Looking
for a way to jazz up your web page or perhaps your holiday
videos? Sit down with SmartSound and you can create
a custom length, professional quality soundtrack in
minutes. We stayed up until 2 AM playing with our review
copy the day it arrived. It is fun, addictive and amazingly
easy to use considering the quality of the results.
The key to this quality is that SmartSound is not really
a composition tool per-se. Instead it uses built in
royalty free scores. There are two options for selecting
a score to suite your needs. The quickest approach is
to use the built in Maestro function which walks you
through the process by having you answer a series of
questions about the style and length of your desired
score. At the end of this process you are presented
with several candidates that fit your criteria. Each
candidate has several different arrangements (guitar
solo, heavy bass etc.) from which to choose. Although
the program comes with close to 50 scores (counting
sound effects) I found myself rushing to the SmartSound
web site to look for additional scores. There are currently
9 CD's covering 9 different categories with additional
CD's released on a regular basis. You will pay a premium
for these however, $69 or $129 each depending on the
sample rate.
Once You have selected your score you can head to the
editor to tweak it. Smartsound breaks its scores into
musical "blocks." In the editor you can add,
remove, swap or combine these blocks to customize your
score. A built in hint/suggestion feature helps you
avoid making musical gaffes and highlights block combinations
that don't flow well. Assuming you don't stray away
from the recommended path these blocks flow together
seamlessly. You can also create your own blocks with
narration or music imported from CD. If you are preparing
a score for a QuickTime clip, SmartSound can import
and display the clip in thumbnail form, handy for synching
the music with the content.
When you are satisfied with your score you can export
it in a variety of formats including RealAudio and QuickTime.
The strength of this program is that it does not require
any musical knowledge or ability and allows you to create
a score that is exactly the length you need. Even if
you don't have a multimedia project waiting in the wings
I would recommend this program. It might inspire you
to go create one!
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Looking
for a way to jazz up your web page or perhaps your holiday
videos? Sit down with SmartSound and you can create
a custom length, professional quality soundtrack in
minutes. We stayed up until 2 AM playing with our review
copy the day it arrived. It is fun, addictive and amazingly
easy to use considering the quality of the results.
