Amberwolf

Or when there *is* no batery because it fell out of the rusted out holder....

At least you got the notification in a reasonable time. The KSHMR one didn't send me that till days afterward. Then it immediately sent me the notice on the track itself "wasn't interested". Then a while later "just listened to your track for the first time! You've gotten their attention. If they'd like to take further action, they can either shortlist or pass on your track." Then right after that "Thanks so much for participating in the Contest! Unfortunately your track has been reviewed by the contest curators and wasn't selected as a winner this time around. Not to worry though there are always plenty more exciting and valuable Contests to participate in!" So their notifications are delayed for whatever reason, from the actual things that are happening.

AFAIK in all these contests, the stems are only available during the contest time. I didn't end up making a remix (decided that since I know it won't win, and they aren't going to let me post it anywhere, I shouldn't waste my time making music no one will ever be able to hear), but I did play wiht the stems just to see what they were like, and found it itneresting to see all the punch points / etc in the waveforms; you can easily see where each part starts and stops, even if you don't hear it. Regarding notifications / etc., I'd love it if they were better, but AFAICT none of these places is about the user experience, it's all about what they can get out of you. On LR, I submitted a "review" of their site to them when prompted, and gave detailed feedback on many "broken" or inadequate functions, unclear UI design and statements, misleading UI elements, etc., and while their system "thanked" me for the feedback, I can't imagine they care enough to fix any of it (virtually no company does, I am usually shocked when I submit bug reports to companies that then actually act on them in a helpful way--that happens once every few years).

Audio? Or MIDI?

It was funnier in the PS/2 days when the dallas RTC chip would run the clock *backwards* when the battery died. Oh, and when I did computer repair for a living, I was teh only one that ever checked RTC batteries when there were problems...everyone else I ever worked with just replaced motherboards (which also replaces that battery in most cases, and when it didn't come wiht the board they'd swap it over from the old one and hte problem persisted, and they gave up on the machine, and I'd have to take over, and replace the battery to fix it). We were all A+ and in most cases various-manufacturer-certified, but it didn't make any of them any better at troubleshooting.

I don't think LR sends you emails; I think you have to look at your notifications and messages in your account page there. And there wont' be anything until someone manually sends you one., after they actually listen to it, etc. Personaly, I think that only the people paying for LR will get much of a chance, the freebie accounts get listened to last, if at all, from the way things read in the instructions for the site itself.

Danged wobbly giant cigarette pool noodles.

If you want to see what the guy that created this does, try this https://www.pianobook.co.uk/packs/hearth-hollow-plucked-folk-ensemble/ (there are others too).

I do something similar someitmes, dropping bits I want to experiment with into my template's tracks, not in any particular place or time. Listen to it, move things, arrange, trim, cut, add, play/record/draw new stuff, edit, add, edit, etc. Sometimes I get a really good track that way, like Drywater, Mars.

File-Exit (discard all)

BTW, you can usually rent mics and amps and stuff reasonably cheaply, some music-gear stores do this. If you don't know one that does, ask the con itself if they have a place they rent gear from. If all else fails, check with the hotel itself, as they may have sound gear for rent, though it will probably cost more because it's usually last-minute-needs that it fills.

Unfortunately I think she passed away a few years ago. Everytime I was around her it seemed like an adventure. 😆 The local filksings she came to would usually be more entertaining; the cons moreso. Sometimes legendary.... What recording / mic / amp equipment do you have? What do you need to record? (a whole stage, just you, a room, several individuals one at a time in different spots, etc?) Will there be a sound system? (if there is, you could just tap off their mixer, if you can talk to the soundperson in advance to be sure you have the right wires/gear; I've never had one refuse, most have been eager to work with someone else). Knowing what youv'e got, and what you want / need to do with it, we might be able to suggest the best use for it.

If it's useful (probably not): When I used to record stuff into my EPS16+ or ASR88 at events at Leprecons, Coppercons, and GallifreyOne's a couple decades ago, I'd use an old Oktava mic (don't remember which model) generally pointed in the direction of whoever I was capturing, for those that allowed / wanted to be recorded. All I could really do given the spaces it's usually in (sometimes outdoors on a lawn, sometimes in a hallway, sometimes in a small hotel room, etc) was to verify I was getting recordable levels that didn't clip, with no compression hardware, etc. I also didn't really know too much about live recording (as on my own it's all keyboards and virtual synths or a guitar plugged directly into the audio interface (or the ASR88's input, back then). Nowadays if I were to do the same thing, I would use a hardware compressor between the mic and the recording input, to prevent clipping while also getting as much input level as I could for whatever nuance and quieter performance could be captured, without having to sit there and ride the input gain all the time manually. (which i tried doing in some cases, usually to the detriment of the recording). I don't know what mic would be best--if you don't want to move it for each performer, something omni; maybe cardioid if you are moving it for each performer or just doing yourself. Post-production will depend on what you want the result to be. Probably different processes depending on that, such as if you intend to add enhancement tracks (reinforcements of parts, effected portions of some of the main along with dry (or in place of), etc. , or if you want to make them into "complete" songs, with various other instruments doing whatever it is you want them to do, etc. (if you ever heard Leslie Fish's "Robofilker's Ensoniq" filk, that's about me.... 😊 )

That's why it's in this thread....

A more useful question that would help us help you would be to tell us what specific problems you are having, under what specific conditions, with what specific instruments, etc., so that those with experience with those things could suggest changes you can make to corrrect the problems. I can guarantee that the answer to that question is "Yes". It is not a useful answer, but it is the actual answer.

