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"Most common problems with customs" - a few things that a charter should care about


Kamyk

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This thread will be constantly updated. Also - sorry for my english, I'll try to be as accurate as possible.

 

I don't have time to leave feedback at every custom I play. I wanted to gather everything in one place, so I created this thread. Here are some tips to make your customs better. Let's begin.

 

1. ALWAYS turn off the "Ignore capo/tuning" function in EOF.

 

I played an Drop C# custom recently and this is what I saw:

 

http://i57.tinypic.com/167w5k2.jpg

 

These are chords for an E Standard chart, not for a Drop C# chart.

Also if you turn that function off, when charting a custom that needs a capo, someone can learn that song without a capo, knowing just the chords that he should play.

 

2. Sustains

 

A. Apply sustains ONLY, when it's necessary.

 

If you don't understand what I'm talking about, then look at this:

 

http://i61.tinypic.com/wkha38.jpg

 

It looks opaque and sometimes covers other notes. It's often a result of GuitarPro import, when you don't remove the sustains.

 

B. DON'T DO sustains as long as possible.

 

It is a common problem with arpeggios, but not only. An example:

 

http://i57.tinypic.com/5uhhk4.jpg

 

An example of too long sustains in EOF:

 

http://i.imgur.com/kyCp3vr.png

 

It looks very opaque. Don't apply sustains, but if you REALLY want to do them, then do them at most this long:

 

http://i.imgur.com/NKw5GoK.png

 

3. Slides

 

A. LISTEN to the slides.

 

There are many slides in the customs that are applied, but I actually can't hear them in the songs. They're mostly present, when you just have to shift between power chords.

 

B. Apply slides CORRECTLY.

 

The problem lies in the chart, where the slides are often charted like this:

 

http://i.imgur.com/lfGP8YG.png

 

and not like this:

 

http://i.imgur.com/XPGwcMa.png

 

Examples of uncorrectly applied slides:

 

http://i60.tinypic.com/2ms39s0.jpg       http://i58.tinypic.com/akbk1e.jpg

 

 

Examples of correctly applied slides:

 

http://i61.tinypic.com/9kxw7b.jpg   http://i61.tinypic.com/2qvdu1u.jpg      http://i62.tinypic.com/30jgxso.jpg      http://i57.tinypic.com/67k48m.jpg

 

Just remember to use the "Linknext" status in EOF to do multiple slides like the last one you see above.

 

There still a lot things to point out, so I will update this thread. I was just afraid that I will forget some things, so I started it.

 

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MY WORKSHOP/MÓJ WARSZTAT
Gave up Rocksmith and CDLC making, playing on his own now.

 

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The first point depends on everyone taste, some care to learn what the actual real name chord some prefer to have the name as they were in E std, no real obligation here.

 

And for the two other point I supposed you never actually taken the time to see how time consuming it can be when you do a custom and many people don't actually care about it (especially sustain length).

Okay I supposed it wrong since you've actually created custom but I don't think I tried everyone of yours, i'll have to try them.

 

And in fact I prefer to do a mix for the slide between both of your screen with the use of the linknext status, and their is a lot of different way to chart the exact same thing in slides and sometimes choose between pitch/unpitch slides can't be as obvious as it might seems.

 

I see what you are trying to suggest but I think they are bigger problem (I mostly think about sync issues) that can make customs unplayable. I admire what you are trying to do but I think you are doing it without the full view of what it implies for everybody and that won't help charter to take in consideration your point.

Edited by firekorn

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Okay I supposed it wrong since you've actually created custom but I don't think I tried everyone of yours, i'll have to try them.

 

If you play my first customs you will notice that I'm not "saint" either. I will update them in near future.

 

The first point depends on everyone taste, some care to learn what the actual real name chord some prefer to have the name as they were in E std, no real obligation here.

 

The chords where named about what they sound. Sorry, but C chord in Eb Standard tuning, won't be C - It will be a B chord, because it won't sound like C.

 

And for the two other point I supposed you never actually taken the time to see how time consuming it can be when you do a custom and many people don't actually care about it (especially sustain length).

 

I do, trust me. I've abandoned a lot of projects, because of this.

 

I see what you are trying to suggest but I think they are bigger problem (I mostly think about sync issues) that can make customs unplayable. I admire what you are trying to do but I think you are doing it without the full view of what it implies for everybody and that won't help charter to take in consideration your point.

 

I made a thread a long time ago: http://customsforge.com/topic/3079-my-frustration/ where I said about sync issues, missing Riff Repeater and others. It didn't help. I thought that making this thread will be better, than just pointing out things. Here I point out things and present a solution to it. Keep in my mind that this thread will be updated.

