Today, the 12th of january, I subscribed to Newgrounds one year ago.
This is about how Newgrounds influenced (read: totally changed my life) in one year.

First of all, I'll tell you how I got on Newgrounds.

I got into a game called 'Flashflashrevolution' or 'FFR' in short. My skills at the game improved steadily, so I got to play songs by Cornandbeans. I got really interested in his music after a while, and then I found out he had a profile on that site too. From there he linked to his Newgrounds artist page. So yeah, I went on his newgrounds profile, and found out that he had quite a lot of music on here. I spent hours browsing his tracks and downloading them.

I went on his myspace profile, which said that he uses reason 3 and Fl-studio 7. I got inpired to make music too, since I read that he was actually my age. I had already used FL-studio 6 before, but I sucked majorly at it. So I decided to get my hands on reason after watching some videos about it. Ofcourse I chose the most recent version, number 4.

So then my music production adventure started, I played around with reason, and got to know it a bit. I wrote 'DnBcore', later renamed to 'Cold Revenge'. I had little or no knowledge about music production at that time, so yeah, you can hear it's not that good. I didn't get much feedback on it, as I knew no-one on the site. I wrote another song, 'Absolute waviness', a 5 minute long crappy 'trance' track, even worse than cold revenge in my opinion. Same thing goes, not much response to it.

Then I wrote 'Obsession Of Force'. This is were things changed for me. I started writing it in reason only. At the time of making it, I was also browsing some other artists I had discovered, including Kr1z. I found out that he was tired of the 'zerobombers', and he was about leave NG. He wrote this on his blog. I pm'd him about it, telling him his music was great and he shouldn't just quit because of that, since he had quite a bit of legit fans one here too. He replied that he wasn't going to leave after all, so I replied again, saying I was happy about that, and I also aked his msn. Since he's also Belgian, I could just talk Dutch to him.

Kr1z started giving me advice on writing my song. He told me he uses FL-studio, and he uses this great VST plugin, which most of you audio artists know, Refx Nexus. He showed me some demos of it's capabilities, and I was instantly in love.

So yeah, I still had Fl-studio, and I got myself nexus, and I started writing little pieces for 'Obsession of force' in fl-studio (with Nexus) and then exported them, and added as samples in Reason. The song still sucks though, though I didn't really realize that at the time. It got majorly 0'ed, and I got a bit pissed off about it.

I joined 'TEH 5TEAM', which was founded by Kr1z and F-777. I started really advertising it in reviews and such, and we got quite a bit of new members. It were the 'glory' days of teh 5team. One day, we got a group conversation of 5team people started on msn. It was quite funny, but pretty spammy ofcourse. I decided to add everyone from that conversation to my contacts.

On an unrelated note, I made my song 'Frozen mind', which was my first full song in FL, and it turned out quite nice.

A few days later, one of the people in the 5TEAM group chat started talking to me again. I don't remember how we got to it anymore, but we ended up talking about pretty personal things.,

At this time I started writing 'Twilight to Mydnite', a song decicated to the girl who made that banner up there at my profile. (Mydnite) That song was also my first (and only so far) song that got a weekly best spot, which I was very happy about.

We kept talking as the days passed, and we got really good friends. REALLY good friends, and well, fell in love right around the time I was writing the second part of Twilight to Mydnite, which caused it to be filled with love emotion. (Like in the author comments)

We ended up finally meeting in the summer, which was fantastic. We talked a lot over MSN in the following months. During the holiday season we met again at last.

I played around with FL-studio for months and months, but I never got enough inspiration to finish a whole song. Which might have been a good thing, since I learned loads through all that practice. Kr1z was learning new techniques too, and he told me about them, so when he learned, I did too. My girlfriend taught me some things too, and vice versa. There are also various other people who have influenced me on my music skills. Zenon gave me some really helpful tips for goa. Karco gave me some mastering tips, I read Nav's blog, and many more =)

I also started going to the audio forum, first as a newbie, but ah well :) I got involved in a major audio people chat on msn, including Chronamut, Envy, and another bunch of people. I added most of them to my contacts. So yeah, more people to learn from, You know who you are, how insignificant it may look in your eyes, you're all part of me developing my skills. I started going on that forum more and more, and I really fell in love with the atmosphere there.

Thank you Newgrounds. For turning my life upside-down.

