Editing Tutorial - Using Guitar Tablature in Metroid Tuner

[Grimlock]

Editing Tutorial: Using Guitar Tablature in Metroid Tuner

This tutorial will show you how to use virtually any guitar tablature available on the internet as a source for your Metroid Tuner inputs.  This tutorial applies to any printed tablature books as well.


Requires the following actions:
1. Print the guitar note and octave key provided
2. Access internet located tablature at your leisure

Tutorial assumes the following:
1. You have read and understand the introductory tutorial available at Snarfblams blog:
http://snarfblam.com/words/?p=282
2. You basically know how to create and edit tracks in Metroid Tuner.


Step 1:

Print the following guitar note and octave key for reference during your tablature conversions:

[spoiler][/spoiler]

Each note represents a position on the guitar neck, the colors represent the octave as you will input them in Metroid Tuner.

The note length value table at the bottom applies to note length table 2 in the Metroid engine.  Some songs use table 1 or table 3 as their default.  I have successfully changed the default table to table 2 for the title screen music so I'm sure all non-table 2 songs can most likely be changed to table 2 as well (I'll update with additional details).

Note: the note length values shown on the print out are a starting point in converting  your music, you may have to use slower lengths in certain songs.  You'll have to experiment to find the right speed.

Step 2:

Using the key and table you can easily identify the notes, octaves, and associated timing.  Basically the number represents how far up the neck a note is and the line it is on is the string.  "0" is an "open" string and its note is represented at column "0".

So you would see which number is shown on the tab and which line it is on.  Go to the column with the number and row equivalent to the line the number as displayed on the tablature.

Here's a few examples that show the timing and the notes translated with the key and table:





Example of a more complicated sample using multiple timing/lengths in succession:



Here's an example of some text based tablature converted, its slightly more complicated since there aren't any clues as to note timing, listening to an audible sample of the music would be helpful in determining the appropriate note lengths to use:




That's basically it!  Over all its fairly simple once you gain a little experience with the note key and timing table.

Internet sources for guitar tablature:

http://www.songsterr.com/

http://www.ultimate-guitar.com/

Check this thread here also, there are several links to additional tablature:

http://forum.metroidconstruction.com/index.php/topic,3248.0.html

[NARFNra]

EDIT: Whoops, meant to post this in the experimentation thread. Oh well.
Just a quick note for people who understand basic note lengths; The different tables seem to apply to different "time signatures" so to speak. Let's look at the default note length tables.

Code Select Expand

<NoteLengthTable>
// Note durations are specified in number of frames. 60 = 1 second.
// Warning: the length of the last table can not be calculated and is assumed
//          to be 16 bytes. Editing non-note data WILL break the game.

// Table 1, used by these songs: 3 9
04 08 10 20 40 18 30 0C 0B 05 02

// Table 2, used by these songs: 0 1 2 4 5 8 A B
06 0C 18 30 60 24 48 12 10 08 03 10

// Table 3, used by these songs: 6 7
07 0E 1C 38 70 2A 54 15 12 02 03 20 FC B3 AD 4D



Now, a good way to look at this is to note currently existing songs.
Table 1 is used by Kraid's Lair and the Item Get theme. I haven't looked too much at the Item Get theme, but Kraid's lair is in 3/4 time.
[spoiler][/spoiler]
This image might not make much sense to you, but this is Kraid's original theme in the tracker I use. The "Speed 4/4" means each row in this tracker is 4 frames. (A row is any of the numbered rows, not just the colored ones). Row 00 = frames 1-4, 01 frames 5-8, and so forth.

So basically, this "measure" is exactly 24 rows of 4 frames each, or 96 frames long. But we're writing in hexadecimal, and 96 DECIMAL = 60 HEXADECIMAL. The ingame charts use hexadecimal numbers. It can get confusing trying to remember all the lengths and relating them to the song, so here I'll explain the most useful values from the table:

[spoiler]

Code Select Expand

// Table 1, used by these songs: 3 9
04 08 10 20 40 18 30 0C 0B 05 02

02 - SIXTY FOURTH NOTE (48 can go in a 3/4 measure)
04 - THIRTY SECOND NOTE (24 can go in a 3/4 measure)
08 - SIXTEENTH NOTE (12 can go in a 3/4 measure)
10 (16 decimal) - EIGHTH NOTE (6 can go in a 3/4 measure)
20 (32 decimal) - QUARTER NOTE (3 can go in a 3/4 measure)
30 (48 decimal) - HALF NOTE (2 and a half can go in a 3/4 measure)
40 (64 decimal) - DOTTED HALF NOTE (1 and a half can go in a 3/4 measure)[/spoiler]

Here's that piece from Kraid's theme.

Code Select Expand


4 { // --------------
    :20
        E4
    :10
        B3
    :20
        A4
    :10
        C4

You might notice the notes seem to be an octave higher in here than in my tracker, that's just because my Tracker starts numbering them differently. The pitch is the same.

Another way to put this is using sheet music.



This would be

Code Select Expand


    :20
        C5 C5 C5
In Metroid Tuner. So that measure from Kraid's theme would be


If you want to add longer notes, I'd suggest replacing stuff like the 0C and the 0B, or the 02 and the 04. They can be useful, but in general they won't see as much use as 10, 20, and so on.

Now that we have the basic idea down, I'll be a little quicker.
Table 2 is used by most of the songs in the game and it's designed for 4/4 time. A measure here is still 96 frames long, or 60 hex... but the subdivisions are different.
[spoiler]

Code Select Expand


// Table 2, used by these songs: 0 1 2 4 5 8 A B
06 0C 18 30 60 24 48 12 10 08 03 10

03 - THIRTY SECOND NOTE (32 can go in a 4/4 measure)
06 - SIXTEENTH NOTE (16 can go in a 4/4 measure)
0C - (12 decimal) - EIGHTH NOTE (8 can go in a 4/4 measure)
18 - (24 decimal) - QUARTER NOTE (4 can go in a 4/4 measure)
24 - (36 decimal) - DOTTED QUARTER NOTE (2 and a half can go in a 4/4 measure)
30 - (48 decimal) - HALF NOTE (2 can go in a 4/4 measure)
48 - (72 decimal) - DOTTED HALF NOTE (1 and a third can go in a 4/4 measure)
60 - (96 decimal) - WHOLE NOTE (1 can go in a 4/4 measure)[/spoiler]

I haven't looked into table 3 yet, but this should be enough for most simple songs in existence.

[Grimlock]

Thanks, that further clarifies the original intention of the note length tables, I hadn't looked at it the way you presented it.