Stepmania University: We'll make your files suck less (under construction)

[dood gone krazee]

Re: Stepmania University: We'll make your files suck less (under construction)

Great great great idea. Haha Kommi is getting so into it. Make a curriculum if you want cause that would be sweet tbh. Sign me up as a student. I've run into really big problems lately. I either can't find a song to step or I can't figure out what to layer. I'd like to take the advanced stepman theorem class.

[who_cares973]

Re: Stepmania University: We'll make your files suck less (under construction)

probably could be an irc channel or something as well

yes good idea

[jyris1]

Re: Stepmania University: We'll make your files suck less (under construction)

TC Halogen: autoBPM - a great discovery! I have made a tutorial here:

http://www.ddreamstudio.com/manuals/pocketguide.html#autobpm

[~HentaiXXX~]

Re: Stepmania University: We'll make your files suck less (under construction)

meh, joining the student bandwagon, because I'm not really sure if my files are that good, because I've had nobody to judge them.

oh sh*t I forgot I kept only one file that I stepped, and that's pending to get into FFR.

oh well, still being a student.

[Patashu]

Re: Stepmania University: We'll make your files suck less (under construction)

a program better than mixmeister bpm?

alright I added everyone who asked. as far as tutors/profs goes: I'm going to just let kommisar and puppet be profs otherwise I might not get anyone lol. sorry if that seems biased or anything. I might let Vote4Nixon on just to be all tricky about it but idk yet
npv can be a tutor yes, psychozeroskater too cuz he's in vgmp3 etc

damn lots of people now. how do we organize this then

note: the option of being able to upload a file here and ask for it to be critiqued is available at any point. criticism should be tooled to whatever the next step up in terms of stepping ability would be; don't just make it a cluster**** of 'if this was the perfect file made by me it would look like this' unless it's almost there anyway
I'm also thinking about accompanying simfile judgments with a restep of the song just to show another perspective on it but that's only if time permits

[trumaestro]

Re: Stepmania University: We'll make your files suck less (under construction)

+1 student plz

[gnr61]

Re: Stepmania University: We'll make your files suck less (under construction)

imo a live chat situation is more valuable for critiquing files, rather than having this thread be a huge cluster**** of file reviews among all skill levels and disorganized discussions of anything specific. at least for the personal tutor/student stuff. if all of that could be held in an irc environment it would keep this thread much more organized for ~theoretical dizcussion,~ specific "lessons" etc.

of course all that would be kind of pointless if this doesn't grow into something very big (tho i expect it will) and i think it would be cool if this didn't just turn into the file testing thread with a few fancy titles

[Patashu]

Re: Stepmania University: We'll make your files suck less (under construction)

anyway here's a little something on pitch relevancy.

it's basically composed of two features:
1. same pitch notes should use the same column when transcribed (or notes that are very close under some circumstances)
2. ascending patterns should have a 'going-right' feel when transcribed; descending a 'going-left' feel

in the case of applying pr to a section that is composed of a streaming melody with a sparser melody playing over it, there are two competing schools of thought on how you can do this; one way is to make the jumps perfectly PR to the upper melody while the lower melody remains as PR as it can around it. the other is to make the lower melody PR first then add notes for the upper melody, only changing things around if it makes the PR of both better. Which method you should use depends on which would get the most out of your song; does the lower melody have more interesting PR or the higher one? Have you been putting jumps to the higher one in places around this to keep a continual theme going?

When thinking about how to make patterns PR I like to focus on point 1 over point 2. for instance, I stepped absolute a long time ago. I heard about how a0 made all the 24th bursts in absolute (rock guitar ver) the same kind of pattern so I decided to do it myself, figuring out that they all went ABAC so I'd put down patterns like 1412, 3234 and so on. later I found out that a0 did his 24th triplets the wrong way around XD but there you go.

don't think 'ascending feel' or 'descending feel' is just going straight to the right or straight to the left; it's the overall feel of progressing in that direction, going more that way than the other way. if the ascension/descension isn't going straight and perfectly equidistant between each note listen to see where the 'nuances' are and make those distinguished. and if a pattern repeats itself but on different pitches make them higher/lower with respect to each other.

finally, don't be afraid to weave your pr around your layering. with only four notes even adding a 4th bass drum to your stream makes things pretty crowded; a trick you can do is to consider the jumps as a set of two stream notes and keep making it presque like that

edit: oh irc channel would be cool hehe. what's a good place to set one up?