Thanks to this whole year on NG, I found the girl I love, I got to know a whole bunch of new friends and I learned so much about making music. My English greatly improved too, since Dutch is actually my first language.

All because of Newgrounds. Thank you for reading Newgrounds. Thank you for being here for me.

[Edit]
OMG! Twilight To Mydnite reached top5!
Thank you so much everyone who voted! I love you girls and guys!
[/Edit]

Twilight to Mydnite is finished -> Check it out

And I'm working on new stuff (I'm pretty inspired atm)
I decided to leave 'Rainbow spirit ' alone for a while and started a fresh new project on which I will be working the next couple of days/weeks.
It's called 'Crying Rose' (Yay name taken XD)

In other news:
I'm currently having exams, so I won't be to active...

I'm also planning on making a collab with DJ BrixX :) But that will still take a while since she is busy getting her software back... :(

That's it for this one, I'd just say check out Twilight To Mydnite... (see top)

===========

PLEASE NOTE: THIS IS VERY OUTDATED

===========

<<--[Exposure and improving]. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . [Back to overview]-->>
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

The audio Forum is the place where all the audio people like to hang out...obviously. More importantly, you'll find a good set of threads there for different purposes. I've mentioned quite a few of them in the previous articles already, but this one is intended to give a nice list/summary.

[00] The Audio Forum
The forum this article is all about.

The sticky

[01] The Audio Forum sticky
The first link to click when you get to the audio forum for the first time. It contains a set of helpful links to get you started.

Basic offer and advertise threads

[02] Voice actor wanted
Need a voice actor for your flash? Post specifications here and voice actors will get back to you.

[03] Voice actor advertisements
The opposite of the previous one. If you're a voice actor, you can advertise your talents in here, and a flash animator might pick you out to help him/her.

[04] Audio Advertisements
In this thread you can post advertisements for your audio work. Either on Newgrounds or outside of it. If you want to advertise your friends, or some band or so, you can do that here too. Don't spam up the place with links from everywhere though.

[05] NG Audio Album Thread
If you release your own album, or know a Newgrounds artist who did, make a post about it here, and be sure to include as much information as possible. Additionally, post the cover art as an attached image.

[06] Mixes Archive
Here you can post link to mixes you made. Include the track listing and some specifications like file size and length.

Software help

[07] Ask your Fruityloops questions here
Ask and respond any question regarding Image-line's Fl studio, formerly known as Fruityloops studio.

[08] The Reason thread
Same as above, but for Propellerhead's Reason.

[09] Your questions about logic Pro!
Ask/answer questions about Apple's Logic.

Frequently brought up issues

[10] Zerovoting and Exposure
Information about the issue called zerovoting, tips for getting more exposure. Discussion around that too.

[11] Awaiting Audio Approval?
Information about the approval process, and reasons why you could be banned.

[12] Audio Portal Bans - Stop Pm'ing me!
Wade explains the he cannot know why you were banned from submitting audio if you pm him.

[13] Audio Portal Cleanup
If you find an audio submission that breaks the rules for submitting audio, report it here, and include evidence as to why it breaks the rules.

Socializing

Yes indeed, besides talking about audio, we occupy ourselves with socializing a bit, as there's not tonnes of people who frequent this forum. The regulars pretty much all know each other, so they like to have a casual 'chat' about topics unrelated to audio too. For this, we use...

[14] The Audio Forum Lounge
So, this place is used for talking about general subjects, but there are some simple rules connected to keep it a structured, easy to read thread. When making a post, try to always have a bold title with the subject your post is about. You can have multiple subjects in one post. This simple rule keeps it easy to follow a conversation about a certain subject without having to read unrelated posts. Also, this is the place to introduce yourself to the community when you're new.

Others

[15] Music production images!
Here you can post images of you producing music. This can either be DAW screenshots, or just images of you playing your instrument.

[16] Show NG your instrument!
Similar to music production images, this is a thread to post pictures. Here you can post pictures to show of your instruments/studio.

[17] Works In Progress Advice Thread!
Stuck on a song, don't know how to go on with it? Ask here politely and they might be able to give you some pointers on how to continue.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

If there are any link that should definitely be on this list, let me know. I'm only including links to threads on the Audio forum though, hence the title of the article.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

<<--[Exposure and improving]. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . [Back to overview]-->>

===========

PLEASE NOTE: THIS IS VERY OUTDATED

===========

<<--[Back to overview]
<<--[The Audio Portal itself]. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . [The Audio Forum]-->>
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

The reason you want to submit your work to the audio portal is probably that you want people to hear your audio. As you probably noticed in the article about the audio portal itself, you get the most exposure by getting your track featured on the 'best tracks of all time' or the 'weekly best'.

