Melodyne?

[pedrodash]

correct detection mode..correct?
that's funny, i don't have all this problems with melodyne, and i use it with live rock vocals too, with all that ambience bleeding (is this term correct?)
wowo, too many corrects in one post.

[Mark Warren]

Melodyne promises more than it delivers IMO. It eventually will become better and better, but for quick fixes it seems Autotune delivers in its simplicity a bit better. We have the biggest/best version of Melodyne but AT just sees more use at most sessions.

[Royer121]

There is a "Correct Detection Mode", I think its Command+Shift+D,
where you can change the detected notes. The wrong detection is sometimes
due to strange sounds in the voice, that make it sound an octave lower.
There is also an option there to tell Melodyne that this phrase has been sung
roughly or something and so it knows that there are noises in the audio, which dont have to be interpeted.

Actually importing into melodyne and exporting without doing nothing is the wrong way. As I said, rather automate using the bridge/plugin, to make sure none of your audiofiles get altered by wrong detection.

Ray

[sheepforwheat]

i tried melodyne for the first time (previous autotune user) and i like it a lot. I had a problem with it however:

i used the studio version with the bridge in cubase. i routed 10 cubase vocal tracks into 6 melodyne tracks. I had problems when playing back the audio since i was combining multiple cubase tracks onto a single melodyne track. The problem was that melodyne was spitting back the audio on multiple cubase tracks, therefore doubling the volume of the vocals. kind of hard to explain. Not to mention, my intel core 2 duo was snap crackle and poppin.

Just keep your tracks 1 to 1, minimize the number of melodyne tracks and you shouldn't have problems. you could also just export and import and export and import, but that's a bitch. maybe i need the plug-in version.

[diamondjim]

I use the plugin version sparingly in SONAR as a clip effect, after splitting just around the area I want to tune, then use the "bounce to clip" function after I am done.

This removes the plugin from the clip. THis is much easier than using it on an entire track. Works great on monophonic sources.

[Tommy-boy]

This month I purchased the Melodyne plug-in to clean up some of my vox recordings. I got a chance to give it a good workout.

My hat is off to Celemony. They've made an absolutely fantastic plug-in with a wonderful GUI. The layout is really intuitive. Having the amplitude overlayed as a wav blob on the pitch line makes it very easy to see the notes. Editing pitch is really straight-forward.

And the results are fantastic. I even transposed a few notes by large amounts (approx 8 semitones), and the results sound quite natural.

Somebody finally got it right.

I have AT 3 and never really got on well with it, despite reading several posts on how to use it in offline mode with Cubase. I know some love AT, but I think Melodyne's GUI is in another league. It's so well laid out and intuitive, it's an absolute pleasure to use. And this is only version 1 of the plug-in! I'd imagine it will only get better.

Alright, I'm done gushing about how great this plug is. Every now and then something comes out that is such a pleasant surprise you just have to talk about it.

On a side note, I don't like or trust automatic pitch correction either. I manually adjust notes with Melodyne. But I like Melodyne for this because it has clear note separations (which you can edit freely in case Melodyne doesn't make the right choices, although it usually does) and there are several different ways to adjust pitch: adjust the note center, adjust the pitch drift, adjust the modulation (vibrato), or adjust the pitch transitions between notes. And the interface makes it simple and easy to do these.

If you're interested in giving Melodyne a whirl, I suggest watching the short video demos online, then downloading the demo version of the plug to fiddle with (and perhaps perusing the manual to see how the main pitch controls work).

-Tom

[Royer121]

There's also a good tutorial DVD which isn't bad for the first use...
ASK VIDEO MELODYNE DVD-TUTORIAL

If you're through that and your results are still crap, than somethings wrong either with the performance or the user..

Ray

[ron florentine]

Is the dvd tutorial in english and is it avalable anywhere in the USA.....dont want to shell out a lot of extra moola just for shipping.



Ron Florentine
Soundsweest Studio

[Royer121]

The girl in the video is talking American English and is dubbed by a german speaker...so it should be available in te US too.
But I'm not so familiar with US online sellers, so you'd know about that better yourself.

Ray

[Dirty Halo]

Been discussed before, but an updated perspective would be appreciated.

Give the above thoughts, how does Waves Tune rate?

(Please, try to not get into the thoughts on Waves as a company, just TUne as compared to AT and Melodyne in terms of sound quality and ease-of-use)

Thanks

-andrews

[tritace]

I use Melodyne studio all the time, Its a life saving tool and completely essential to me now.

However, if the vocal is very good, iv stopped importing that into melodyne and doing it word by word. I think Auto Tune is fine for just bringing an all round good vocal in tune.