 

 

And in fact I prefer to do a mix for the slide between both of your screen with the use of the linknext status, and their is a lot of different way to chart the exact same thing in slides and sometimes choose between pitch/unpitch slides can't be as obvious as it might seems.

 

Sometimes slides really end with a note, but mostly not. But if it really ends with a note, then the best thing to do is this:

 

http://i.imgur.com/KYIQxdO.png

 

or if it's a slide with sustain (notice the "linknext" status):

 

http://i.imgur.com/KDVVUSJ.png

MY WORKSHOP/MÓJ WARSZTAT
Gave up Rocksmith and CDLC making, playing on his own now.

 

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You don't provide a solution you say how you want people to work on their own custom, that's mostly my problem and you confirmed it with your slides explication, you can do it the way you show it, but you can do it in others way that works too, there's no right or wrong as long as what is displayed in RS is good.

 

And I'm not sure that doing it in the general section is the best way to do it because your openly attack all the others charter without any kind of distinction including you

 

Don't get me wrong I completely agree with the message you try to pass but I'm pretty sure it won't as long as you do it this way ;)

 

About the chord name, I see your point but I see others point that just like to have the name not corresponding to what they hear but what they see, a A chord shape is still a A chord shape whatever the tuning you use.

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You don't provide a solution you say how you want people to work on their own custom, that's mostly my problem and you confirmed it with your slides explication, you can do it the way you show it, but you can do it in others way that works too, there's no right or wrong as long as what is displayed in RS is good.

 

Yeah, but there are differences between slides, slides with sustain, slides ending with a note, multiple slides, tremolo slides, unpitched slides - you can hear the difference and you chart them different ways and the most common thing I see are slides mostly ending with a note that isn't there. It should (not because I said so, but because that's hearable) be just a slide, but it is a slide ending with a note and you have to pluck the string at the end of that slide. It is not a matter of "style".

 

And I'm not sure that doing it in the general section is the best way to do it because your openly attack all the others charter without any kind of distinction including you

 

I don't want to attack anyone. I just want to point out some things that charters in my opinion should look about to get the quality that the official DLC offers.

 

About the chord name, I see your point but I see others point that just like to have the name not corresponding to what they hear but what they see, a A chord shape is still a A chord shape whatever the tuning you use.

 

I don't care. In the official DLC's the A chord in D Standard would be a G chord.

 

Don't get me wrong I completely agree with the message you try to pass but I'm pretty sure it won't as long as you do it this way ;)

 

Then how am I supposed to do it?

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MY WORKSHOP/MÓJ WARSZTAT
Gave up Rocksmith and CDLC making, playing on his own now.

 

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A reboot of this topic could help everyone learn some new tips while keeping things objective.  Instead of saying "Do this - not this" you could say:

 

Here is a slide technique in Tak Matsumoto's "Go Further" (on-disk):

(pic)

Here's how to recreate this specific slide:

(pic)

 

This way we are not commenting on how you should/shouldn't chart, but rather how the Rocksmith dev team charts.  It's too big a job for one person to figure out what the dev team does, but with discussion we can compare objective in-game examples to get a list of helpful tips.

 

What are your thoughts on this?

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I thought about removing this thread and doing a new thread called "How to reach the official DLC quality in your customs". I noticed now, what firekorn tried to say to me. My tips look like orders, I will change that in future, but now I've got no time free. Someday I will do screenshots from the official DLC's techniques and show how to chart them in EOF and then it will be more like tips.

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MY WORKSHOP/MÓJ WARSZTAT
Gave up Rocksmith and CDLC making, playing on his own now.

 

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It's always tough to offer suggestions, especially if English is not your first language, a lot of words carry hidden weight that can often be forgotten. Perhaps 'Advanced Tricks Used Commonly in Official DLC?' I don't know.

 

I mean, for what it's worth, after sync issues, I honestly think unnecessary sustain length is one of the most disorienting things in CDLCs on faster songs, because it obscures the next notes into a jumbled mess. If the tempo's 120 or below it's just unattractive to me, but start pushing past 150 and it genuinely becomes hard to decipher personally - really the reason I started making sure I fixed those during my testing.

 

I do find sustain length is a variable though - I feel I should have different lengths for faster and slower songs, though they should never be touching in the project regardless, one of the first things I do if I import a tab is Ctrl+A then press '[' at least once (if I shortened a note that has nothing but silence following it, I'll redo its length when I get to it, chances are its length wasn't perfect anyway).