Zerovoting

Unfortunately there are some obstacles on this road to exposure. Many people tend to vote 0 on other people's work simply for eliminating competition. This actually causes a 'zerobombing' war every Tuesday evening. It's been the cause of many pointless topics in the audio forum. Many people have offered ideas to solve the problem. A whole load of good suggestions too. The problem is that it isn't too easy to just change up the audio portal. Newgrounds' staff has other priorities than the audio portal. Voting 0 on other people's submission isn't going to help either, as that only makes the problem worse. So please refrain from doing that... unless a submission actually deserves a 0.

I encourage you to vote what a submission is worth by your standards. And perhaps refrain from voting your own music up, it doesn't help much anyway. One thing I can advise you is to not care too much about your scores. Care about helpful reviews, as they help you improve your composition skills.

Other ways to gain exposure

People tend to return the favor when you review their work. So, if you put some effort in reviewing around a bit, you'll most likely get some more traffic to your submissions too. Don't just go advertising yourself in your review though, that often does not work as intended.

If you're going to review a submission, provide some constructive criticism; explain how the submission could be made better. Point out what parts of it you liked and why, point out what could be better, and how it could be made better. This way you help the artist to improve, plus it'll be more likely he/she'll get back to you and review your submissions too.

Additionally, you can advertise your audio in the Audio advertisements thread on the audio forum. In the Clubs and Crews section of the forum, you will find the Review request club. On there you can politely ask them to review your music.

Another good idea is to put a link to your latest submission in your forum signature and be active around the forums.

You can gain quite some exposure from participating in contests held at the audio forum. Not every contest has actual prizes, but the honor is a great reward on its own. A contest that gets a lot of attention and is held periodically is the Represent a Country (RAC) contest. So it might be a good idea to participate in that.

Improving

As I explained above, good reviews help artists improve. It's good to be on Newgrounds to improve your skills, and to be helping others to improve theirs. This turns Newgrounds into a very helpful environment where we can all grow.

As said, reviews are mostly intended to help you improve future works, so this should be a good source to learn from. Read reviews on other people's music too, you can learn a lot of them. And then you have the Audio forum, where every now and then, some very helpful topics show up, and everyone can learn a whole bunch of new things; all from each other.

Of course you can learn a lot from your own experience too. Fiddle around in your DAW, try things you normally wouldn't. This way you discover new things, and perhaps you can share what you found out with others.

Additional links

[1] Zerovoting and Exposure
Some more information about the zerovoting issue, and some tips to get exposure. You also have the opportunity to join the discussion about these. Be sure to skim through the thread (and mostly read the first few pages well) before you post.

[2] Audio Advertisements
In this thread you can post advertisements for your audio work. Either on Newgrounds or outside of it. If you want to advertise your friends, or some band or so, you can do that here too. Don't spam up the place with links from everywhere though.

[3] Review Request Club
This is the place to request thought out reviews from people who have formed a club to do so.
Politely ask them to review your track, don't ask to get more than 2 tracks reviewed per week. Please note that it can take about a week before they get to reviewing your submission.

[4] The latest Represent a Country contest
This can give you an idea of how a contest is held on the audio forums.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

<<--[The Audio Portal itself]. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . [The Audio Forum]-->>
<<--[Back to overview]

===========

PLEASE NOTE: THIS IS VERY OUTDATED

===========

<<--[Back to overview]
<<--[Rule Clarifications]. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . [Exposure and improving]-->>
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

On the Audio portal, you'll find 3 big sections and some additional smaller ones.
I will try to explain them to you here.

New submissions

As the name suggests, these are the newest submissions on the Audio Portal. The newest can be found on top. You can view the 30 latest submissions up here. There is a 'More latest submission >' button down there, but when you try it, you will realize it just redirects you to the top of the page. This functions was never built in, just like the 'Great score' and 'Awesome score' were never built in.
Perhaps these little functions will sometime be built in, but now, I can only tell you that they won't work.
The icon in front of the submissions number indicates whether the submission is in loop or song format. This way it is easier to find whichever you need.