I do find that if a phrase is way out, or sung wrong, then importing just that bit into melodyne, fixing it and putting it back into the track works well.

All this talk of melodyne degrading the sound quality, I do agree a little bit with that, but i see melodyne as a last resort fix, and if you could always get the artist back in the room, you would, but thats not possible.

Anyway, putting one melodyne phrase in the middle of a Auto Tuned vocal isn't really noticeable. The pros definitely out-weigh the cons.

thanks

t

[waltermusik]

John and Barry,

the question whether Melodyne degrades sound of notes that have not been edited has been discussed quite a bit in the Celmony forums. I think the Celemony guys will be very glad to get a sample project from you guys to help reproduce the issue.

Speaking of myself, I use Melodyne a lot and have no such issue.

Cheers, Thomas

[feck]

Originally Posted by tritace

I use Melodyne studio all the time, Its a life saving tool and completely essential to me now.

However, if the vocal is very good, iv stopped importing that into melodyne and doing it word by word. I think Auto Tune is fine for just bringing an all round good vocal in tune.

I do find that if a phrase is way out, or sung wrong, then importing just that bit into melodyne, fixing it and putting it back into the track works well.

All this talk of melodyne degrading the sound quality, I do agree a little bit with that, but i see melodyne as a last resort fix, and if you could always get the artist back in the room, you would, but thats not possible.

Anyway, putting one melodyne phrase in the middle of a Auto Tuned vocal isn't really noticeable. The pros definitely out-weigh the cons.

thanks

t

Depending on the tambre and delivery of the singer, I find that often times I like the sound that Melodyne imparts on the vocal track. An upper mids grittiness that pushes the vocal forward. Doesn't happen on every vocal, mind you, but that is the brakes. As to people having various problems, while it is not a perfect program by any means, it can be very in depth and dependent on the users' knowledge of the software, and understanding of how best to manipulate the source audio. Any way you cut it, it is a seriously powerful tool, and for the money it costs, has saved me tenfold in the time saved by using it overall.

[jamwerks]

In The Feb. issue of Sound on Sound, producer Stuart Price (Madonna, etc.) talks about having used Melodyne extensively on Seal's latest CD "System". I'd have a hard time believing that there's any degradation of the audio......

[Royer121]

My ears don't lie. I compared a imported/exported file which has been altered in Melodyne and a unprocessed file and:

The processed file has something going on in the high freq, which
reduces the air frequencies and the presence. That's a fact and everybody can do that test himself with melodyne

You can work against this with equalizers, but thats not optimal.

[camerondye]

I started a thread for this but wanted to put it here that the Melodyne dvd by ask video is amazingly thorough and covers everything...It is a little of a boring watch but showed me things I had no idea Melodyne could do. I'm downloading the melodyne manual now to see if they even mention some of this stuff.
cam

[dannygold]

Originally Posted by Royer121

My ears don't lie. I compared a imported/exported file which has been altered in Melodyne and a unprocessed file and:

The processed file has something going on in the high freq, which
reduces the air frequencies and the presence. That's a fact and everybody can do that test himself with melodyne

You can work against this with equalizers, but thats not optimal.

I totally noticed that about auto tune (although that was years ago in old version)... if I had one track of corrected audio and one of uncorrected, together forming a vocal performance I had to EQ the uncorrected one darker or brighten up the corrected one.

[DeadPoet]

I was just looking at the price of Melodyne and to my surprise they have two prices:

If you live in the EU you pay €299 (=$450), if you live outside the EU you pay $299 (€200).

A €100/$150 difference FOR A DOWNLOAD PRODUCT!

I think this is outrageous, I mean, there's no shipping, no customs, no extra marketing, etc. Just a different hyperlink to click on. Come on!




Herwig

[s.d.finley]

Originally Posted by whitepapagold

Exactly! Its funny cause everytime I read someone bashing Melodyne, its because they DON'T KNOW HOW TO USE IT! But of course nobody ever admits that.....

It makes auto tune sound broken....dfegad

Booyah!!

Melodyne is very deep. You need a very clean vocal take to mess w/ Melodyne. I have noticed that melodyne will take recording noises and do weird things to them, pitch wise. You can get some strange whirls and such. I just make sure to edit out all the extra noise. About the esses, another poster suggested something I do, just seperate the blobs.

If I have some even stranger problems, which has occurred once in a blue moon, I will just take pieces of vocals, and pitch whats needed, not the whole track!

Melodyne can sound very natural, if you are just fixing by a minimal amount and I mean 1/4 or less of a half step.

Also, support rocks!! They have always been helpful, although they may take a day to answer....they are across the pond!

