CD+G Creator

[Yorkie]

Has anyone out there tried using the programme CD+G Creator
from http://www.cdspeed2000.com It's a nice little programme for putting a graphic + titles at the begining of your discs
And it's FREE ( well worth a look )

STEVE

[PastMember]

Been there, tried it, and tossed it out. I've tried it on 9 karaoke machines --- got the audio only. Not to mention that its utterly useless on a busy night because it takes at LEAST 20 seconds to display a full screen when I did get it to work.

IMHO: Waaaaayyyy Tooooo SLOOOOOOOWWWW! Not to mention that not all machines can use it.

[Yorkie]

WORKS ON ALL 5 OF OUR MACHINES!!! Must be one of those things I suppose. I accept the 20 second display time is a bind but we work with it o/k. All I was suggesting was give it a go, If it works all well and good (as in our case) If not,bin it (as in your case) Either way it dont hurt (or cost much) to give it a try,

Good Luck

STEVE

[BANDL]

I have been using CDGCreator for quite a while. It is correct that it does not work with all machines, but when it works...it's great.
I use it only when there is a 15-20 seconds intro (many songs have it) I rather watch a nice picture developing on the screen, than watch a meaningless stationary screen. I can also place graphics in the bridge, if it is longer than 20 seconds. Also at the end. It does not add much real time, it just makes the time more interesting...keep them guessing at the picture as it develops!

BANDL

[karaokespotlight]

It works on my players. I usually use music videos if theres an extended break between singers however on dead nights with no singers it works well for an occasional ad for drink specials or announcing some upcoming event or band.

Sam

[bose]

CD+G creator is rubbish in my opinion, for the following reasons...

1 - Some CD+G players won't read the graphics, like my JVC players.
2 - The picture takes 20 seconds to fully appear.
3 - You can only use 16 colours.
4 - You can't change the colour of the border area.

What does everyone think of Dart's CD+G creator program? I personally thought it was terrible.

Bose

[jasonk]

For reference, in my experience it is only JVC machines, and machines manufactured by JVC (RSQ) that do not display CDGCreator files. I have successfully used it with the Pioneer twin-tray, several Pioneer LD/CDG & LD/CDG/DVD combos, CD-I machines that play CDG, the old Sony/DK "BigEcho" players, the VocoPro outboard CDG decoder, and a few PC-based CDG players (including microstudio) without any problems. Except, of course, the 20-second intro time.

[jasonk]

There is a way to work around the 20-second display time of CDGCreator.
You need the DOS Utility CDGMERGE, which will bump forward or backward the graphics in relation to the music. CDGMERGE will also join 2 separate CDG files together.

With these programs and a little audio file editing (use a non-linear digital audio editor, like Cakewalk Pro-Audio), you can have the CDGCreator image draw over the instrumental intro of the song before the KHPro graphics display.

For example, if a given song has a 10 second intro, then the CDGCreator image will only need 10 seconds of extra time prior to the start of the song to begin drawing- the rest will draw over the intro.

Time prevents instructions in greater detail here, but this should be enough for you to figure it out.

-Jason

[Corbin]

Jasonk,
Where do we find the utility for download?
thanks
corbin

[BANDL]

Here is how I "get around" the 20 seconds problem.

After I have the .wav file ready the way I want it. I place the file in AudioStation32 (from Voyetra, although any software that allows you to visualize the .wav file will do) and cut the introduction to the song. Most songs have 10-15 seconds of music before the actual singing starts. I placed that cut "chunk" in a separate file, say song_a.wav. Then I place the actual lyrics part of the song into a separate file "song_b.wav". If I am interested in placing graphics at the end of the song I cut the tail end (as long as there is no singing at the end) and place it in a third file song_c.wav. At this point I make sure that song_a.wav and song_c.wav (where graphics are going to be placed) are at least 20 seconds long. If they are not I add the amount of time needed to make them 20 seconds using AudioStation32.

I then use KHP to do the song using the song_b.wav file and CDGCreator to make the music/graphics files (now they will be CDG files) so I end up with three CDG files song_a.cdg and song_c.cdg made with CDGCreator and song_b.cdg made with KHP.

All is left is to join the three files, this is very easy to do with a free software known as split.exe (it also splits files).

The 16 color limit is a pain in the butt, but if one uses a program like PaintShop Pro (or comparable) you can make a regular (million color picture) into a 256 color first and then into a 16 color picture(using error diffusion and reducing color bleeding) that looks reasonable. I have done many actual pictures that we have taken at parties, scan then and play with them in Paint Shop. They work great for leading into popular songs.

By the way I tried CDGMerger and found it hard to run and not very reliable. It is DOS based and will not run as a windows program, so you have to have the commands that you want ready to use. When I used it it merge the Karaoke part but it did a poor job with the graphics.

BANDL

[jasonk]

try downloading from this ftp site:


ftp://ftp.simtel.net/pub/simtelnet/m...l/cdgmerge.zip

[jasonk]

Bandl,
When using CDGMERGE, all of your file names must conform to the old DOS standards, as far as max number of characters, number of spaces, etc. Otherwise it won't work and won't tell you why.

I completely agree that cdgmerge is tricky to use. However, I have never had any problem with its reliability or how well it does its job. I wonder if your problems are based on file format. Often, what one software manufacturer calls a .CDG file may actually be a .BIN and vice versa. Example, what KHPRO saves as a .CDG is the same as goldenhawk's .BIN. Just change the file extension to .BIN and you can burn KHPRO files with CDRWIN. Likewise, you may have to change the file extensions in order to get CDGMERGE to function correctly, as well as set CDGMERGE's switches (-b, -c etc.)

I think the file-format confusion stems from some CDG software vendors save the graphics in a separate file from the audio, and refer to the graphics file as a .CDG. This is CDGMERGE's definition of a .CDG file.
MTU and CDGCreator on the other hand, save the audio & graphics together in the equivalent of a .BIN file and call it .CDG

[Corbin]

Thanks Jason,
I downloaded it and can't figure it out..
Dos is over my head, I need CDGMERGE for dummies.
I can usually figure things out but this is to tricky
Good luck to those of you who can figure it out.
I wish I could.
Thanks
Corbin

[jasonk]

Corbin,
I'ts definitely tricky. If I get time in the future to post a detailed procedure to use, I will, but it might be awhile.
For the meantime, if you simply type CDGMERGE at the DOS prompt (in the directory where the file is located), you will get a page of command-line syntax for the program.


Also, I think i might have mentioned this in another thread, but i'm not sure... CDGMERGE will also "bump" the graphics forward or backward in relation to the music bu a number of frames or seconds that you specify. So you can fine tune sweep sync, etc.