The 12 Days of Techmas - Day 8: Soundation Studio

On the 8th day of Techmas, I bring you Soundation Studio. For those of you that are Mac users, you have Garageband and probably don't need to read any further. For those of use that are suffering through the imperfection that is a PC, Soundation Studio is a free program where you can create original music. Students can use this music during their own videos or presentations without any need to worry about copyright infringement (a special concern if they are posting their work to Youtube).

While this site is free to sign up and use basic features, there are plenty of pay-for-use options. These pay areas can make it a bit of a chore to navigate around the site sometimes, but just keep looking for the "studio" and you'll be fine.

In the studio you have access to free sound clips on the right-hand side that vary according to instrument and music type. Select one that you like and drag it out into a channel. There are 4 channels you can work with that will allow you to easily overlap sounds and adjust volume levels in each channel.



There are a variety of effects you can add to any channel, such as reverb, delay, compressor, and equalizer to further modify your sound. If you're like me, then those words mean absolutely nothing to you, but for true audiophiles it makes sense. Clips can also be easily clipped, cut and copied or moved around by clicking and dragging to modify the order they are in and the length they play for. If you find a good beat, you can repeat it by clicking the top-right corner of the clip and dragging it out (thus making the clip longer). To delete any clip, simply click on it and press delete on your keyboard. You also have the option of recording a sound clip directly into the software, allowing you to customize it even further.



Save your clip in the File menu and if you wish to download your song, select Mixdown. You can download it as a .wav file (the same file type as CD music). If you have a blog or wiki page, there is also an embed code available after you get the URL for the song. Here is my original song:



TOMORROW: Animoto - The end of slideshows