can do amazing things with a consumer camera and there are some bad photographers who suck with a DSLR and a lens kit that costs more than most cars.

To continue the analogy: your soundcard contains samples. These are put into the soundcard's memory. This memory is called a "wavetable". The wavetable isn't exactly big (not much megapixels). To make it worse, the people who've recorded the sounds aren't that great at sampling (bad photographers). All this is done to cut costs, because nobody uses the wavetable for serious music production anyway; it's adequate for GeoCities pages that have a MIDI-file playing, to get a rough idea of the song.

On the other hand, you can have a CD or DVD filled with piano samples. Not only is there enough room, but those who did the sampling were also pretty damn good at it (this is not always the case, but let's assume they are). So, the piano of the CD sounds much more realistic (when played realistically - it should be played with some feeling, just hammering on the keys doesn't sound realistic because a real player wouldn't do that either, unless the music called for it) than the one in your soundcard's wavetable. Ergo, it's got that "MP3-quality" you're looking for.

However, it's not cheap. Most decent piano sample libraries (a library is a collection of samples, ordered in groups) could make you $300 poorer.

In this case I took a piano library as example. For almost every existing "real" instrument, there's a library; and, also for some non-existing instruments.

Second of all, how can you use these samples?

You need a sampler. This can be software or hardware. Examples are Native Instruments Kontakt (expensive but pretty awesome) and Vember Audio Short Circuit > http://www.vemberaudio.se/shortcircuit.php - cheap and pretty awesome, too.

Third of all, what program would you use to compose samples

You don't compose samples; you compose a song. A sampler can be seen as any other instrument. Likewise, you don't compose violins; you compose a piece for violins and let a violin play it.

and put them together into a song? And those are pretty much my only 3 questions. If I use the term "Sample" incorrectly, please forgive me, I really know nothing about the whole process.

Get yourself FL Studio, lock yourself up in a room, don't leave it for 3 months and don't ask questions; just learn by doing and reading the tutorials.

[NeoS]

and put them together into a song? And those are pretty much my only 3 questions. If I use the term "Sample" incorrectly, please forgive me, I really know nothing about the whole process.

Get yourself FL Studio, lock yourself up in a room, don't leave it for 3 months and don't ask questions; just learn by doing and reading the tutorials.

I remember doing so, and got caught up being busted by my girlfriend for downloading porn... weird...

Anyways, best thing for TS to do is probably start importing midi's into either Reason or FL, and toy with it with either VSTi's or Soundfonts. Works best for learning.