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Melodyne explained perfectly.

Long & McQuade - Glyph Technologies 250GB Quad-Port Tabletop Drive

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Big K Fri, 01/28/2011 - 04:16

I work with DNA and it does exactly what you see in the video.
Only distorted and mixed instruments can not always be processed satisfactory, but, as I know Peter Neubaecker, they work on that, already.
The studio version with many new features including DNA will be out in a few months.

A game changer for music production and nightmare to any copyright holder...
Whistle a line and correct it to perfection... export melody as midi file and win the next Grammy...lol...
Take a Tschaikowsky piano concert and redo it to something new... export the midi files and build an orchester around it...
or use it to tune a string of a rhythm guitar after recording, make a minor to a major chord... all is possible...

BobRogers Fri, 01/28/2011 - 12:55

I agree that DNA is a great advance and works as advertised. But to me the huge strength of Melodyne is the transparency of its basic pitch shifting capabilities. I had really been against the use of pitch shift after demoing several pieces of software. Far too artificial and sterile - too many artifacts. The quality of Melodyne is just far superior to anything I've tried. Horn parts, vocal harmonies. Give them a touch of tightening and they are much easier to mix. Beautiful program.

audiokid Fri, 01/28/2011 - 19:30

Good to read your comments. I like your quote Big-K "Melodyne starts where Autotune stops..." This is definitely going int my rig.

I wonder when DNA will be able to do this to an entire song.
It scares me though... I worry new generations will stop appreciating live music one day. Such perfection could make an unforgiving society; impossible to perform what we are selling as music. We're already there... hmm and evolving .

"What Is Music", is the next question...

This is really cool.

Big K Sat, 01/29/2011 - 04:15

I don't think we need to worry, ...
With MP3 and earphones, these days it seems more important to maintain a tight percussion.
The rest.... is there anybody left, besides the old bones, who could say that a singer is too late or his intonation sucks?
Some bands live on their imperfection and could not play a straight vers if their life depended on it..
Sad.... and lots of reasons for Melodyne...for outself and our ears' sake...
;-)

BTW, have you guys seen the feature that can transfer a melody onto another instrument?
Like a voice line melody gets copied onto a conga track ( of different bpm and rhythm), with timing adjusted to the specific track?
You get any instrument with a little tone to play any other tracks melody, and then make it 4 voices in 4 seconds..
woot....

Another mystery (to me) is, how it can discern between a natural vibrato and an unwanted pitchdrift...
so, that it corrects a pitchdrift, but does not kill the vibrato existing in the drift ...which is also adjustable in depth...

BobRogers Sat, 01/29/2011 - 08:04

Yeah. Don't think there is much to worry about. The key to using the program is not going to 100% pitch correction. You want to tighten - not quantize.

I have not see the transfer feature. That's bizarre. Have to check it out.

I have my doubts about it ever being able to pick notes out of an ensemble. But we'll see. Pretty amazing software as is.

Big K Sat, 01/29/2011 - 14:31

Well, before Peter and his team invented DNA there was no way anybody even thought that this was ever possible...
We'll see what the future brings...

Transfer is a breeze... you just need to copy and paste the melody from one to the other, but only in Melodyne studio version.
the commands can be found in the EDIT dropdown menue... You'll find it. It is also a part of the Melodyne Studio tutorial project in which you can practice all moves by yourself.

Big K Sun, 01/30/2011 - 04:53

Hi Jack
Just try the free demo. All functions can be tested.
It takes a medium learning curve, but it is worth checking out the possibilities.
Once you get the hang of it, it is hard to escape the temptation to tweak and alter all known and selfproduced songs to explore it further.
Not even the Celemony team has found out about all possible applications,yet... and the new Melodyne Studio will be a game changer.

It is not that I go to bed with melodyne, but it is VERY reassuring that many mistakes can be fixed, f nothing else helps, anymore.
I still rather have the musicians re-do the recording, though, and keep Melodyne as a kind of rescue pack for the hopeless siuations.
;-)

And for puzzling some instrumentalists with performances that one single person simply cannot play ( 7 fingers?, .. 13 bars apart ???..lol...)
JK

Melodyne imports and categorizes all audio comming in, even squeaks or grunts. There is an adjustable filter that cuts out weak notes or/and obscure noises.
They can be made part of the played notes and can be tweaked like those. Squeaks from strings can be kept or erased.
Glissandos are no problem and can even be generated, but obviously not with the sound of gliding over the frets..

audiokid Sun, 01/30/2011 - 09:53

Another good explanation:

I'm not hearing it ideal for vocals. Did I miss something, Rainer, Bob?

The fact that guitars intonation can be corrected after the session rather than stopping is enough for me. How many times do we record a good performance that is effected by intonation.
Looks like its $299.00 Canadian.

Big K Mon, 01/31/2011 - 00:51

I'd say, vocal correction is its main domain.
That is where I ( have to ) use it most.
Not that so many singers need total correction of their recordings, but to iron out little mistakes in
other wise good performances. That the rest of it undergoes a pitch and timing correction is sometimes
an additional bonus, which I not allways want. For that I just fix notes manually and leave the rest untouched.
If the singer gets to much inbetween notes, Melodyne has to decide if it is up or down in the scale, which it can't
always discern to 100% correct. How could it know what note the singer wants to sing if both notes fit the scale?.
So, it is necessary to listen through the treated material and do a few corrections yourself, which is as much as grabbing
the "blob" and drag it up or down. It is all rather nicely explaned and can be exercised with the tutorial project.
No need to buy the cat in the sack--lol---
Melodyne editor is a light version of Melodyne studio, which should cost over 600.
If you think you like that software go for the Studio version, it is worth it. Otherwise, you can upgrade anytime..
Melodyne Studio used to include the additional plugin version. IDK, if this is still the case...

Big K Mon, 01/31/2011 - 08:37

They are within 5 minutes reach with the subway, here in Munich...
If they ever build crap, I go there and empty their fridge so bad....
No, they would not dare...lol..

If I was asked to foreward companies for promoting, Celemony with its Melodyne would certainly be on top of a very short list*.
It is a superb product and the guys there are really great. Their way of thinking is truly visionary, even or because there is no huge multi-national
concern behind them, backing them up.
I had to test their customer service and goodwill on a few occasions and was more than agreeably surprised. Thumbs up!!

There is brains in Munich, too, not only Oktoberfest.
;-)

* about 5 in total.

BobRogers Mon, 01/31/2011 - 10:00

It's great for vocals. But vocals don't show off the DNA feature. If you are just correcting monophonic vocal tracks, you can do that with Assistant for $200 - great deal for a plugin.

Also, remember the thread where I got such good customer service over the New Year's weekend. I have no connection, but they've been a pleasure to deal with.

Big K Mon, 01/31/2011 - 15:46

Yes, if you want to correct mono or even stereo tracks it is enough, but the editor has DNA build in.
And you might get hooked....lol.. and just one occasion, where you neeeeed to fix a chord or a few notes in an otherwise perfect take you are upgrading, anyhow.
;-)

It is buggin' me that there is no word to be squeezed out of the gang, yet, what the new Studio version will be capable of.
My guess is that it won't be long to a DNA style tweaking of a choir... We will see.