What is this all about?

[Renard]

There's a lot of singing in My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic. Good singing. And awesome music too.
I'm pretty sure anyone who watched an episode felt the urge to sing along. Well, that's the very goal of the Karaoke Project!


The MLP:FiM Karaoke Project aims at creating quality song packs for Singstar clones, such as UltraStar or Performous.

So what is UltraStar?

UltraStar is a clone of SingStar, a music video game. UltraStar lets one or several players score points by singing along to a song or music video and match the pitch of the original song well. UltraStar displays lyrics as well as the correct notes similar to a piano roll. On top of the correct notes UltraStar displays the pitch recorded from the players.

UltraStar is basically to Singstar what Stepmania is to DDR. It's an open-source project, and allows for custom tracks designed by its users.

Aim of this project

The goal of the Karaoke Project is to provide songpacks for Ultrastar, for all possible languages.

- All tracks should be perfectly synced, with pitch-perfect on-screen vocals and an appropriate background video (no watermarks, color-corrected).
- SD versions are the regular releases, with stereo sound, while keeping a reasonable file size and allowing for a smooth playback on all computers.
- HD versions should be over-the-top, with (possibly) 5.1 surround sound and 1080p video.
- Vocals are here if you wish to sing along. Instrumental versions (or, when not possible to get the optimal file, voice-removed songs) will let you sing solo.
- A pack with only the txt files will also be released, if you do not wish to download the videos nor the songs.

First milestone: the english stereo pack.

Bronies, I'm counting on you to help!
There's a lot to do, including helping others out, providing lyrics, high-quality media, syncing, and misc suggestions. ;)

[Renard]

Sounds good! How can I help?

Well, there are many ways to help - two of them being especially appreciated for now! While we currently have all needed audio and background video assets for the official songs, we still need to sync the lyrics and design static art for each song.

Please register on the forum!

First step: get familiar with UltraStar DX (or Performous, or Vocaluxe)
- Install and configure one (or more) of these applications on your computer. Pick your favorite - they all support the same karaoke files.
- Install a reference song (this one is provided by the Ultrastar DX project) to make sure everything works perfectly (ie. no audio lag).

I want to help sync'ing songs!
This part may seem daunting, but it's quite fun and not that hard actually!
- Experiment a bit with an editor.
  ? There are a few to choose from, here's a partial list of tools.
  ? If you plan to use Composer, check out this thread.
  ? Try opening the resulting "song.txt" file in a text editor, to see how it's build
- Pick a song you wish to work on!
  ? We're currently focusing on S1 english songs. Get your MP3s from that thread!
  ? Create a thread (or post) in the W.I.P. section so we all know what you're working on.
  ? Get to work, silly! ;) And release your files in its dedicated thread.

You don't need to bother about anything else at this point. The background videos and various artworks will be added later on.
What's important is to keep both the song's rhythm and pitch as accurate as possible!

I wanna help with the art!
I'd love to see some specifically crafted artworks for this project. Only static images are needed:
- A CD cover, that will appear in the game's menu. To be honest, I have no idea what should be done here so far. Got any suggestion?
- A background, that will be seen during loading times and during the song if no video is displayed (there will be a lighter pack, easier to download, easier to use on low-end systems such as netbooks, with no bg videos at all). Aim for a 1080p picture!

? If a thread for the song you choose already exists in the WIP section, please post your art in here.
? If none exists, create it!  ;)


Going further
We're sharing a Dropbox folder with the work being done. This makes it a lot easier to work on: all the files you might need are already available here, and you'll get a local copy of everything that is being worked on. You can even set up UltraStar / Performous to use the Dropbox folder as its songs directory!

Please request an access to the Dropbox shares in this topic. If you don't already have a Dropbox account, do not create one yet - I'll send you an invite, this will help to gain more free storage for the project. Thanks!