[Xx{neon}xX]

Re: Stepmania University: We'll make your files suck less (under construction)

cool i was just gonna say i wanted to be a student ^_^
also i love patashu files hehe

[dood gone krazee]

Re: Stepmania University: We'll make your files suck less (under construction)

I agree with seal, a live chat way of critiquing files would be more effective then just having ****-tons of reviews in a single thread. This is a splendid idea, and hopefully it will be successful and grow. Professors/tutors better be prepared if they stick with it because in the future it could be more than just one or two file critiques.

PS can a tutor/professor get on AIM? I have a file that I need checked out. I think I layered it correctly but like I said I'm just having issues on everything right now.

[Patashu]

Re: Stepmania University: We'll make your files suck less (under construction)

yo toss it my way. Patashu0

[gnr61]

Re: Stepmania University: We'll make your files suck less (under construction)

Some more stuff on PR from someone who uses it only loosely. Expounding a bit on Patashu's notes.

one way is to make the jumps perfectly PR to the upper melody while the lower melody remains as PR as it can around it. the other is to make the lower melody PR first then add notes for the upper melody, only changing things around if it makes the PR of both better

When intermediate steppers go into a stream melody with the intent of creating a jumpstream often the first temptation is to lay down the melody as pitch relevantly as they can, and then layer the jumps somewhat arbitrarily around it in such a way that they fit without creating jacks. One frequent problem this causes:

-large 8th jacks; I was once told by a jumpstream sensei that 8th jacks of more than 4 notes in length in the middle of a jumpstream are disproportionately difficult to the rest of the stream. I'd go one step further and say anything more than 3 notes in length tends to be a bit abrasive and detracts badly from the file's aesthetic value (long arbitrary columns of 8th notes are ugly and awkward to hit). And believe me these form often and are more or less unavoidable when shoe-horning jumps into a big stream; however, if the lead melody is forming the jumps and you choose to follow THAT pitch relevantly--rather than the lower melody--8th jacks that are caused as a result of following the pitch of that melody will feel more natural and accurate every time.

So basically, you will usually want to follow the pitch of the leading melody as those take the jumps and thus are accented while playing (generally attaining the most attention from the player). As Patashu said, there will be cases in which the pitch of a lower voice is just so darn interesting that you can't help but adhere completely to PR when stepping that. My advice to you in those times is to step that as a single note stream and leave out the jumps all together because they will only divert the player's attention from what you want them to notice/feel.

The progression of pitch in 2-note jumps is generally [12] [13] [23] [14]* [24] [34]; for me the most appealing method is to use full jumps to represent the pitch of whatever you are following, even if what you are following only takes up one musical note of the jump according to your layering. That means, for example, that if your pitch interval in the lead is ascending (if it sounds like it should go 2-3, for instance), your jumps should be ascending according to the progression I listed above (ie. [12][34] fits better than [23][12] in this situation).

*I suppose technically the order of these two jumps is up for debate, but since right typically dominates left and [14] contains the highest possible note it feels higher for me than [23]

There's another 2 sections I want to get into with PR but don't have time at the moment. Also, Patashu, perhaps add links to the OP to these 'lessons' or somethin before they get lost in stepmania oblivion

[who_cares973]

Re: Stepmania University: We'll make your files suck less (under construction)

i dont do any of that when i step =x

[gnr61]

Re: Stepmania University: We'll make your files suck less (under construction)

i don't think you will run into that particular issue very often stepping cock rock disco ?_?

[who_cares973]

Re: Stepmania University: We'll make your files suck less (under construction)

i gues thats true rofl