 

Likewise, I feel the Linknext slide thing is definitely another important thing to be communicated to charters early on, I didn't figure it out until like at least my fifth custom, but again it makes the majority of those slides up and down look and feel so much better.

I've always got the multitracks.

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Thanks for gathering problems. I agree on all points with Kamyk.

I use this post now to share my problems with customs.

It has been and will be updated regularly.

 

Slides

Slides can be, like bends, played early or late, short or long.

I didn't care in my earlier works, not understanding the use of Nextlink..

Slide outs from GPro are "black" slides in EOF, which strangely can't be made inside EOF.

 

Gracenotes

They are important, because they give the song a play style, which is different from just playing simple notes.

Gracenotes don't have a beat of their own, and they are not imported in EOF.

It must be done manually. I place them very close, with a slide to enter their main note.

 

Sustains

Why connect close notes, I didn't do it, then I did  like everybody else, and stop it again.

Notes ring naturally until the next close note, they should not have any sustained line. 

They ring longer on another string with no following note, but sustains on any string are blocked in EOF by any note on another string.

 

Stop Ringing

For rhythm reasons, it's important to see when a note must be stopped ringing.

This is most important for Bass, which is mainly a rhythm instrument.

I would suggest that a note played short cutting the natural ringing should have a minimal sustain

to differentiate it to notes without sustain, which might have been removed by the DD creator.

 

Removing sustains in DD Creator also removes slides even at 100%! 

 

Accents

Not seen often, and I don't know if EOF imports them from GPro. They change the feeling of the Rhythm of notes.

They add to play style.

 

Tones 

They may be completely wrong in category

A distortion tone can't be used for an acoustic tone..

Getting the right acoustic tone is not that easy.

 

Volume 

Tones may be too loud or too low

RS sometimes applies irregular volumes, tones start low, and then back normal at the next start.

This also happens when EOF is running in the background.

Sometimes when I test the volume, I forget to set the mixer back to 100%.

This maybe reasons for higher or lower volume tones.

 

1st step is to get the volume of the music right

In Audacity, amplify should be maximized to let a few peaks touch the window border and most peaks come close.

In the Toolkit Edit tones, most tones do well with 20+ , acoustic tones require 30+ 

 

In the Toolkit song volume settings should be tested In RS.

I try to level the music with the tone at 70%, and not the tones with the music.

to keep harmony between different tones.

Users can make it louder

 

Layout of notes

Tabs available for GP may sound right, but they may not be setup for best playability.

Charters should observe live performances to see how a tab is played.

Chords can be played easy (cool) or hard (classic) ways,

Solos can be played by changing strings (easier) or changing fret hand positions (harder). 

Bass players chart guitar tab without testing them or analyzing the playability

Example :

The fret hand position is on 7 in a very fast play.

Then a single note from the original tab is set on fret 12!

Why move the hand to 12 when the same note is on the next string on fret 7?

The Tuning in EOF shows how to calculate the fret of a note on a higher string,

In standard tuning, its -5, except for b-string (-4)

So if a fret 15 is shown. while notes before and after lie around 9th fret, its better to set it a string higher to fret 10.

 

It needs experience to deepen these subjects. And patience.

Quantity releases may lower their quality.

 

Finally, experienced charters should spend some time to advice novice charters,

If we play a release that looks wrong, we may check the structure and give feedback, even if they may be offended. Specially if notes are not aligned on the beats, or sectors don't work in the RR.

 

I cannot share the sensibilities here.

This thread should not become a dispute on pointless formal aspects instead of content.

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And in fact I prefer to do a mix for the slide between both of your screen with the use of the linknext status, and their is a lot of different way to chart the exact same thing in slides and sometimes choose between pitch/unpitch slides can't be as obvious as it might seems.

 

I just want to point out that official DLCs NEVER have a notehead in a slide, apart from the very first one. In short, every slide has the "linknext" status applied.

 

There's another thing I'd like to add to this thread, but I'll post that (with screens) after dinner.

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Right, what I wanted to add to this thread:

 

Correct chord sustains

 

This has two meanings:

 

1) With the EoF Preference "GP Import truncates short notes" enabled, chords shorter than a quarter beat get a sustain of 0. If this is a lonely chord, e.g. there are no chords coming after this one, it looks and plays silly. It's like you need to strum and immediately mute it.

