recorded tracks out of time

danny-e39 wrote on 12/15/2013, 7:08 AM

I am learning to play drums and have learnt a few songs. While I play the drums i record the music on my phone. I then decided to upload the drums to magix music maker so that I could add the mp3 of the song, line the two up and have my drums over the music. The problem I am experiencing is that even though I am playing along to the song and am pretty much perfectly in time, no matter how I line the song up, it always goes out of time and my drums end up being a bar and a half ahead of the track. there is no way I am playing that far out of time, and every time I check the tempo the speed of the song is different to the speed of my drums. I saw another question that mentioned something to do with latency as a possible cause but I am not sure. Any help as to how to solve this problem would be much appreciated. I am using magix music maker premium 2013, the songs are recorded on a simple recording app on my phone which records them in mp3 format, andt he tracks are also in mp3. I have windows 7 as well. many thanks

Comments

johnebaker wrote on 12/15/2013, 9:47 AM

I think it is a question of bitrate - I would suspect the app on your phone is using a non standard bitrate which is lower than that expected by Music Maker.

The rate at which the data is processed has a significant effect and when a difference occurs between what the MMM project is set to and actually gets, then one or the other will lag behind.

To solve this problem don't use a mobile phone for recording, they are not designed for good quality recording, and get a decent microphone and record directly into Music Maker.

This also comes with some possible problems due to latency in the USB drivers (if using a USB microphone) or PC audio system (if using an analog mic) however these are not unsurmountable.

HTH

John

danny-e39 wrote on 12/15/2013, 1:29 PM

Hey John, thanks for taking the time to reply. I would like to say first of all that I am not a professional musician nor am I trying to make professional tracks. As somebody who is learning to play the drums and is coming up with different stuff I merely wish to overlay my drums on to the music im playing to so I can show the people who are interested in how im getting on the songs im learning with my drums over them.

To that end I dont really have much choice in using my mobile phone to record as my drum kit is not at home, and I know it is theoretically possible to make it work so I would resent having to pay out extra money for a good recording device. You mentioned the bit rates potentially being different on the mmm and my phones recording app. Do you know anyway to find out if there is a difference and correct it? Also you mentioned latency and that is something I have seen mentioned elsewhere.

I know where the latency settings are for the program but I have no idea what to do with it. The best I have been able to come up with has been to tempo check it and try to make a slight adjustment to the tempo of one of the recordings but this only helps a little. i tried slicing the song in to bars so I could align it section by section but the silence in the gaps is noticeable and runs the cynschronisation. i really didnt think it would be this hard to overlay my drums on to a track. i downloaded easy music editor trial version and that did it all perfectly. The only problem was that it would not let me export it as mp3 on the trial version. Now I have this huge program and it wont work for another reason, its frustrating!