Karaoke Forums

Looking for a few people who have created good sized karaoke libraries and can give me some advice. Specifically advice on building extended LRC files so your lyrics are timed to the word. I want to have a quality output and am looking for tips on how to create a solid library in a reasonable amount of time. I have looked at a tool called Media Commands which seems to be the only one I could find that does timing based on words and not just lines.

Are there other tools that do this? Anyone have experience creating a library with Media Commands? Thoughts on whether it is worth the effort to do more than timing line by line?

TIA.

I have done a moderate number of songs.

However my time to do a song well involves listening to the song several times to get the lyrics right. That may take on average 30-60 minutes for song depending on complexity and length.

With an average 4 minute song just listening to it about 6 times. A couple times to familiarize with the song and verify the correctness of the lyrics text file, even if you know it already (songs with 5+ repeats of a phrase in a row are especially difficult to verify), once to vocal remove, once to add the lyrics and a couple times to verify/edit the lyrics placement.

That comes to at best 2 songs per hour.

Even at minimum wage that is about $4 a song. So unless you have a lot of idle time, buying commercial karaoke songs is better unless the song is not made commercially.

And is the song available to create the tracks legally?

Good Point.


I played with the concept some a few years ago but it really wasn't hours per song efficient.

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Okay, who took my pants?

I would not do it for $10 a song

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I can neither confirm nor deny ever having or knowing anything about nothing.... mrscott

There is a lot of time needed to create a really good karaoke track. You either have to really want to sing the song yourself or you have to have the possibility of selling the track to a mass market like the karaoke manufacturers do. You can make a profit at 2 dollars a track if you can sell thousands of them but if you are trying to make a profit by selling only a couple of tracks to a small group of fans; you're never gonna get rich. LOL I've made a few dozen karaoke tracks for myself and a few friends but profit has never been the motivating factor. It's more of a desire to sing a certain song at karaoke or to do a favor for a friend. Funny part is that when I make a song for a friend, I wind up singing it myself because by the time I'm finished creating the CDG file, I know the song well enough to sing it myself.

I have rights to the songs, I just find for a high end audience you get a certain level of frustration when the lyrics come up one line at a time - especially if it is not a really familiar song. That dampens enthusiasm and participation and cuts down on the repeat business. If I don't get enough people up at a corporate event, I don't get asked back to the next event. So I experimented with songs timed to the word and in some cases the syllable and the frustration goes down and the participation rate goes up and the repeat business flows in.

So I have been playing around making songs timed to the word that I can drop into a system that outputs them. I just haven't figured out how to do it efficiently and my time is a little limited so I was looking for some tips. I would consider paying people to do it if we could agree on an output and a reasonable per song rate. I'm looking to do several hundred songs and if it does as well as I think it will, I would expand beyond that.

Tips appreciated. My guess is there are people more experienced than I that can crank this stuff out so, if anyone's interested in working with me on it let me know.

Yes they are all legal. They are tracks I have purchased that are timed to the line. I just want to augment them so they are timed to the word. When I have word based timing on a song I just don't out the original a/v and instead output a/v that I have created that is timed to the word. Works great but I am struggling to get a library large enough so that every song I offer is like this.

Have you tried using tracks in CDG format? They are sync to the the words.
There are also video tracks with song in multiplex format, all with lyrics sync to the word and not line.

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I can neither confirm nor deny ever having or knowing anything about nothing.... mrscott

I looked at CDG but couldn't figure out how to extract the data I needed (I don't think it is there in the final file). Basically I need to be able to pull out the timing data into a text file which I can then feed into a program that overlays the words on the background I want. Perhaps there is an interim file used to create the CDG file - actually I believe there has to be one - but I have not found anyone who knows how to get at it.

What this does is it gives me control over the graphics and I can customize those to the song and the event and project them onto a screen for people to watch and sing along with the person who'd singing the lead vocal. So the background to the vocals may actually be a set of pictures taken from earlier in the evening of the people who are at the event. Gets the audience participation up. I find it's a lot more engaging than the canned stuff and more people pay attention and sing along. For corporate events that's important.

