Best practices Guide to create Custom CDLC Songs

[mikewiehle]

Hello all,

 

After reading many ideas for creating custom CDLC songs.  I have finally completed a guide that is almost fail safe.  A few notes, first the link is a mediashare word document.  Next, you can complete all steps in the guide except for the WWise part, which you can only do on a PC.  Last, the hardest part for me now is tones.  If you do not a have tone that is really close the song will sound awful.  You can find some tones out there on pirate websites, but for many songs they are not available.  I did start another thread for people to post their tones for bands, but so far hardly any responses.  So I will say this, if you do not have a tone for the song you are thinking of making; stop now and save yourself the time.  Any feedback, upgrades, or changes to the guide from you would be appreciated.  Also, if something is unclear ask in this thread.

 

Link: http://www.mediafire.com/view/qvuy1s59g3tkjlb

 

Thanks, Mike

[firekorn]

Hum.. looking at this tutorial, i'm pretty sure it will fucked up a lot of songs and i don't really understand what you mean even when i have already created some customs, so for a perfect beginner...

 

-Songsterr doesn't require registering to download tab

-"Do not use Real Bass 22" why? i always use it when i need to create a bonus arrangement and everything works fine.

-Why always add 3 seconds for leading silence, if the chart doesn't start too fast adding 3 seconds is useless and sometimes even 3 seconds might seems short to be prepared.

-The first beat marker could be after the beginning of the waveform, it doesn't matter because EOF will ask to create new beat marker evenly spaced at the start.

-i absolutely don't understand what you actually want me to do for the sync part, the first phrases make me fall since it's what nobody should ever do and the following is incomprehensible for a beginner.

[MVega]

Yes, I'm going to have to go with @@firekorn on this one. I appreciate the effort though!

[GetTheLedOut]

Yeah, I agree with @@firekorn as well. While I definitely admire and appreciate the effort, some of the points fall a bit short. We desperately need a better guide to EoF than the existing material here on CF, which is at best, misleading. I might end up making a video tutorial once my screen capture software is configured, but there's definitely still some value to be had with your venture here.Firstly, telling EoF to encode your audio file at 256k isn't going to benefit you if the file you're importing is already less than 256k. All you're doing is making a larger than necessary file. A 128k mp3 isn't going to sound any better after you've encoded it to 256k.Like firekorn said, the real bass 22 track is totally usable, so it might be best to explain that all 4 of those available tracks are interchangeable for guitar and bass. They're just pre-configured for the instrument in their name. For rexample, if you import a guitar GP file into REAL_BASS 22, EoF will automatically change the string/fret setting to accommodate it.With regard to the leading silence, 3,000 milliseconds would just be a guideline. I'd say anything between 3,000-5,000 is perfect, but if the song already has (for example) a drum intro that lasts at least 3,000 milliseconds, then there's obviously no need to add additional leading silence.The guide is definitely misleading on the first beat marker position (firekorn is right again). The position of the beat markers relative to the music has no effect on DD. DD simply interprets the .xml files that EoF creates.After importing the GP file, you NEVER want to drag all the notes around. For basically any reason. This is because the notes are locked into the specific BPM of where they were dragged from, and the area where you'll be placing them is not necessarily going to have the same BPM. If you do drag notes, then using CTRL+SHIFT+R will snap them back to the grid (based upon the nearest value, set in grid snap).Selecting "also add a RS phrase isn't the end of the world." Especially if someone's not going to use DD, since they'd have to manually add all the phrases that DDC adds automatically. DDC works perfectly fine whether or not you check this option.With Wwise, once again, setting a higher quality output won't do you any good unless your ORIGINAL input was of higher quality. The Wwise setting of 8 (128k per channel) would only benefit you if your original input was of 256k or higher. If your original input had a bitrate of 128k, then there will be no difference in sound quality between setting 4-8. Your file size will just be about twice as large.Ok, I'm done I swear :D Despite how this might read, I'm hoping to contribute a bit to your project here, not take away from it. I'm glad that you took the time to spearhead this effort. If you feel compelled to do so, feel free to use any of the above in any future revisions. 

[MVega]

About the dragging notes thing -- instead of dragging notes, after importing the GP track, I select all of the notes, copy them, then delete them. Then I position the cursor to the beat for the first note and paste. This will snap the notes to the grid you've established with the beatmap.

 

I've found resnapping to be hit and miss -- it works if the notes are not too far off the grid. But if there are more than one note close to the grid snap points, EOF will combine them.

[mikewiehle]

This is just another guide for people to review and find what works for them.  This is also the very short version without all of the explanations behind what the steps are (that guide was over 20 pages when I finished it).  This is just something that I have used for over 20 songs and each time it worked flawlessly.  As far as synching goes, it becomes an art and depends on how good the GP tab you are using is.  Sometimes you can set the BPMs and CTRL+A (highlight all notes) and just align with the waveform.  Other times you may be required to move almost every note manually.

 

As far as the comments above; each comment has merit :

 

(such as not always needing leading silence)  But 95% of the songs do.  So rather than tie up document length with every possible exception, I decided to give a guide that will work.  I did not see any comment that says - 'This won't work'.  I have been contacted a few times for help from beginners and this what I send them, and so far no one has asked for clarifications of any part.

 

So, what I recommend is to look at all of the guides available and find what works for you.  Try this guide step-by-step, not changing anything, and see if the end result is a working song.  If it is then my goal was achieved.  This will mean more songs for all of us.

 

Thanks for the comments, Mike

[GetTheLedOut]

All of the suggestions are basically centered around a few of the things that your guide has incorrectly mandated. Such as "always add 3000ms of leading silence" or "do not use REAL_BASS_22." There are plenty of instances where these things just aren't true. Wouldn't we be doing a disservice to the reader if we fed them this kind of false information?The sad truth is that many of the submitted CDLCs fall well short, for one reason or another. If we could all agree, and point to a single document (such as yours) or video and say "refer to this", I think that the community would be better for it. 

 

As far as synching goes, it becomes an art and depends on how good the GP tab you are using is.  Sometimes you can set the BPMs and CTRL+A (highlight all notes) and just align with the waveform.  Other times you may be required to move almost every note manually.

No, even though it may work on very rare occasions, you should never move notes like this. Syncing should be done by moving the beat markers only. Once that's done, you may need to move notes if the GP file is incorrect or has a different lead in time. As an alternative to this, some people prefer to use software outside of EoF in order to properly sync the beat markers. Moving notes as a method of syncing will lead to:1) DD not working correctly (  @@Chlipouni, the author of DDC, has this in his signature)2) sections and phrases out of alignment, and possible riff repeater issues3) major trouble with alternate time signatures4) beats will appear incorrectly in-game5) having to sync each arrangement individually, as opposed to just once6) the inability to collaborate/add arrangements charted by others. You will have to re-sync once again.7) further headaches when making any revisions/updates