Attention all Flash artists! We've noticed a lot of entries that are very well done, but very poorly optimized. Please take time to optimize your work to keep the file size down. Keeping the file size to a minimum will allow more people to view your work and will reduce the load on our bandwidth. Please review this page on audio optimization tips:

http://www.newgrounds.com/flash/audio.html

Also be sure all imported images are compressed as much as possible while keeping the quality reasonable. We have a 5MB limit, but that doesn't mean you should be lazy and submit a 4-5MB entry when it could be 500k-2MB. Not only will this help improve your views, score, and the performance of Newgrounds, it is a good practice to learn. Remember, this is the Internet and not everyone has a fast connection. Keeping things as stream lined as possible is very important.

Star syndicate does that very often >=(

Converting from MP3 to wav definitely does the job. I have a program called shuffler converter.
Another program that is good which i use is Cool Edit Pro. Cool Edit Pro.. a person can remove some of the audio and make it shorter.. a person could also make a song loop instead of the full length. It's nice that there's now a page on audio tips.

At 1/28/05 05:26 PM, BonusStage wrote:

At 1/28/05 05:25 PM, wismty wrote: Star syndicate does that very often >=(

OMFG big file size = good movie XD

That's why always fifien!

When I saw a news post that began with the word "Audio", I got all excited. But audio optimization is not exciting!

Wade, perhaps it should be added to the Flash submission page.

"Make sure you have optimized your audio! Click this (link) if you don't know how!" .. or something

At 1/28/05 05:34 PM, RageVI wrote: "Make sure you have optimized your audio! Click this (link) if you don't know how!" .. or something

Agrees. I was hoping for more exciting news myself. : (

Who here actually uses the 'speech' compression for voice acting? I usually use .mp3 compression instead, just wondering...

I tried submitting an WAV entry lately, but an error appeared saying it's not WAV or MP3. So I converted it to MP3, and it still won't submit, giving me the same error message.

At 1/28/05 05:25 PM, wismty wrote: Star syndicate does that very often >=(

Star Syndicate isn't as bad as the people who make Mystic Kisses, when it comes to audio optimization. Each and every one of them is at least 3 megs and all that it is, is one tween, which takes more than a minute to load with my broadband.

It's really infuriating that some people ignore the audio optimization altogether simply to annoy the viewer. They aren't newbs, and would easily know how to compress the audio. And it's always just a crappy flash that gets mass-voted / protected by idiots past the judgement.

I loved the bit at the end about giving free advertising to an industry that doesn't care about you.

NG Audio Portal = Win

Noticed on alot of new stuff the audio has been set to EVENT, instead of STREAM, too. Adds to the filesize and screws up syncing ...

At 1/28/05 05:44 PM, Aapo wrote: Star Syndicate isn't as bad as the people who make Mystic Kisses, when it comes to audio optimization. Each and every one of them is at least 3 megs and all that it is, is one tween, which takes more than a minute to load with my broadband.

It's really infuriating that some people ignore the audio optimization altogether simply to annoy the viewer. They aren't newbs, and would easily know how to compress the audio. And it's always just a crappy flash that gets mass-voted / protected by idiots past the judgement.

Well said. I couldn't have put it better myself. The Syndicate stuff has actually improved a lot recently... usually 4 (albeit crappy) movies for under 2 Mb. It's the Piconjo-related shite that's the worst - and it's done on purpose, because they know that there is a percentage of NG viewers who won't even download the whole thing before voting 5, based on the list of other submissions. Second worst are the complete Flash newbs - it would be nice if they read this thread, but I'm not even convinced that the majority of them even know how to read... they certainly don't know how to write or draw.

At 1/28/05 05:23 PM, WadeFulp wrote: Attention all Flash artists! We've noticed a lot of entries that are very well done, but very poorly optimized. Please take time to optimize your work to keep the file size down. Keeping the file size to a minimum will allow more people to view your work and will reduce the load on our bandwidth. Please review this page on audio optimization tips:

audio optimization is good cept in amyn cases in my movies its ruined the effect i was trying to have by creating a softer or weaker sound. :(

I love to ait for 4mb flash of a stick figure shoot eachother while the SOAD music plays, the whole show not just a clip of it.

