Week 3: Notes on Notation
- karencortez7797
- Aug 22, 2019
- 3 min read
App-based notation
NotateMe ($62.99 on the App Store, $52.99 on Google Play): made by PhotoScore people. App based and uses Apple Pencil to allow you to draw notation and it translates it into music. According to Humbo "claims to learn your handwriting" as you fix things. Personally I found the overlap of the two notations on the page - handwritten and printed - was messy and confusing.
StaffPad ($104.95 on the Microsoft Store) - "wants you to draw notes its way" - software only recognises if you do notes as a diagonal line, etc. While this initially makes it slow, the results in the long run are more accurate.
Humbo: Working on paper means you can come straight back and remember what you were working on, but both versions mean you come back to perfect print which makes it difficult to pick up where you left off.
Notion (Desktop/windows $199, iOs only $22.99 on the App Store): its main selling point is its playback, with sounds from the LSO. Good playback is primarily important to film composers who present to directors but otherwise is not usually an issue. Notion is definitely gearing towards this customer base as they are also selling add-on a small set of sounds for $22 each!
Both can export to Soundtrap, with parts coming out as different layers of MIDI to be played with.
Both CAN export XML - but both failed to different degrees
Neither can download/print parts on the free version
Flat: has cool guitar feature where you can notate in trad and have it come up in TAB, or vice versa
Noteflight - has "Marketplace" of arrangements that are editable. Can edit, upload back UP TO THE CLOUD, the people sort out the copyright and royalties, and then you buy back your copyright cleared version.
Musescore is way better now than when we all tried to not buy Sibelius in high school. :D Musescore also has a sharing space and a library of other peoples' arrangements to access (a bit not-so-crash-hot but are a good starting point to play with). Teacher can upload a template for students to redownload from the Musescore cloud.
Its note input is essentially the same as Sib/Finale.
Currently not really up to scratch with Sib and Finale in terms of presentation (though fonts can be imported!) but other than that is the best option for school budgets.
A COOL THING! Musescore has a thing where you can arrange a piece and then put it alongside a Youtube performance:
Note to self: Look up Sibelius Tantacrul
Sara's prac school: Stage 4 have Noteflight, Stage 5/6 get Sibelius
Sibelius: some new things I learnt
Key point: Use Shift-L to STOP the sticky slurs and hairpins.
Using hitpoints to align video
I learnt this off Humbo's free set of videos, in video 5.2 Adding Video and Hit Points. I think I'm obsessed. Remembering how we did film composition in highschool, I know having the hit points would have made composing for a clip feel much more meaningful and exciting for all of us Year 8's - and maybe would have given some incentive to understand reading trad-notated rhythms!
Screenshots from the video: you can display the rhythm of your hit points too!! Eeee!
Video of score playing
Just use "Export Video"!
Ideas bank
Has a set of ideas available for perusal. Can add your own in - particularly useful for saving different versions of a theme.
Also: the worksheet creator!!!
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