Would you want to make your own music for your movies?

Would you want to try to create your own, copyright free music to go with your videos?

how about if there were tools available that quickly allowed you to mix your own tracks according to your own style and preferences?

For instance: go onto www.ejay.com and check out their current survey regards music videos!

I think that a multi-track mixer would be great!

If the audio capabilities of Moviestorm could accept widely available plug-ins such as VST, well, that would just be gravy!

I currently use Adobe Audition 1.5. I rarely use all the tools in that program. Commonly though, I adjust levels, panning and use noise reduction.
I often use envelopes to control level and panning over time.

I believe that a digital clapper board would be essential for keeping the video and audio in sync. The clapper board could be an item in the inventory that could be used by any puppet.

I would like to see the clapper board even if advanced audio is never incorporated into Moviestorm.

I would also suggest a change in time units from the current version using decimal portions of seconds to one that uses hh:mm:ss:frames.

just my 0.02

revdoug

Ialready do some of it as I write a little music myself. I currently use Band in a Box which costs about $140.00, but if there were a less expensive or even free or included with the package product that does the same kind of thing, it would be fantastic.

I confess I'd be concerned about the can of worms which could be opened by Moviestorm expanding in this direction. There are lots of very low cost / free options out there for whipping up music tracks, and a growing base of Creative Commons music by indie artists who are approachable and open to having their work exposed in this way.

As such, I mostly see the downside of venturing into this territory, namely the likely lessened focus on attending to Moviestorm's "primary" needs: flicker-free shadows, more robust lighting, keyframable props (and everything), more character animations, more characters (or user control of character customization, prepping mod workshop (and the content store) for general release and use. These are things which do not currently have other viable solutions, whereas music does.

If this new feature set can be added without reducing the manpower/resources devoted to getting Moviestorm's directing and cinematography related issues up to top notch, then yay! If not, then I have a hard time getting enthused.

I had one of the Magix music video creators and I found it somewhat difficult to get something out of it that sounded reasonable, but that is pretty old technology now, and I had a limited number of samples to play around with.
If we could attract some composers to the site, and have their output available, in the same way that mods will be available, that would be interesting.
How easy? What kind of quality would the output be?
Does it all have to be hip hop trance garage house dance music?

No offence intended, but I think Moviestorm should stick to what it does best, animation, and leave the Music side to dedicated music software. I Use Propellerhead Reason, its an infinitly sized virtual recording studio kitted out with as many synthesizers, samplers, drum machines and effects units as you want, and all wired up with virtual wires (that actually giggle around!).

You do need a REAL USB/MIDI keyboard though!

Right now, there are a lot of software capabilities to handle music, and it's pretty easy to integrate those outputs with Moviestorm (for those interested in an affordable music tool, you might want to check out Music Maestro).

I'd rather that Moviestorm continue to focus on what it does best--the characters and animations.

i gave this idea back in the day when this was still closed beta.as i make my own music and will be using this program for my music videos that would be a excellent feature for me and i am sure all the other folks here........but alas people said you should focus on the movie itself and leave outside audio editors to do that but i highly disagree. i also asked for vst implementations as someone said there is a open source free one on sourceforge.

Yes, That would make a good feature. Modular features that can be entered ( turned on/off)

At the moment Effects and music have to be "spoken" by a few characters and they don't sing too well together sometimes (many characters singing at once. eg. character for effects, music and a singer character ) when it comes to rendering.

A clear vocal multi-track character display (Hi-resolution menus) with a feature to add background/foreground effects/music mixer (like in eJay style) would be great.

Let this be my first post, then.

I am a music composer interested in animation, so I already make my own music

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Timing in film music is critical so you need fairly sophisticated editing possibilities to create an effective music track. For my last project I used Sonar (which is a sequencer like Cubase or Logic), which allows you to load your video and then tweak your music.

I've just downloaded Moviestorm, so I haven't any experience with it yet, but most other animation packages allow you to import a sound file with dialog and/or music, which would be mainly useful for synching purposes.

To include usuable music generation within MS would be a challenge and maybe there ar more pressing needs in other areas.

zuijlen wrote:

Let this be my first post, then.

I am a music composer interested in animation, so I already make my own music .

Timing in film music is critical so you need fairly sophisticated editing possibilities to create an effective music track. For my last project I used Sonar (which is a sequencer like Cubase or Logic), which allows you to load your video and then tweak your music.

I've just downloaded Moviestorm, so I haven't any experience with it yet, but most other animation packages allow you to import a sound file with dialog and/or music, which would be mainly useful for synching purposes.

To include usuable music generation within MS would be a challenge and maybe there ar more pressing needs in other areas.

I am going to check out SONAR. I just started writing my own music. I used to make up these little tunes but never did anything with them. Anyway this sounds like a great program.

lucindamc123 wrote:

I am going to check out SONAR. I just started writing my own music. I used to make up these little tunes but never did anything with them. Anyway this sounds like a great program.

To clarify, Sonar allows you to record MIDI data, which is then used to control a synthesizer or sampler. These used to be external (I still have some of those), but with the more powerful PCs of today it is feasible to have synthesizers and samplers as software. Sonar comes with some of those included. Synthesizers are good for "electronic" sounds and samplers can get you realistic sounding orchestral sounds.

Sonar also allows you to record audio and import sound files, for example your dialog files. What is nice about modern sequencers is that you can have a large number of tracks, allowing to keep your instruments separate. This makes it easy to adjust the volume of one of your instruments for example, if that turns out to work better with your picture.

Of course, initially, you would probably want to keep it simple...

I use Sonar, but there are other sequencers. Some people like Cubase and for the Mac there is Logic.

I'm also a Sonar user, but if you're new to audio sequencing I would suggest you go for either Logic or ProTools, as these are the industry standards. The former is the much easier to use and cheaper, and though its now a mac only program some earlier versions existed for PC. That said, I've heard the most recent versions of Sonar are getting quite nifty themselves, so just have a look around before you dive into anything.

I used to use Logic when it was still an Atari program and I really liked it. The PC implementations weren't very good; that is one of the reasons I moved to Cakewalk (now Sonar). On a PC I would not recommend Logic, as it is no longer in development.

As with all software, it's a matter of taste. I would recommend for anyone to download trials and see what speaks to you. I know ProTools is considered the industry standard in some areas, but if you do your own movies from start to finish, I think that's less relevant.

I have always used FL Studio. It does everything the other studios do, and it's cheaper. It also has a video plugin to synch the music to the video.

It's all I have ever needed.

Even if Moviestorm went this way I would rather use the programs I have to make and mix the music.