Help/Aviary Advanced Suite/Getting Started
Frequently Asked Questions
Aviary Support
posted this on June 06, 2010 21:25
About Aviary
What is Aviary?
Aviary is a suite of free, powerful creative applications that you can use right in your web browser. These applications are an on-demand service hosted on remote servers. This means there is no software to buy, download, install, update, or maintain; everything is done on the server. This gives the user freedom to create and host images on the site. Along with these award winning applications, Aviary has a large active community of artists. Our mission is to make creation accessible to artists of all genres, from graphic design to audio editing.
Aviary's unique system of file management facilitates collaborations, learning, and growth. A user can open, study and build upon others' files. To keep artists in control of their creations, there is an extensive tracking system and copyright licensing.
What is Aviary's mission?
To make creation accessible for everyone. We like to call it "democratizing creation"!
Why did you choose the name Aviary?
Our motto was "creation on the fly" so the bird metaphor seemed like the best choice. We didn't want to name our software after bugs (for obvious reasons).
Who made Aviary?
We're a privately held company currently headquartered in New York, with team members around the world. The founders also created Worth1000.com, a talented community of almost a million digital artists that participate in amazing daily contests. You can find more information (and our group shot) in our About Us section.
Why did you start Aviary?
Through our interactions with the artists on Worth1000.com, we realized that while many people wanted to use digital editing software, it was very inaccessible:
- The costs were prohibitive (and many people didn't want to risk installing a virus by pirating).
- The interface was too bloated with rarely-used features to make learning it easy.
- You actually needed to install the programs on a machine with specifications that complied with the program and suffer through any unwanted DRM malware that might also come with the software.
We have our roots in the grassroots hobbyists community. We are artists ourselves and know that there are so many other potential creators out there like us... all they need are accessible tools.
Is Aviary funded?
We have been fortunate enough to attract a group of industry visionaries who believe firmly in our mission and want to help us grow.
About the Site
How do I find my friends?
You can search for people by name or user name, import friends from other networks, or invite friends via email. You can also browse through our community of artists, and add anyone whose creations you like to your contacts from their profile page.
What's with the badges?
Everyone is labeled as a "fledgling" by default when they sign up with Aviary. The other badges are for staff (full-time employees of Aviary Inc), students (members of the Aviary education program), and former Pro members (left over from a time when Aviary had paid accounts - we've kept these to show our appreciation for the users who supported us at that time).
Is there a place where I can find out if there are problems with Aviary?
Yes. Check our Known Issues page, read the Aviary blog, or follow @aviary.
How do I report spam?
You can report an inappropriate creation or user by clicking the "Flag this creation" link in the sidebar on any page, or you can contact us directly.
How do I delete my Aviary account?
If you would like to delete your Aviary username, profile, and all associated creations from the Aviary website, please make sure you are logged in to the Aviary website as the user you would like to delete, then visit Your Profile and Account Settings page and click the "Delete your account" link. Please note that once your account has been deleted, you will no longer be able to access from the Aviary website any of the creations you made with that account.
What applications are currently available?
In Beta release:
- Phoenix, our layer-based image editor
- Peacock, our visual laboratory for creating amazing effects and visualizations
- Toucan, our color palette coordinator
- Raven, our vector editor
- Talon, our firefox extension that allows users to perform screen captures
- Falcon, our image markup tool
- Myna, our audio editor
- Roc, our music creator
And rumor has it we've got many more to come :)
How does this support site work?
This is the place to come when you have questions, comments, or suggestions about Aviary. Please search for your topic before submitting a question, because if it's already been addressed in the help resources you will get the answer you need much faster. If you don't find it there, feel free to either submit a ticket for help from the Aviary staff, or to add your question/idea/comment to the appropriate forum for both staff and other users to see.
You can also browse through topics and vote on the answers that were the most helpful to you, the questions you need answered the most urgently, and the features or tutorials that you'd most like to see implemented. We will always try to address the most popular topics first.
Subscription Plans
Is it true that Aviary is completely free?
Yes!
Can I use Aviary for commercial purposes?
Yes. Please note that the use of certain content (such as the audio library provided in Myna) may have certain separate restrictions on being used for commercial purposes. However, the tools themselves and any content you yourself create are totally fine for commercial purposes. If you're not sure, please check with us.
Is there a separate standalone version of the applications available for students or schools?
Yes. We are beta-testing a special program for students and educators that lets them use Aviary in a completely private setting apart from the rest of the community. To see if you qualify, please contact us with details about intended usage.
Is there an Aviary API?
Yes! You can find information about it here.
Permissions and Licensing
How do I set permissions on who can access a file?
You can set this in any application when you save it. You can set more advanced permissions on the file (like allowing specific people to access it) by clicking the "Creation Settings" link, located on any of your image's display pages. You can find more detailed instructions here.
What are derivatives and sources?
Sources are the files used to make a creation, and derivatives are new creations made using an existing creation. This helps give credit to the original creator, and is also useful for learning how a creation was made if you want to do something similar with your own. If you open someone else's work, you can use it as a source file for your own creation, but you cannot overwrite their file to make any changes to their original creation. You can find out more about sources and derivatives here.
Does Aviary have any rights to the works I create?
You own the full rights to all works you create. Aviary only retains a license to display any works you make viewable to the public within Aviary and in any external publication provided it's in a way that promotes Aviary. For example, this means your work may be used to accompany a third-party newspaper article about Aviary.
Where can I find out more information about Aviary's Terms of Use?
Aviary's Terms of Use is posted on the site, and you can read more about our site guidelines here.
Comments
Very clear and concise. Thank you!
How do I listen to my music when it is s saved?
To access your previously saved creations, just go to your creations page:http://www.aviary.com/artists/joyjoy186/creations. There you'll find all your saved work. You can preview your Roc Beats & Myna Mixes by clicking the play button within the egg icons.
