Hmm, couldn’t really find anything on the forum about this. I want someones input on this.
I know that you can use royalty free music on basically anything. However a quick search shows many different companies that are selling cd’s of royalty free music. Do I have to buy it and have my own copy before I can actually use the royalty free music? Or is the music in open domain. It’s because I have a friend who does have a cd of royalty free music. I’m wondering if I can use it leagally on a game or animation if I just borrow his CD to use the music. Thanks.
Rule # 1: Talk to a lawyer who specializes in copyrights and published materials, preferably in the medium which you want to use [!]
Having said that, there are some issues. Music that’s in the public domain is by definition royalty free, however the execution of the music may not be. In other words, a musician can legally record and publish a piece of existing music that’s in the public domain, but you can’t use that musician’s rendition without consent. There’s nothing to keep you from recording your own rendition and using it.
Some pieces of royalty free music can be used and copied but may have restrictions (for example you could copy it for your own personal use but not for any commercial use). Restrictions of this sort should be (and I think must be) provided with any authorized release of the media (if the material is on a CD and it’s produced by a company then any restrictions should be noted on the CD label and described in full in an included pamphlet). If you get a copy (of a copy of a copy…) of that CD you might not know what the restrictions are, and therefor be violating a copyright somewhere.
As far as using a friend’s copy, it comes down to the same thing; the author and/or publisher get to decide if that’s OK or not. If there’s any copyright notice on the CD at all then you’d best contact the publisher and ask them first.
And always remember rule # 1. I’m not a lawyer so don’t construe that this is good advice (or even necessarily correct advice). It’s well worth the $200 to have a consultation with someone who knows what they’re talking about.
just like open source has different agreements (GPL…) so does music.
in some cases you migth ened to own the cd. in others it might be entirely open source. in more still it might cost you $100 or less for royaltys (rather than $20,000). but the music might be free for non comerical use, and personal use as well as distribution.
there are almost as many different rules, as there are different artists.
Boy, all this legality stuff. All this is enough to make ones head spin. Lol, going off on a limb here. I’m not really a musician or talented musically so it’s going to be quite hard for me to record my own music. Is there software that’ll be able to allow me to create basic beats with instruments electronically or something? Something that’ll allow me to create music for my game or animation, so that it’ll be under my own copyright so I wouldn’t have to worry about all this legal stuff.
Lol, when in doubt, it’s always better to create everything yourself. Eliminate the middle man and there’s less things to worry about.
Oh, oh just thought of something else. You know the classical music composers, Bach, Beethoveen, Mozart, etc. The music they composed was from pretty long ago, so there basically is no copyright on them right? So can I use the those kind of classical music if someone else was the one playing it? If not, I can somehow play it on my keyboard, then record it and edit it. It would then be considered my music then, right (not that I claim copyright over there original work, but on the revised work)? Thanks.
PokerFace has one of there songs for download, I could think of two great reasions to give it away freely, one issue would be as a mean of speech, to make people aware or send a message the second one would be to prove to your public that your band is good and worth buying other songs and going to there concerts.
Royalty-free basically means that you can use it with a one-time fee rather than giving a certain percentage of profits you make involving that music to the creator. Rap beats are often offered royalty-free to aspiring rappers. The rappers pay $20 for the CD of rap tracks and then they are free to rap over that and sell it without paying a percentage of profit from every CD to the creator.
they have some ideas and contacting artists individually from there might be able to sort out a deal. btu their rates are very very very cheap (like seriously) their music is free but do read the contract on each artist.
DStone: $200 for a consultant is way too much. Lol, maybe if I think I’ll be able to sell a game for more than that, then it’ll be worth it, but thanks for the advice.
Al_Capone: Lol, I get your analogy. So work create by other people are considered there’s. Thanks.
shbaz: Thanks for the definition. That’s how I sort of understood it too.
Alltaken: Wow, thanks for the site. The music is pretty cheap there. Lol, but it’s kind of hard to find what I want.
Hmm, so the best way to not spend a cent is to just create my own music. Lol, boy that’s going to take awhile, but at least I’ll be able to learn something in the process. Thanks so much guys.
hey if your gonna make your own then go check out the OSSS article front page of elysiun, it has a program called audacity there and a link to it.
also depending on what you want, or what its for i know a guy who plays the chelo and has some mates and stuff who are musitians, i could ask him. he would do it royalty free i believe.
(i asked him once and he said he’d do it for free for me)
Hey Alltaken thanks for the offer. I’ll keep that in mind. I’m just asking questions and such, because I want to create a game along with animations. Lol, so right now everything basically in the planning phase. Won’t really have much time to actually work on something and get results until spring break or the summer. Hey, I’ll keep your offer in mind and lol, I’ll be asking you in the near future . Thanks.
Audacity is way cool, I just wish it had more stock plugins. I’ve been toying with it lately and while it is simple, it is the best (and only) multi-track editing program I’ve found (Alltaken found it first though, I saw it in his links).
For you or anyone else who wants to have free music for their (free) game, I’m willing to play over a track that is already done with my guitar. I have recording equipment good enough to get adequate results for any mixes you might want a guitar in, and I think I’m fairly good.
Thanks shbaz. I’ll remember your offer too, when I finally get to the point where I’ll be adding music to my game. First game I make will definitely be free, so I’ll follow up on your offer. Most likely before the end of the summer. Thanks.
For anyone with a Mac, “iLife 04” has GarageBand which can be used to create just about anything. It works both with MIDI and by arranging loops. Pretty cheap for $49… but once again, you’ve got to have a Mac…
Is there software that’ll be able to allow me to create basic beats with instruments electronically or something? Something that’ll allow me to create music for my game or animation, so that it’ll be under my own copyright so I wouldn’t have to worry about all this legal stuff.
Take a look at ACID (previously by SoundForge, now owned by Sony). This lets you construct music out of pieces ranging anywhere from a one-shot (like a single snare hit) to an entire segment. Note that you’ll have to buy additional sound-loops CDs (and there’s a website where you can purchase individual loops as well) in order to have enough variety of instruments, musical moods, sound effects, etc. to make it worthwhile. All of the ACID loops are royalty free; once purchased they may be used for any purpose, personal or commercial. The musicians creating the loops are diverse, from David Torn to Mick Fleetwood.
Note that ACID does require that you either have some musical knowledge and talent (of which I have little knowledge and no talent) or are willing to sit and play with it for long periods of time till you get something that you like (which is pretty much what I do).
If he’s is going to it it by himself, and putting money into it he should look at something like reason or fruityloops (and maybe read some basic book about music, but you can as well just copy some notes directly)
It has links to some other good software. Jeskola Buzz is fun to play with, can get some pretty cool loops going.
Certain songs (I forget exactly how old they have to be) are in the Public Domain. While any recording of them belongs to the performer, often you can find MIDI files online. Pretty much every computer can play MIDI files, and lots of software you can get free lets you record it.
Check out the Synthfont link for a good way to get quality audio (.wav) files with even a low quality (or even no!) soundcard. It can use SoundFonts (different instrument sounds) which are easily available online. Both are Freeware.