We're mainly concerned about the higher quality productions that would have a chance of being featured. These entries will get a lot of views if we show case them and if they are not opitmized it's a shame to use up so much bandwidth because the author was lazy. We may stop featuring content that we feel isn't optimized. There are several entries on the front page right now that could probably be reduced in file size by 1-3MB's.

I guess you do need more optimised entries, seeing as how that 50 mpbs or something limit is starting to interfere cause of more popular large movies.

eitherway, I seriously don't get why people don't read the small print, but how can you miss the large print that says optimise your audio on the submission page?!

and another thing,

At 1/28/05 05:25 PM, wismty wrote: Star syndicate does that very often >=(

too true, they submit like 3mb of crap like everyday, if the entry is good I wouldn't mind, but today almost all or maybe even all parts where done by threestar and already submitted, lazy.

my suggestion is that you just lower the maximum limit a Megabyte or two & make them break up their huge assed files into smaller parts.

At 1/28/05 06:21 PM, -izax- wrote: my suggestion is that you just lower the maximum limit a Megabyte or two & make them break up their huge assed files into smaller parts.

Or better yet, limit the filesize for new artists to 1 meg, and have it increase with batting average.

I downsized my audio and people complained for poor quality. I upgraded the sound and people complained for filesize. There's no way to win.

At 1/28/05 06:38 PM, Painbringer wrote: Or better yet, limit the filesize for new artists to 1 meg, and have it increase with batting average.

Hmmm, quite a cool idea, but could offend some artists who are established on other sites but new to NG - to the extent of them not submitting here - eg: brokensaint69

At 1/28/05 05:34 PM, RageVI wrote: When I saw a news post that began with the word "Audio", I got all excited. But audio optimization is not exciting!

Heh what a surprise...you see an audio topic and zoom right to it...

If I ever make a flash movie Wade...I promise I will optimize it :)

At 1/28/05 06:45 PM, KupaMan wrote: I downsized my audio and people complained for poor quality. I upgraded the sound and people complained for filesize. There's no way to win.

It's all about balance. I think I usually set my audio to 32kbps and it sounds good enough. People aren't coming to a website to test out their $50,000 surround sound systems. People need to trade off some audio quality so their entry is quicker to load and able to be enjoyed by more people. A lot of people are submitting content with 128kbps MP3's, etc. If they went to 64kbps it would cut the audio's file size in half, and 32kbps half again, in theory.

Off topic time!

Wade, why don't you respond to emails anymore? :'[

i have an idea ppl, there shall be 2 newgrounds this one, were authors submit maxed out 70mb submissions with surround sound high octane 3d vector graphics and ,crap grounds were the same movies are there but optimized to the point of no distinction i would be going to crap grounds considering i have like a 56k connection lol

I always vote 2 points lower than I normally would if the audio is too heavy. So if a short movie is over 2Mb because of the audio, and I think it deserves a 2, I'll give it a 0. People need to realized what a waste of bandwidth it is to leave the audio unoptimized or make the flash uncompressed.

At 1/28/05 08:05 PM, TheShrike wrote: I always vote 2 points lower than I normally would if the audio is too heavy. So if a short movie is over 2Mb because of the audio, and I think it deserves a 2, I'll give it a 0. People need to realized what a waste of bandwidth it is to leave the audio unoptimized or make the flash uncompressed.

Heh. Glad I'm not the only one that does that.

At 1/28/05 07:28 PM, Orodreth wrote: Wade, why don't you respond to emails anymore? :'[

I get a lot of emails and I have a lot of other things to keep up with. There has also been a lot going on with the holidays, preparing for my 2nd kid, and I've been sick twice this month. So that doesn't help me get ahead. We have a lot of things in the works that will help to optimize the way we handle things so I won't be bogged down with things I shouldn't have to be bogged down with.

At 1/28/05 08:30 PM, WadeFulp wrote: I get a lot of emails and I have a lot of other things to keep up with.

You should hire a secretary!

i'll be sur to remambah that in meh animations COMING SOON NEAR YOU!!!!!

P.S. i dont submit any in the next 30 day then forget i even say annehthin' ^_^;;

For a flash site newgrounds sure lacks a good tutorial/tips section. It would be nice to have a page with all the best tips and tricks for flash optimization. Some examples of good optimized audio files would be good also.