A side note about submissions under approval: When you haven't been approved yet, your track will not show up in the new submissions. If you do get approved before 30 new songs/loops are submitted, your submission will still show up on this list. This is, however, very rare.

Best tracks ever

This section changes weekly. It lists the submissions with the highest scores, measured at exactly Wednesday, 12:00AM (EST). So, the submissions with the absolute highest score at that very moment will be on the #1 spot for one week. The submission with the seconds highest score on #2, and so forth. There's one condition though: The submission needs a minimum of 20 votes before it can reach the best tracks ever list.

Just like the new submissions list, the best tracks ever has a button which promises you to view let you view more best tracks. This button never got its intended functionally though, and will also lead you back to the top of the page.

Best Of The Week

This works the same way as the best of all time, only it consists our of tracks submitted in the last week. The tracks are selected at the exact same time as the 'best tracks ever'. These tracks will play automatically for whoever visits the audio portal, and therefore gives a lot of exposure to whoever gets a spot up there.

The submit button

Click this button to get directed to the submit page. This is where you'll get to upload your mp3, enter information and submit your song/loop.

Genre list "- Browse Genres -"

This is a drop-down list listing all genres available on Newgrounds. Well... except for voice acting.
When you select a genre from this list, you get directed to a page with all the submissions with the genre set to the one you selected. By default, this list is sorted by score. You sort them by title and by date too. The list is updated at real-time, unlike the weekly best and the best tracks ever.
You can browse through all the pages of submission here too.

As there's no link to the voice acting genre (Perhaps it's not there because it's not a music genre), you can use this one. Voice acting

Featured artist

This is pretty much a random feature. Every week, when the new tops are set, a random audio artist gets selected and displayed here for a week, along with his/her most submitted genre. I am not too sure if there are any special requirements to be featured here, at least I don't know any. Let me know if there are.

Audio Search

Pretty self explanatory, this little box enables you to search for an audio submission. You can search either by title or by author. You have to enter at least 3 characters in order to search.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

<<--[Rule Clarifications]. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . [Exposure and improving]-->>
<<--[Back to overview]

===========

PLEASE NOTE: THIS IS VERY OUTDATED

===========

<<--[Back to overview]
<<--[Getting your music on Newgrounds]. . . . . . . . . . . . . . [The Audio Portal itself]-->>
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

The audio submission page has a box with a brief rule explanation.

- You are making the legal claim that it is your own original work.
- Loops you made from existing copyrighted songs are not your own original work.
- If your submission is not your own original work, you will be placed on a rejection list and held responsible for any repercussions.
- You will remain the owner and credited author of the submission.

Your own original work

It's a rather vague term. I'll try to explain it to make that more clear.
The song you're uploading should be your work. Clearly that means you can not upload a song by some band you like, I hope you realize that.

If your friend (or your friend's band for that matter) made a song, but he doesn't have a Newgrounds account, it's not your job to upload it for him/them. Let him make his own account for that. Perhaps you want to help out people by giving them some exposure on Newgrounds. Don't do it, as it only causes trouble. Only YOUR work. If you are in a band, you can upload the music you made with your band. Be sure to mention that it's your band, and perhaps include what part you played.

Loops you made from existing copyrighted songs are not your own original work

Basically, you are not allowed to use any copyrighted samples in your music. This means you can not use copyrighted vocals from a song (also known as a Capella's). You're not allowed to use any bit of a commercial song. There is no length limit for this, keep it to nothing. Sure you found plenty of songs on the Audio portal that DO use copyrighted samples... they're all breaking these rules. This does not allow you to do the same thing. Gradually, all the submissions breaking the rules will be deleted anyway.

Midi-rips are not your own original work

A midi file (.mid or .midi) is a file consisting of raw note, velocity and instrument information. You can load it in almost any DAW, and simply assign instruments to the note tracks you see. This way you use the composition that was in the midi file and you add your personal touch to it by giving it your own instrumentation.

Although this may be fun to do, it is not allowed to be uploaded on Newgrounds. Making a midi-rip is done without much effort of yourself, as the actual song has been written for you. Therefore, it is the work of the person who composed the midi file, and not yours. Refrain from uploading these things.

If you want to cover a song, Do your very best to get the notes by ear, and write your own composition around that, so you only use the original melody (or you can even alter that) to make a new, original composition out of it.

