Melodyne DNA — you've gotta watch this!

[musicarteca]

that's sort of like pointing out that the difference between two photos of Pam Anderson naked is that she's wearing different earrings in one of the photos. It's not the earrings that I'm looking at.

What would you be looking at exactly?

[dave pine]

creative possibilities are endless.....

[James Steele]

But for me, that's sort of like pointing out that the difference between two photos of Pam Anderson naked is that she's wearing different earrings in one of the photos. It's not the earrings that I'm looking at.

Right... and you can buy new earrings, but you can't buy new... ummm... well the analogy sort of doesn't work I guess.

[mhschmieder]

I don't want to pan this product/feature as plenty of people will achieve musical results with it, but I'm having trouble believing that an individual note could be extracted and corrected in a transparent way when there are harmonic interactions with the other notes.

The artifacts are obvious in the audio demo, as they were to me on a demo version of current Celemony offerings when I transposed a vocal even by as little as a half step w/ formant adjustment enabled (TC Helicon seems to do better at vocal transposition, but it is really a stretch to take ANY of this technology even as far as three semi-tones at this point in time).

I had a very strong negative reaction initially because of how the demo positions this product. But if I take a step back and focus instead on how it could be used SPARINGLY as a SURGICAL tool in cases where it is simply impractical (or impossible due to the death or otherwise unavailability of the artist or artists) to retrack or overdub, then it probably would be more useful in many circumstances where a project is primarily audio-oriented vs. MIDI-oriented.

In cases where MIDI is the route, it is easier and probably more successful to do MIDI editing and then retrack the MIDI.

I think Celemony does themselves a disservice and opens their product to ridicule, by presenting it as an alternative to wasting three precious minutes at the start of a session tuning the guitar .

[donreynolds]

Could it be a prank? After all, the guy DID say something like "no reason why you can't do it in real life even if it is theoretically impossible." And he did look a little stereotypical for the mad scientist role. Ah, it's probably real. But it does make me wonder. As someone pointed out, you could take a Beethoven symphony and do remixes forever. This is opening some doors into territory we barely even know what to do with. Just when we're starting to get a handle on the problem in DRM as regards remixes, and we're nowhere near a solution, someone ups the ante.


Shooshie

It's no prank. I got an e-amil from Celemony today advertising it

[philbrown]

But for me, that's sort of like pointing out that the difference between two photos of Pam Anderson naked is that she's wearing different earrings in one of the photos. It's not the earrings that I'm looking at.

Right... and you can buy new earrings, but you can't buy new... ummm... well the analogy sort of doesn't work I guess.

ROFLOL!

[David Polich]

This is from Celemony's website:

" Direct Note Access is designed for single polyphonic tracks. You can use it for the quality targeted editing of a piano, a guitar or a string quartet. Optimum results are obtained with cleanly recorded signals to which as few effects have been added as possible."

So there you go. It isn't a total miracle worker. Obviously distorted guitar tracks would be less than ideal candidates. Even listening to the audio for the video demo, the original guitar recordings leave something to be desired.
They sound like they're just straight D.I. recordings from some guitar with a
typical piezo pickup.

The audio on the streaming video demo is already compromised - worth remembering that as well. That and the fact that it's a pre-beta version
we're watching and listening to.

The audio-MIDI feature is another thing that has me really excited -
I can take strummed guitar parts and export them as MIDI and then use
something like Real Guitar with the MIDI data. Totally cool.

[mhschmieder]

Yeah, I missed that feature as I stumbled through the streaming video last night (I can't really watch streamed videos in anything resembling a continuous fashion, so probably shouldn't judge audio quality from something that is hiccupping frequently ).

Another way in which the "Mee-Dee" functionality could prove useful is in using an acoustic instrument as a "virtual MIDI controller" to later trigger other sounds, without all of the tracking issues that current guitar-to-MIDI and cello-to-MIDI converters still suffer (though they're getting better).

Once past the beta stage, it will be interesting if someone can do a shootout of bi-tracked audio and MIDI from a guitar that has both an audio out jack and a hex pickup (just as one example), change the MIDI a little in DP, change the audio a little in Melodyne and export it to MIDI, and then use the two resulting MIDI tracks to trigger something like, say, a lute. Then compare (one could visually compare the two MIDI files as well, using Quickscribe).

[beautypill]

Please, everyone, focus on the wildly creative possibilities of this technology, not the lazy "fixing" possibilities! Who cares about fixing mistake notes in a guitar performance? Yawn!

We're headed into a territory where all aspects of audio will be mutable! I mean, think of what you could do with this power!

Imagine stretching, molding, adapting and grafting the exquisite string intro of Etta James' "At Last" into the bridge of your next song. The notes might be entirely unrecognizable, but the basic tone and feel would remain. The potentials for collage-based art are now bizarrely limitless.

Get excited!

I mean, that's what I'm going to do with this technology... Experiment to my heart's content!

The world of sampling just jettisoned into a new era. And the world of intellectual property laws just took another hit...

- c

[Hideout]

I think that this will render all of my chordal loops and samples infinitely more useful and flexible! I can't wait to check it out.

[npatton]

I showed this to my wife (a wonderful flutist and musician), who normally isn't that interested in this stuff. Her eyes popped out of her head, too.

However, if you're looking at this as replacing good performances, it actually just multiplied the potential headaches (as well as billable hours) for engineers everywhere, just as pitch correction did a few years ago. While inexperienced singers know they can suck in the studio and still get a "good" product, we're now adding guitarists and keyboardists to that list of frustrating clients.

Mixed blessing?

OK. I'll take it anyway...

[RCory]

And he did look a little stereotypical for the mad scientist role.

it's probably real - did you see his teeth? There's lots of coffee and cigarettes on those!

[RCory]

Please, everyone, focus on the wildly creative possibilities of this technology, not the lazy "fixing" possibilities! Who cares about fixing mistake notes in a guitar performance? Yawn!

Hear! Hear! It's the creative aspects of this that intrigue me - and will most likely get me off the fence to get the darned thing...

[James Steele]

The potentials for collage-based art are now bizarrely limitless.

That's true and the people that are into that can get excited. I'm one of those old school rocker guys who primarily likes to construct my music with some other people... like a bassist, keyboardist, and drummer... rather than slice it together behind a computer like a mad scientists for hours at an end.

I'm not saying that disparagingly either... but I'm not the kind of person who wants to sit with something like this and "manufacture" music out of audio snippets. Call me a romantic.

[toodamnhip]

Please, everyone, focus on the wildly creative possibilities of this technology, not the lazy "fixing" possibilities! Who cares about fixing mistake notes in a guitar performance? Yawn!

We're headed into a territory where all aspects of audio will be mutable! I mean, think of what you could do with this power!

Imagine stretching, molding, adapting and grafting the exquisite string intro of Etta James' "At Last" into the bridge of your next song. The notes might be entirely unrecognizable, but the basic tone and feel would remain. The potentials for collage-based art are now bizarrely limitless.

Get excited!

I mean, that's what I'm going to do with this technology... Experiment to my heart's content!

The world of sampling just jettisoned into a new era. And the world of intellectual property laws just took another hit...

- c

I agree..

I think all criticism thus far is misguided..seriously..this is the future and the guy should be congratulated without any negativity...

I am totally impressed..who cares if at first it cant reach into distorted tuba..lol

Take a lesson from Picasso..
Any true artist uses all of these toys in AMAZING ways...just because some fool will tune his guitar with this doesn;t mean anything..yikes..give the guy a hearty applause..