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- Get the song's lyrics and timing into Rhymecraft.
- Tap out the BPM.
- Background:
- We need to do this to:
- Know how wide each syllable should be on the graph.
- Know the left/right positioning that the syllables should have relative to the beats shown on the graph.
- We need to do this to:
- Step-by-step process:
- Open the BPM window if it isn't already open.
- Click 'Song' in the navbar, then click 'BPM'.
- Open the 'Record the timing' window if it isn't already open.
- Click 'Song' in the navbar, then click 'Record the timing'.
- In the 'Record the timing' window, click the 'Play' button.
- Click inside the 'Tap for BPM' input box.
- Background:
- You need to do this so that the website knows it should start interpreting your pressing of the spacebar as a measurement of the beat.
- Background:
- Press the spacebar to the beat.
- Important: Your first press of the spacebar should be on the first beat of a measure.
- Background:
- This is necessary to correctly show what beat (within a measure) the lyrics start on.
- Step-by-step process:
- To hear the first beat of a measure:
- Listen for where the music seems to start repeating.
- Most songs begin on the first beat of a measure.
- To hear the first beat of a measure:
- Background:
- You can stop pressing the beat whenever you want; the more you press it, the more-accurate the estimation of the BPM will get. I normally press the spacebar for at least 16 beats, but if I want a very accurate estimate, I'll sometimes press the spacebar through the entire song.
- Important: Your first press of the spacebar should be on the first beat of a measure.
- Click outside of the input box.
- You should now see a numerical BPM estimate.
- Open the BPM window if it isn't already open.
- Background:
- Open the timing graph.
- Click "Song" in the navbar, then click the "Timing Graph" option.
- Alternatively, press Alt+Shift+3.
- Click "Song" in the navbar, then click the "Timing Graph" option.
- You should see the syllables of the lyrics displayed on the timing graph like this:
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- If you don't already have a Rhymecraft account, create one.
- If you are not signed in, sign in.
- Prepare a new, blank song.
- If you have just created an account and signed in for the first time:
- You should've already had a new, blank song created for you.
- You should see a screen like this:
- Otherwise, if you have already used the app for another song, and you'd like to add a new song:
- Click 'Song' in the navbar, and then click the 'New Song' option.
- If you have just created an account and signed in for the first time:
- Prepare the lyrics.
- Insert the song's lyrics into the 'Type/Paste Lyrics' window.
- Get the lyrics from Genius.
- Make any changes you want to make.
- Examples of changes you might want to make:
- Add or remove line breaks.
- Remove lyrics you don't want to keep (for example, secondary performers).
- Examples of changes you might want to make:
- Click the 'Submit Lyrics' button.
- Click the 'Syllabify Lyrics' button.
- Insert the song's lyrics into the 'Type/Paste Lyrics' window.
- Prepare the audio file.
- Open the 'Record the timing' window.
- Click the 'Song' option in the navbar, then click the 'Record the timing' dropdown option.
- Alternatively, press Alt+Shift+2.
- Add a link to the audio file to the input box.
- If the audio should be taken from a YouTube video, extract an audio file from the YouTube video.
- Copy the link to the YouTube video.
- Go to http://www.flvto.biz/.
- Insert the YouTube link.
- Click the 'Convert to' button.
- It should convert to mp3 by default.
- If you don't have a link to the audio file, move a copy of the file to a cloud storage service that will let you generate a link to the file.
- With Dropbox:
- Move the file into a Dropbox folder.
- Copy the Dropbox link.
- With Dropbox:
- If the audio should be taken from a YouTube video, extract an audio file from the YouTube video.
- Click the 'Load' button.
- Open the 'Record the timing' window.
- Record the rhythm.
- Click the 'Record' button.
- Change the song speed to a fraction of its normal playing speed.
- I generally find 0.25x lets me record the rhythm fairly accurately.
- Click the 'Play' button.
- Press down on the spacebar when you begin to hear a syllable, and release the spacebar when you no longer hear that syllable.
- Note that the syllable that will have its timing recorded the next time you press the spacebar is shown in the 'Record the timing' window.
- If you do not have the spacebar held down, just the next syllable is shown.
- If you do have the spacebar held down, both the currently-being-recorded syllable and the next-to-be-recorded syllables are shown.
- Note that the syllable that will have its timing recorded the next time you press the spacebar is shown in the 'Record the timing' window.
- (Optional) You can make corrections in the timing more easily by using the shortcut keys.
- (Optional) Verify your work.
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