Using loops in songs

This has always been a bit of a vague rule. Certain programs allow you to create a song out of loops from a library you can drag together. Some people around here call that Duplo music, as you're technically just playing with blocks. A duplo song is not your own original work. It consists of premade loops, and are thus not made by you. You only chose the order in which they are being played. - Do not upload song like that. Examples of programs in which you can make songs like this include Apple's Garageband and the older versions of Magix music maker.

You are, however, allowed to use a limited amount in your song. This is where common sense comes in. There's no problem with using a loop to thicken up the mix a bit. Sometimes using a loop can just give that extra touch your song needs. Just be sure the majority of the product is not loops.
I can advise you not to use loops for melodies or harmonic backings. These will be instantly recognizable, and at Newgrounds, we obviously support originality. Again, use your common sense.
The Audio moderators will judge whether or not it's your own original work, using their common sense.

SPAM

SPAM submissions are obviously frowned upon. If your submission consists of a bunch of random sounds, or is actually ear-hurting, you will be banned. Randomly clicking around in a DAW and submitting the result of that is considered SPAM. Common sense is key again. I'm sure you know whether or not you put effort in making your submission.

I hope this article helped clarify the rules for submitting for you. You can ask questions by commenting.

Additional links

[1] Awaiting Audio Approval
Information about the approval process and a brief explanation of the rules.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

<<--[Getting your music on Newgrounds]. . . . . . . . . . . . . . [The Audio Portal itself]-->>
<<--[Back to overview]

===========

PLEASE NOTE: THIS IS VERY OUTDATED

===========

<<--[Back to overview]
<<--[New to the whole audio thing]. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . [Rule clarifications]--->>
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

The technical part

The file you upload to Newgrounds needs to be in MP3 format.
It needs to be under 15 Megabytes in size.
It can be either encoded in constant bitrate or variable bitrate.
The sampling rate has to be 44.1 kHz (44100Hz).

If your DAW / editor allows you, export your project so it fits these requirements. Some DAW's can not do that though.

Problems you can have:

- You have an mp3, but the file is larger than 8 Megabytes.
Lower the bit rate of the mp3. The bit rate pretty much equals the sound quality of the mp3.
The lower the bit rate of an mp3, the smaller the file size, but the worse the sound quality.
Don't worry too much though; for the average listener, the quality difference only starts getting noticeable under 128kbps.

To export your mp3 with a lower bitrate, use a converter like Switch. Most converters will have an option to set the bit rate.

- The sample rate is not 44.1kHz.
For this one too, use a converter. If the option to set the sample rate is not found, it will most likely export as 44.1 kHz by default, as this is pretty much the 'industry standard'.

- The file is not an mp3
Use a converter to convert it to mp3.

Your first submission - THIS SECTION IS OUTDATED

If you managed to get a valid file uploaded, filled in everything, and clicked 'Submit!' for the first time, your submission is added to a queue.

Every new audio artist needs to be approved by an audio moderator. An audio moderator will decide whether your audio is suited for the audio portal or not. Since the amount of people joining up in making audio is going up, the audio moderators can take quite a while to get to listen to your submission. So, as a result of that, it can take quite a while to get approved. Currently, it can take up to a week [last updated 8 November 2010]

To help out the audio moderators a bit, include as much information about how you made your submission as possible. This will help them a lot to judge whether or not it is your own original work. (Typing 'a cool song' or something similar in your author comments will only cause them to think it might not have been you who made the submission.)

Audio moderators can currently only do two things: Ban and approve. Once they've approved you, they can not ban you. Once they've banned you, they can not unban you.

I will explain the rules for you in an other article.

Once you have been approved, your audio submission will show up on your Newgrounds user page.
When you are still awaiting audio approval, you are able to submit more audio. You will still be judged by your first submission.

You will not be notified if you are banned, unless the moderator who bans you send you a private message about it. (I mostly do so.) You can check if you got banned by trying to submit another piece of audio; If you're banned, a message will pop up telling you so. Again, I will cover the reasons why you can be banned in an other article.

Here is a list of the audio moderators; if you need to contact them for any reason.

AllReligiousDrunk, B0UNC3, Bad-Man-Incorporated, Bjra, cast, DarKsidE555, EchozAurora, Envy, jarrydn, Joe, Jonas, Khuskan, LJCoffee, Mich, Mrmilkcarton, Nav, Quarl, RageVI, Rig, Rucklo, Sequenced, SineRider, Spikrodd, Supersteph54, SymbolCymbal, TMM43, xKore, and Zendra.