[tamasdragon]

Originally Posted by Royer121

My ears don't lie. I compared a imported/exported file which has been altered in Melodyne and a unprocessed file and:

The processed file has something going on in the high freq, which
reduces the air frequencies and the presence. That's a fact and everybody can do that test himself with melodyne

You can work against this with equalizers, but thats not optimal.

It's strange, it completely nulls out here, so I guess you should investigate more.
Tamas Dragon

[macleodgrant]

Originally Posted by tamasdragon

It's strange, it completely nulls out here, so I guess you should investigate more.
Tamas Dragon

i've experienced the exact issue as the above poster however on some tracks it didn't happen. didn't occur when using Onyx Preamp, did occur when i used my valve preamp

[gregohb]

Originally Posted by Jenz

Are you guys kidding? Melodyne completely destroys the sound quality! Even if you just pitch a few cents, an "ess" in a word will sound like the most horrible mp3-conversion. I have tried all versions, and i still can't belive why this is not mentioned in the reviews. Auto Tune doesn't perform formant correction, so it sounds Donald Duck if you pitc a lot, but the sound quality is a trillion times better. I've used Melodyne on a few problem productions, and i had to manually replace the bad sounding parts back to the original. Took me days. And yes, i know how to use it. The idea is great, but algorithm's suck. This thread should be at "Music Computers", certainly not High End, sorry.

Have you tried using the FORMANT tool in Melodyne? There is a separate tool for that.

[tamasdragon]

Originally Posted by macleodgrant

i've experienced the exact issue as the above poster however on some tracks it didn't happen. didn't occur when using Onyx Preamp, did occur when i used my valve preamp

I'll try to test this on different materials, soon will report back.
TD

[gregohb]

Originally Posted by DeadPoet

I was just looking at the price of Melodyne and to my surprise they have two prices:

If you live in the EU you pay €299 (=$450), if you live outside the EU you pay $299 (€200).

A €100/$150 difference FOR A DOWNLOAD PRODUCT!

I think this is outrageous, I mean, there's no shipping, no customs, no extra marketing, etc. Just a different hyperlink to click on. Come on!

With the Euro worth .67 dollars, that means they are selling for exactly the same price in both "local" currencies. I am glad they do this. With the dollar's fall, all of the European plugs are now 50% higher in price. Some companies demand payment in Euros (e.g. Ohm force), some in dollars (e.g. PSP), and some in both (Celemony).

[gregohb]

Originally Posted by camerondye

I started a thread for this but wanted to put it here that the Melodyne dvd by ask video is amazingly thorough and covers everything...It is a little of a boring watch but showed me things I had no idea Melodyne could do. I'm downloading the melodyne manual now to see if they even mention some of this stuff.
cam

There are some sample video lessons on Celemony's site here :
celemony_ :: Tutorial DVD

[gregohb]

apart from tuning, Melodyne allows you to rough out vocal harmonies pretty quickly and easily.

in both cases, you can always re-sing parts, listening to over-corrected versions too - then you get the best of both worlds.

[gregohb]

the DVD is available for $55 (yes dollars) if you are outside the EU via Celemony's online store or Askvideo's site. However you can also get it for $45 at Amazon (I think taxfree, and free shipping).
Amazon.com: Melodyne Tutorial DVD: Musical Instruments

[truthnlife13]

I find with many less than stellar vocalists. I can take their track and pitch correct it to perfect pitch. then have them sing another take to that track. This works especially good for harmonies since many people have a hard time singing harmony. I will create the harmony n melodyne then mute the lead and have them sing in unison to the harmony track i created. so in the end none of the trax in the mix have been coorrected just sung to corrected trax thus preserving the natural sound as opposed to a processed one

[azzzy]

Originally Posted by truthnlife13

I find with many less than stellar vocalists. I can take their track and pitch correct it to perfect pitch. then have them sing another take to that track. This works especially good for harmonies since many people have a hard time singing harmony. I will create the harmony n melodyne then mute the lead and have them sing in unison to the harmony track i created. so in the end none of the trax in the mix have been coorrected just sung to corrected trax thus preserving the natural sound as opposed to a processed one

Wow, that's a great idea! I'm gonna try this. Thanks.

[truthnlife13]

Originally Posted by azzzy

Wow, that's a great idea! I'm gonna try this. Thanks.

using digital as a crutch I decided to do this. I had many singers that couldnt sing or harmonize that would just say can't you fix it in the mix. I would get aggravated and say if you can't sing it then don't record it. So I figured instead of fixing their performance I would try to help them improve it. It seems to help get a desired result without the sound of being processed. I am now battling with myself about drum replacement. I love the challenge of making drums sound good but it seems much more time effiicient to use drumagog. I guess at least it still keeps the human side of the performance.