 

I suggest that you disable "GP import truncates short notes" if you're importing a track that has either:

 

* Only chords

* Chords and single notes that have an associated technique that requires a sustain (like bends, vibrato, slides)

 

In the latter case, you can remove the sustain from the single notes easily by following the following steps:

 

Find a note, and lengthen it to be the length of a quarter note. In the detail window, note the duration in ms:

 

http://thumbnails110.imagebam.com/34447/2d41be344468508.jpg

 

Follow the following steps:

 

* Go to Edit -> Selection -> Select all shorter than

* Put in the duration of a quarter note + 1ms (in the above example, I would put in 360)

* Go to Edit -> Selection -> Deselect chords

* Now use the mouse wheel to shorten the duration of all single notes to 1 ms

 

 

On to the second part of correct chord sustains. Watch this video:

 

 

Notice how the first two chords have correct sustain. Then notice that at the 11 second mark, there's a chord that has its sustain all the way to the next chord. It's a popular song, and we all know that's not how it's played. So, what happened?

It's simple. When EoF exports your song to the XML file, it looks ahead of every chord, and if it finds the same chord within 10 seconds (at least, I believe it is 10 seconds), it will lengthen the chord's sustain all the way to the next chord. This was done to reduce screen clutter in the RS1 era (as far as I know). However, sometimes this messes up a lot of chords, and thus the rhythm.

 

So, now that we know what happens, how do we fix it? Simple. We toggle crazy on the next chord. We do this by pressing T while having the next chord selected, or going to Note -> Toggle crazy:

 

http://thumbnails110.imagebam.com/34448/bdb4fe344474957.jpg

 

Notice how the rectangle inside the note goes black? That's how you know it's a crazy chord.

So whenever you notice incorrect chord sustain like this, you know what to do. If you're worried that this might clutter the screen: don't. It's not that bad. Just look at the difference between the following two versions (Skip to 3:48)

 

Version 1

 

Version 2

 

And yes, this is some shameless self promotion ;)

 

This is what it looks like in eof:

 

http://thumbnails110.imagebam.com/34448/981a92344478200.jpg

 

 

 

So, that's just my 2 cents.

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Correct chord sustains

 

1) With the EoF Preference "GP Import truncates short notes" enabled, chords shorter than a quarter beat get a sustain of 0. If this is a lonely chord, e.g. there are no chords coming after this one, it looks and plays silly. It's like you need to strum and immediately mute it. 

 

I suggest that you disable "GP import truncates short notes" if you're importing a track that has either:

 

 

Thanks for directing my attention to chord sustains, I haven't reached that level yet and ignored them (just like the fret hand positions) when they are not helping.. 

 

So the length of the note in the GP links the sustains together in EOF, causing the problem of clarity,

Which I find most disturbing in the case of following bends.

 

About the question when to mute a ringing string, I presume, if the tab in GP is right, the note must be followed by a "Rest".

Which is rarely done.

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So the length of the note in the GP links the sustains together in EOF, causing the problem of clarity,

Which I find most disturbing in the case of following bends.

 

About the question when to mute a ringing string, I presume, if the tab in GP is right, the note must be followed by a "Rest".

Which is rarely done.

 

 

I am not exactly sure what you are asking here. You are going from chords to single notes.

But I can answer your last question. A note must be held as long as the GP tab says. Every kind of note (in musical theory, and in the way it's displayed in GP) like whole, half, quarter notes etc, have a specific duration (in this case, respectively a whole bar, half bar, quarter bar). It must be muted when that time has run its course, whether or not there is a rest. An empty bar does not mean that you let it ring out, just because there is no rest.

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I always make notes and chords as short as possible. When there is really a sustain I lengthen the note or chord and then mark it as a sustain. But I've got your point now, yeah it actually looks silly, but it doesn't affect the chart like complex bends (variable strength during bend) marked as a normal bend...Still I'll take a note of that sustains.

MY WORKSHOP/MÓJ WARSZTAT
Gave up Rocksmith and CDLC making, playing on his own now.

 

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Undeniable fact is that the Tabs are rarely perfect, that's why I adjusted the sustains to the length of the audible sound, if it went further or shorter than the length imported from GP. Empty bars are basically a complete beat rest.

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There's some "problem" with slides between GP notation and EOF.

 

When there's a "slide in" in GP that import as an unpitch slide starting one fret below/above the actual note and finish on the correct note.

A "slide in" is not clearly define (no starting fret) in GP so EOF interpret it as he can.

 

The "slide out" are more correctly interpreted but it still need the charter adjustment to indicate the final fret of the unpitch slides that EOF can't guess by himself.

 

But I give you the point that the direction (up or down the neck) should always be correct during the import.

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