LP MRU is proibably stored in the windows registry; you could hand edit that to remove them if so.

Reminds me of one of my song titles (for a project I haven't yet posted on the web): "Offhanded Chirality"

I may be missing it but I couldn't find a product with that name... The closest stuff I found was on this site in their sale but there are separate products for each half of the name.... https://www.sonarworks.com/autumn-sale Which one(s) did you get?

I can tell you that heavy duty rubber bands strung along the length of a bamboo backscratcher doesn't work very well. (several other DIY methods also either don't work at all or are pretty awful sounding).

Note that the Genealogy stuff is apparently separate from the CinematicAlpha stuff, so isn't in the sale. But for this type of sound, it appears to be a very good deal, especially since two of the three players the stuff is for (Vital, Soundbox) are available as free versions that work for these libraries. (At least some, probably all, of the Kontakt libraries do require the full paid K and not just the free KPlayer). You get 58 libraries, some of which are versions for each different player, but it's still a lot of stuff. (I didn't count how many are "dupes" between the 3 different players; not all libraries are available for all players). I don't know how independent the Vital or Soundbox players are; if they can be used completely offline, or if they have to be logged into / have live internet connections, or forced updates to be able to access your own on-system content (like Sineplayer, making it useless because it breaks frequently), etc. But as long as they can operate completely offline, the libs for them would be pretty useful.

I do this sort of thing (compositing several sounds into one) with my music not just for vocals, but for many of the parts. I am usually not recording my own audio these days, but instead playing with sample packs, and since they don't have the exact thing I want I build what I want from what's there, often enough by using parts of one sample from one pack, and parts of samples from other packs, to build each little part, and various automation and effects to blend them all together. I'm no expert at it, but it isn't terribly tough--just time-consuming. The most recent example is Drywater, Mars; another more drastic example is the "elven rock" section of Behind You Lie Many Unseen where it's not just the vocals comped togehter it's also all the other parts in there. I even do it to the percussion in some cases, where the sound I want doesn't exist in anything I have, so I take two or more sounds to create the hit I want, and blend them together, etc.. I'm still working on creating "lead" vocal tracks with words out of existing phrases that weren't intended for what I'm doing with them; this is harder than regular comping.... But it's an interesting process.

My biggest problem is that I have lots and lots of detailed ideas for all sorts of projects, much but not all of it art in one form or another (music, still and moving visual art, sketches, painting, physical models and sculptures, stories, etc), the rest of it stuff I want or need to build / create for mostly everyday needs, or just stuff I want to design and build and document so that anyone could then duplicate it and use it. I have time beyond the dayjob and resting up to keep doing that to *note down* maybe one percent of what I come up with, and maybe begin one percent of *that*, and maybe finish one percent of *that*. Money is another issue--most of these things require stuff I don't have, and while I'm *very* good at making do and macguyvering, only so much is possible this way.

Thanks! I wish I had FV. I would have bought their bundles at one time, but they never have htem for Soundpaint, only the kontakt/etc stuff. I asked them about that, and they said that since their soundpaint store and dev team is separate, any sales would be separate...but sp never *has* any sales (none they tell me about in their mailing list or that I've ever seen on the site), which makes zero sense. :roll: The primary vocals throughout were modified from bits of Black Octopus Sound - VocalKitchen - A Taste Of Heaven. The secondary stuff for the intro was modified from bits of Ghosthack - Origin - Arctic - Aurora Borealis and Archive - Security Risk and Shymer 2 - Vocal FX. The "pulsing" breathiness underlying one of the middle sections were modifed from bits of Security Breach. If I could get any of the video-creation thingies out there to actually do anything even remotely like what I tell it****, I'd make some nifty videos for a few of these tracks that have "ideas" behind them, like this one, and The Last Flight, etc. (I don't have nearly the time to create all the stufff that would go into making even a very short video--in my previous ventures into CGI with Lightwave3D v6 it would take several months of work to build the stuff that would then have to be animated, which takes a few more months to do, though at least that usually includes all the lighting setup, rendering, etc. as well as the kinematics and such. The version of LW I have is so old that pretty much everything in it is a manual function; there's none of the computer-assisted stuff that does so much work-saving for the animators these days. ****It's just as hard to "convince" the still-image tools too, but at least with those it is relatively easy to get it to do each individual thing, separately, and then I can quickly composite them together (also editing out all the wierdness that gets generated).

One of the disadvantages of not drinking...I can't accidentally end up with things I want. Drywater, Mars has been extended at both ends a bit, and there are extensive small edits throughout. What do you think of it now? https://amberwolf.bandcamp.com/track/drywater-mars

Thanks! That does sound pretty human, it is MUCH better than the vocaloid-type things (i guess they have their place for types of music that need that, but not for what I'm doing.) At least this one appears to have a completely offline usage, is a purchase not a subscription, etc., but it is out of my (nonexistent) budget. The cheapest one that comes with any voices is a hundred bucks, and that's limited to a male voice (liam) if I want english. (the only female voices you can choose with it are chinese and japanese, and neither one of them sounds anything like what I am after even when used for english). The "felicia" voice, for instance, would be another eighty bucks. So...it's not going to be a "soon" thing. FWIW, if I could find someone willing to do the directed experiments of vocalizations and whatnot as I create the music, for something I could afford (not very damn much 😆 as my actual income is from working in retail, which pretty well sucks for pay), I'd rather have people doing this. But I have yet to meet someone that would help me out for any price. (I'd also like to have other real musicians playing the parts, but same problem there...both me and my music are too weird for anyone to want to work with (most won't even listen to it)).