UltraStar: Adding Videos

Please note: my UltraStar guides now have their own dedicated website on UltraGuide.net. An updated version of this article can be found here

Sorry it’s been so long since my last UltraStar updates, but I’ve been very busy with the program itself, getting it ready for Christmas!

Note: I have no idea if these guides are proving useful – looking at my site stats, I notice that I’m getting a handful of hits a day from people trying to find out how to set up their microphones etc. It would be great to hear from you either way… tell me it’s been useful, totally unhelpful, or perhaps some elements need further clarity. That, and whilst I’m no expert on the game, if you want to fire a question or two at me then I’ll be happy to help if I can.

Now that we’re done with the bare necessities of the game, we can move on to the bonus tutorials. This section will look at how to add video files to the songs. Video files are not necessary, but many people prefer to use them as they definitely enhance the experience of the game. As a result, and this is something that you’ll probably want to note, many people make .txt files that match the video version of the song, rather than the album version or the radio edit. Quite often, this doesn’t make a difference (music videos normally use the same version of the song in question), but on a number of occasions, it can. For example, I was adding ‘Rock the Casbah’ by The Clash the other day, and the text didn’t match the lyrics towards the end of the song. I added the video version instead, and the problem was rectified.

Many users on USDB won’t specify what version of the song their .txt file refers to, so this trial-and-error process can be quite common. It’s worth looking at the comments at the bottom of the song – these can quite often be in another language, primarily German. If you don’t speak the language, paste the comment into Google Translate, and you can normally get the jist of things. It is often stated which version of the song you’re supposed to use.

As well as making the game more fun, adding video files can make obtaining the songs you want much easier. For example, I actually really hate Cheryl Cole’s ‘Fight For This Love,’ the song that I used in my adding songs tutorial, but I decided to put it on there, because some people like it (failing that, a lot of people at least know it), and I want to widen the appeal of my collection as much as possible. I don’t want to buy the MP3, because I won’t be adding it to my iPod. The sound quality generally isn’t as good, but when you and your friends are screeching your hearts out over it, you probably won’t notice!

Your first stop for music videos, of course, is YouTube (though DailyMotion is a good place, too). Using the download helper add-on for Mozilla Firefox, it’s possible to download videos in .flv format to your computer. Once you’ve downloaded and installed this feature, visit the video of the song you want, and eventually the (new) icon next to the address bar will begin to move. This means that Firefox has detected the video on the page, and it is possible to download it.

Click on the arrow next to the icon, and select any of the options referring to the video (it doesn’t matter which one, I don’t think, but correct me if I’m wrong). The video will begin downloading, though you should navigate away from the video on the browser first, or you’ll be waiting there all day.

Now that you have the video file, you’ll also need an mp3 containing the same audio used in the video file (you could try adding the normal mp3 if you like, but getting it to synchronise with the video can be tricky – if you want to have a go, the #VIDEOGAP tag in the .txt file specifies when the video should start playing, and this is independent of the normal #GAP tag, which specifies when the audio should start). There are a number of tools that will create an mp3 based on your video file. Those downloaded from YouTube are usually .flv files, but you can get .mp4 files from DailyMotion, and these are much easier to contend with!

For .mp4 files, I’d recommend downloading DBpoweramp. Once this is installed, you can simply right-click on the video file, select ‘convert to,’ and create an mp3 file in the same directory. This will also work for a number of other file types, both audio and video (not .flv, sadly).

For .flv files, you can use a number of .flv convertor programs, plus some online facilities that link directly to the YouTube video itself, such as www.flv2mp3.com.

Once you have a video and an audio file, place them both in the same directory as your .txt file, and link the two files in the .txt file using the appropriate tabs, for example:

#ARTIST: Cheryl Cole

#TITLE: Fight For This Love

#MP3: Cheryl Cole – Fight For This Love.mp3

#VIDEO: Cheryl Cole – Fight For This Love.flv

The next step is to open UltraStar Deluxe and test the song – does the video file load? If not, make sure you’ve spelled the filename correctly and used the right file extension. To get the text to synchronise with the lyrics, use the same method with the built-in editor function that I described in the adding songs section. Enjoy, and please let me know if this was useful or not!