Additional links

[1] Sound converters
A list with sound converters, so you have a wide range to pick from if you need to convert you submission to a usable format for Newgrounds.

[2] Awaiting Audio Approval?
A load more information about the approval process. The thread is quite old, so some data in the initial post has changed a bit since. This is mostly the time the audio approval process can take.
Skim through the thread, and if you have questions left unanswered, post them there. Don't just post there to complain about not being approved yet though.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

<<--[New to the whole audio thing]. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . [Rule clarifications]--->>
<<--[Back to overview]

<<--[Back to overview]. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . [Getting your music on Newgrounds]--->>
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

So, you heard all those submissions on the audio portal, and you got inspired.
You want to make your own music. Here's a few things to consider.

What kind (genre) of music do you want to make?

You'll probably already have this one figured out if you got the plan to start making your own music. Before you can start making music, you have to figure out what tools you need to make that music.
If you want to create 'real' music, with real instruments, you'll most likely have to learn how to play those instruments, or form a group with people who can play all the instruments needed.

Most likely, you'll be looking to make electronic music though. (Because most music on the site is electronic). If you want to go for making electronic music, starting out will be quite a bit easier, simply because you don't really need much more than your computer to start out with.

What you need to start making electronic music:

- A computer with (obviously) sound output.
- Speakers or heaphones with decent quality.
- Software to make this music with.

Normally this last one will be the problem when you're only just starting out. There is a wide range of options if it comes to music software.
The software you use to make your music with is called a Digital Audio Workstation, or DAW in short. Remember that term, it is widely used among the people creating electronic music (and not only them).

Here are a few commonly used DAW's.

- Image-Line Fl studio (Windows)
- Propellerhead Reason (Windows, Mac)
- Steinberg Cubase (Windows, Mac)
- Apple Logic (Mac)
- Apple Garageband (Mac)

If you own a Mac, you probably have Garageband on there already, as it comes with it.
For Windows, I recommend Fl studio, as it's widely supported. You'll find the most tutorials for this, the most people to help you, and so forth.

If you want to use it though, it comes with an investment, unless you want to go for the demo.

More information and a demo for Fl studio can be found here.

More information and a demo for Reason can be found here.

More information about Cubase can be found here.

More information about Logic can be found here.

More information about Garageband can be found here.

- - - - - - -

Now, the thing about these DAW's is that they cost you money. There are some free alternatives out there, with mostly little functionality compared to 'the big ones'.

A relatively complete, free DAW is Mu.lab. (More information+download) There's a version for both Windows and Mac.

Now you have yourself a piece of software, you can get started. A Big tip I can give you is to listen to the genre you want to make. Don't just listen for pleasure. Listen, and separate what you hear into layers. You'll get to know what the music is made of. Listen for re-occurring patterns in different songs of the same genre.

When you find certain things, try recreating them in your DAW. If there are things you don't know how to do, firstly, experiment a bit, ask google, look for tutorials on youtube, then ask people. Preferably in that particular order.

Using google for help with your DAW

Here's an idea of how you best search for something you want to do in your DAW.
["DAW name"] ["What you are trying to achieve"] (the quotes are important)

Here's an example. You want to look up how to automate the volume in FL studio 9.
the exact search query would be: "Fl studio" "volume automation".

Additional links

Here's another bunch of links that will probably be quite helpful when you're starting your audio journey on Newgrounds.

[1] Audio Forum Sticky
This a set of basic links you might need. I'll cover some of them here as well. Definitely check this one out before you post on the audio forum.

[2] Studios and editors
This thread contains a very complete list of audio software. You'll find the DAW's I mentioned in this article, and a whole load of other programs. There are a lot of programs out there for different functions. The list is mixed up with free and commercial software.

[3] Software Synthesizers
Similar to the above one. The important difference is that this one contains software synthesizers for use in a DAW. Synthesizers are used to create all kinds of sounds by using varying techniques.

[4] Mediaconverter.org
If you need a sound file converted (like a .wav to a .mp3), you can use this website. It is perhaps the fastest way to quickly convert a file if you don't have an application lying around. If you have to convert a bigger amount of files, find an appropriate converter here. (linked from the audio forum sticky).

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

<<--[Back to overview]. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . [Getting your music on Newgrounds]--->>