New member here and I have a couple questions

CyborgNinja1000

CyborgNinja1000

New member
Hello everyone, after going to a lot of raves and dubstep shows I have decided to get into making my own music. A friend gave me a demo version of FL Studio and I've been messing around for a few months. If you wouldn't mind I have some questions if you could help me out that would be great. I hope I am posting in the right section!


1) I am using FL Studio and I know a lot of my favorite dj's use ableton. I've heard a lot of people say that FL is not professional but I think that in the right hands people can make any DAW have quality sound. I find the interface of FL very easy to use. If I want to seriously produce my own music and eventually play live at venues is FL okay to use?


2) A lot of artists use sound samples from movies, video games, other artists. How does this not violate copyright? Is it safe to use sound and voice clips from movies in my music?


3) I realize that I will have to decide on a DJ name for myself. What if I choose a name but it is already taken or in use by someone else, even if they are not well known or "famous"? And as a side question, suppose I decide on a name that happens to be a character from a movie. I'm just making this off the top of my head but say I decided to use the (lame) name as, Snape. As you probably know that is the name of a character from Harry Potter. This was just a bad example but could I face legal copyright issues? (that's not what I want to be known as :p)


Thanks for the help and I look forward to getting to know you all on the board.
 
CyborgNinja1000 said:
1) I am using FL Studio and I know a lot of my favorite dj's use ableton. I've heard a lot of people say that FL is not professional but I think that in the right hands people can make any DAW have quality sound. I find the interface of FL very easy to use. If I want to seriously produce my own music and eventually play live at venues is FL okay to use?
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(Ableton) Live has a lot of featured geared towards live used (hence the name); that's what it was originally intended for. The more traditional DAW features came later. Absolutely nothing wrong with FL for making music, but for performing, it's probably not quite as good. But of course, it all depends...even though many people use Live for their live sets, it's not like people didn't play live before it existed. So it's down to how you want to perform. Ableton offers one platform to do it, and it isn't impossible with FL either.

2) A lot of artists use sound samples from movies, video games, other artists. How does this not violate copyright? Is it safe to use sound and voice clips from movies in my music?
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It does, unless you have a permit to do so. Usually any big-name release includes the label "clearing" the sample usage with the copyright holders. Basically there's no situation where using other people's stuff - in any form - is legal, but in practice if you're not making money off of it, no one's gonna bother coming after you (because there's millions of people doing it all the time). Things can get complicated if you happen to hit it big, though.

3) I realize that I will have to decide on a DJ name for myself. What if I choose a name but it is already taken or in use by someone else, even if they are not well known or "famous"? And as a side question, suppose I decide on a name that happens to be a character from a movie. I'm just making this off the top of my head but say I decided to use the (lame) name as, Snape. As you probably know that is the name of a character from Harry Potter. This was just a bad example but could I face legal copyright issues? (that's not what I want to be known as :p)
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I guess the simple route to take here is, well, not using other people's well-known names. But once again, it's more about the amount of exposure you have - Disney's probably not gonna bother if you wanna DJ at your local bar under the name DJ Mickey Mouse, but might cease-and-desist you if you level up to bigger arenas. So better safe than sorry after riding to fame with someone else's name.
 
CyborgNinja1000 said:
Hello everyone, after going to a lot of raves and dubstep shows I have decided to get into making my own music. A friend gave me a demo version of FL Studio and I've been messing around for a few months. If you wouldn't mind I have some questions if you could help me out that would be great. I hope I am posting in the right section!


1) I am using FL Studio and I know a lot of my favorite dj's use ableton. I've heard a lot of people say that FL is not professional but I think that in the right hands people can make any DAW have quality sound. I find the interface of FL very easy to use. If I want to seriously produce my own music and eventually play live at venues is FL okay to use?


2) A lot of artists use sound samples from movies, video games, other artists. How does this not violate copyright? Is it safe to use sound and voice clips from movies in my music?


3) I realize that I will have to decide on a DJ name for myself. What if I choose a name but it is already taken or in use by someone else, even if they are not well known or "famous"? And as a side question, suppose I decide on a name that happens to be a character from a movie. I'm just making this off the top of my head but say I decided to use the (lame) name as, Snape. As you probably know that is the name of a character from Harry Potter. This was just a bad example but could I face legal copyright issues? (that's not what I want to be known as :p)


Thanks for the help and I look forward to getting to know you all on the board.
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1.Yes, any sequencer can work, but each has his own features

2.You need to buy copyrighted samples, good chance they have digital stamps

3.You can use a name of a character. .. If you use a name of an unknown dj and you get bigger, chances are you'll get to keep the name, but try to avoid that, you never know who's the guy and how far he I'd willing to go.
 
2) Using samples is a bit of a game...

You can seek clearance... And depending on the Artist/Label this will be either pretty cheap or cost an arm and a leg...
Or you can just do it without clearance... You might get away with it and you might not. If you get caught out then it'll probably cost you more than it would've if you got legitimate clearance (quite a few factors here: inc your own sales).

I've not released anything commercially so it's not something I worry about... If I sell or lease a beat to an artist it's on them if they get sued (it's in the lease agreement - I'm clear that I haven't obtained clearance and possible 'problem' samples are listed) and not me as they're the one releasing the track.
 
Thanks for the replies. I am tossing a bunch of different names around but I really like, Cryotek. I did a google search and turns out there is a dj who uses that name and makes trance and dance music on beatport and it's actually the name of a decepticon from transformers. I had no idea.

So I don't know if it would be safe to plan on using this or not.
 
CyborgNinja1000 said:
Thanks for the replies. I am tossing a bunch of different names around but I really like, Cryotek. I did a google search and turns out there is a dj who uses that name and makes trance and dance music on beatport and it's actually the name of a decepticon from transformers. I had no idea.

So I don't know if it would be safe to plan on using this or not.
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I wouldn't
 
Actually we don't know how many Dj-s and producers are there worldwide, so you can imagine how hard it is to find your artist name you like and nobody has, which is catchy and sounds awesome. But if you can't find it on internet, you'r good to go, if you can then i don't suggest you to use that name. i'm sure everybody can think about the artist name i described before, somewhere deep in our minds :)
 
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