Sound and music for animation?

[Starbase1]

I've started trying to pay a bit more attention to finishing off my animations, taking the time to add a title and some music for example. I'm quite pleased with the results, and I'm thinking of doing more of this, maybe even making some (very) short 'films' about the objects I've modelled where they are not well known.

I'm not sure about some of the sound aspects though.

Premiere Elements has a very handy 'smart sound' feature which generates music to a required length and style - but extra content seems expensive... (Any know of cheaper sources?)

Archive.org has loads of music that can be used, and its often worth wading through to try and find some good stuff which is creative commons licensed.

And editing to length is not a problem with quite a few free and reasonably priced packages.

What I seem to be missing though is tieing the audio into what's going on in the video. And I think a bit more of that would take things up a level.

How do other people handle this?

Even something simple, perhaps for introductory titles before proper music starts. I'm thinking of something mid way between a sound effect and music, perhaps a sort of "musical thump" as you might get in a trailer for a horror film...

BE AFRAID!
(Booming rumble)
BE VERY AFRAID!
(Musical thud)
IT'S ANOTHER BORING OVER HYPED COOKING SHOW!
(clang)

While I'm on the subject, what's the situation with using copyrighted music on youtube? It spotted (for example) the version of Holst's Mars I used for the Valdore, but let it go up saying something about maybe putting ads against it.

If they spot it and go ahead and put it online, they apparently have no problem, so can I safely assume I won't have problems if I do this more?

All ideas and thoughts very welcome!

[Taranis]

You could try there

http://incompetech.com/m/c/royalty-free/

[Andrew March]

I found a site a few years ago that did loads of music you could use in animations all you had to do was include a credit. They had everything from Epic to Trance and everything in between.

As for tying in your music with the action on screen, it gets a little trickier since that is why the music that is written for films is written for a specific part.

I remember going to the recording of the Episode II soundtrack at Abbey Road studios and watching the LSO playing the music along to a huge screen showing the almost finished movie, the idea obviously was designed to make sure the musicians knew what piece keyed in where and to help them play with more drama and emotion when appropriate.

The trick for you is experimentation, use levels and move the music around your animation to get the right fit.

[Andrew March]

Right, go here: http://www.seabreezecomputers.com/tips/freemusic.htm

It gives you links to all the places that offer semi decent free royalty free music, some of them ask that you include credits and some don't I would add a credit whether they do or not.

[Starbase1]

I understand the problems in finding music with the right sounds at the right time!

I suppose, apart from timed brief sounds, as I mentioned in the first message, I need sounds which can be overlaid onto a soundtrack. Sound effects don't seem right - as you'd expect to see something on screen that would make the noise.

I can't even come up with the right words, but I think I need a source of semi-musical sounds which overlay 'proper' music at key points? Or am I barking up the wring tree with the wrong end of the stick?

[Starbase1]

Originally Posted by Andrew March

Right, go here: http://www.seabreezecomputers.com/tips/freemusic.htm

It gives you links to all the places that offer semi decent free royalty free music, some of them ask that you include credits and some don't I would add a credit whether they do or not.

That sounds handy, I'll go over those in depth when I get home from the day job.
Thanks

[rustythe1]

you tube has an automated service which can work out what music is in your clip, if you are not the owner they forward the info to the owner who then has the option to take your video down, or have an addsense revenue from the video on your channel along with a credit, it happened to me when i put a video up ages ago with music to it, they didnt take it down but it just comes up with a message that says i will not get any addsense revenue and who the track is by, record label etc,

with your timings, if i am not mistaken you can load audio tracks into lightwave for syncing, that way you could make your audio first then time the animation to it.

[Jedi2016]

I've always just kind of winged it when it comes to my animations. I cobble together sounds from different locations (including a few collections of sound bite CDs that I've picked up over the years). As for music, I typically have something in mind already, some tune that I'll be running in my head while viewing the pre-vis animation in Layout. Something from another movie, or a movie trailer, or whatever.

[Starbase1]

Thanks Rusty - I figured youtbe was something like that.

I have done video to sound before for music videos, but I really want to go the other way around.. I'm current looking at sonicfire pro, which appears to be based on the cleaver stuff in premier elements..

Looks powerful, but additional content is expensive...

[Starbase1]

OK, I have taken the plunge, and bought Sonicfire Pro, and 5 albums of content (a mix of effects, classical, cinematic, hard rock, electronic atmospheres).

Not sure quite where I will start, stay tuned for a WIP thread for soundtracks!

No promises, but if anyone has something they'd like me to take a crack at, get in touch. I'd say it should be over 45 seconds in length, under 5 minutes for now, and should have sections or something happening for me to try and work to.

Nick