I played around with Media Commands and it can export a file I can parse and pull into my format easily. It's getting the songs done in Media Command that is time consuming. I am a novice at it so I'm sure it is taking me longer than it should. And there may be other programs that can produce this that I am not away of. You can also do it manually through Pro-Tools but that is even more time consuming.

You can use cdg/mp3+g file for what you want to attend.

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I can neither confirm nor deny ever having or knowing anything about nothing.... mrscott

Really - to get the graphics effect or to get the timing file I spoke of? If it is the latter I would love to know how. I fooled around with CDG for a while and just couldn't figure out how I could get what I needed. I do not understand the format that well so any tips would be appreciated.

Then try it again with the proper tools:

Powerkaraoke:
http://www.powerkaraoke.com/

Karaoke Builder Studio:
http://www.karaokebuilder.com/
or
http://www.cdgfix.com/

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I can neither confirm nor deny ever having or knowing anything about nothing.... mrscott

I will give those a try - thanks for the tips.

Ask and yee shall receive...more or less.

CDG is a single bit graphics format. The file is read in 24 byte chunks at a constant speed of 3.333..(more or less) miliseconds per chunk. The active chunks are identified by the number 9 in the first byte. The non-active chunks are used for timing and discarded without being processed. Only the last 6 bits of each byte are used to hold CDG information.

The CDG pixel map area is 300X212 utilizing a color table of 16 colors limited to 4 bits per RGB color. Color table is filled using two command chunks 30 and 31. An active chunk containing the commands values of 6 and 38 fill a 6X12 pixel block. The 6 command assigns predetermined colors from the color table in an if/else condition while the 38 command XORs the existing color in the pixel map to determine the block color. Once the back buffered block is complete it is assigned to the pixel map. Thus, you get the CDG "sweeping" effect.

...and now you know. Yes, I am being a smarta$$ .

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Okay, who took my pants?

ReadyTeddy,

I wish when you first started this venture, before purchasing anything, you had the information
from the above posts! Especially the info from Jian and Exweedfarmer!

As Jian shared software advice and stated that he wouldn't do it for $10 a song and Sir Weedy
really broke it down to what's inside CDG, breaking down karaoke is Time Consuming.

Your Goal is to Precisely Control the Sweep and Display Content to You Liking!

The Time Spent On Extracting Timing Of One Track, I could Batch Proces an entire disc.

* You could achieve the desired results by ADJUSTING the software and exporting OVERLAYS for your video.

SOFTWARE:
CDGFIX............You can Precisely Configure (Sir Weedy's explanation) If You Know What Your Doing!

Power Karaoke CDG Creator Pro or their AVI creator!

Karaoke Builder Studios:
Dispaly The Content In Various Locations and ANGELS i.e. 45 degress!
Precisely Controll Every Syllable!

Overlay The Results On A Video... PERFECT! Just How You Like It!


Kind Regards,
sw00000p

Thank you to everyone who provided tips. I am going to play around with some of aforementioned packages and see what they can do. From what I have read they may get me there. One thing I neglected to mention I was looking for in all of this is the ability to change some of the lyrics in existing songs so I can customize them to the event.

Any other advise is always appreciated...

CDGFix is what you may want to try if you want to edit existing graphic file. Sw0000op uses that tool and is the best person around here to help you.

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I can neither confirm nor deny ever having or knowing anything about nothing.... mrscott

If you do custmise comercial karaoke tracks...
Don't tell anyone.
Manu's can get a bit up tight
I know in Karafun you can use your own pics as backdrop.

Changing Existing Lyrics:
Unless you a "Seasoned Vet" like Sir Weedy...
Start Tappin and create a new compilation!

The Cdgfix help files ARE NOT COMPLETED YET!
Personally, I Never use Cdgfix to change lyrics.
It's Much Easier and Quicker to create a new disc.


sw00000p