Hope that helps!
how can i download my creation and save it to my pc.,,pls help....
The download for my creations is also not working
Hi tintinay,
To download your Myna creation, just go to your Creations Page (http://www.aviary.com/artists/tintinay/creations) and click on a creation's title. This will bring you to that individual creation's page (http://www.aviary.com/artists/tintinay/creations/biba_un_2) , where you can right-click (ctrl-click on a Mac) "Download MP3" or "Download WAV" and then "Save Link As..."
Please let me know if you have any other questions!
Hi malessandra,
I'm sorry to hear you're having trouble downloading your creation! What exactly happens when you click to download? Are you receiving an error message? If so, what does it say?
Thanks!
I tried a few times.... I made the mixdown as everytime but after that, there was no button to download it... it just returned to the "normal" site, where you mix the music. Also under "my creations" I couldn't download it. There was no error message at any time.
I waited a few minutes/hours and as I tried now, it's working again. I don't know what the problem was, but I'm happy it's working now =)
Glad to hear it; please let us know if you have any other issues!
HOW DO I CREATE MI MUSIC CUZ I DONT UNDERSTAND
To create music, you can use Roc (our music creator) and/or Myna (our audio editor). For some beginner Roc tips, please visit http://support.aviary.com/entries/196850-roc-basics . For Myna, please visit http://support.aviary.com/entries/225719-recording-and-importing.
Also, please feel free to search through and post to our community forums (http://www.aviary.com/forums ), where our friendly and knowledgable users frequently hang out.
Have fun!
Is there a limit to the length of tracks you import? I was importing several tracks of music, starting a new track after the previous one ended. By the third song, it was like I ran out of space.
Yes, there's a 6-minute track limit and a 2-minute recording limit in Myna.
6 minute TOTAL for ALL tracks, or 6 minutes PER track? Thanks.
6 minutes total. They're layered, so the longest the song can ever be is 6 minutes regardless of how long each track is separately.
I have uploaded a track and im trying to layer an acapella over the top of it, but i cant get the acapella to the same speed as the track. How can i fix this? Is there a way to spped up the bpm after upload?
Thank you for this information.
can you take out vocals in myna
Hi djdawson,
At this point there is not a way to remove vocals from a track with any of Aviary's tools. We hope to add this feature or at least the tool to achieve this effect n the future.
-Aviary
Hello Aviary Support.
I had mixdowned my music 3 times but when i when to view it it said that there was no mixdown for it.
I am confused.
Please help.
aviary is so great!
thx a lot for this..:)))
still so amazed, til now..
how do i delete the first bit of my track in the song in the audio editor?
Hi Casathywong,
There is an easy way to trim the ends of your song. put your mouse in the upper left corner of the sound clip and a "Trim" handle will appear. Dragging that handle will trim the sound clip. If you ever need to reset the trims you can right click on the sound clip and selct the "Reset Clip and Remove Loops".
IS there a way to download my creations song onto a CD
Hi BlackTiger,
You can download an MP3 file of your song to your hard drive. From there use any CD burning software to make a CD of your creations.
how do u burn the music u made on a disk
See my previous comment. :)
Hi there, Aviary "Music creator" or "Roc Sounds" not sure which it is, looks like a good program with the potential to be much better, I have some questions:
How can I add more "Measures" to my song? & Where can I find "Music creator/Roc Sounds" specific tutorials?
I can only make the song as long as the interface is wide, which only seems to be 2 measures/4 beats.
if you could help with either of these I would greatly appreciate it.
Thanks for your time,
bouch.
umm , i cant mixdown my music . Can anybody help??
$5 This will be deleted: I wish i could delete my old post above, the fact is I wish I never asked! I don't mean to beat up on Roc & Myna but they are just too limited to be a rewarding enough experience to justify the amount of screwing around you must go through to make a generally terrible song, I might come back in 6 months and see how it's going. There are just too many freely available alternatives out there that can do more only minus the fact it's not inside your browser!
I'm outa here.
how can i add vocals to mixes
Hi LOTR, you can add your own vocals in Myna by selecting File>Record Audio. If you have existing vocals that you want to import (instead of recording new ones), use File>Import Audio instead.
i cannot change my avatar. i upload bmps, jpgs, everything! but it keeps saying its invalid!!! proabably because this is still in alpha.......
I'm trying to burn my song I made onto a disk. How do you do that?
Hi i am Mathur...
In the music editor software when i try to save a music creation i keep getting a message:
[edit-attribute] throws an error on key: thumbnail.png etc
What does this mean?
How can I make my audio creation longer than 6 minutes?
6 minutes is the current limit of all Myna (audio editor) creations.
how can i delete my account
When will you start a staff's picks for music? Why is it blank?
Hi Mercerdrew,
I don't think that staff have had time to add any picks to the list. Thanks for bringing it to our attention.
hello.
well im having trouble with opening my saved songs. yes i go to were it say "you" and press "my creations" but then when i want to hear it it does not play.
Having trouble downloading my creation... there IS no download button to click when I go to its page. Only options are publish creation, link and embed, send to friends, add to groups, creation settings, and delete creation. Help?
Doesnt work, says i have to publish it but i did.
Hi chibiansem02
There is no direct download button. Instead use the view at full size link, this will open the image in a new tab. Then you can use your browsers the right click menu to save the image to your desktop.
-Aviary
Hi HayleyBerx,
We're not sure exactly what you are wanting to do. Can you give us some more information we may be on the hope you.
oops , i meant to say that i was trying to download it. because when i clicked on ilanatheyogi's link it shows 3 buttons that say 'Download mp3 , download wav, link and embed, send to friends. but i cant seem to get that when i click on my music file.
Hey Hayley,
So it looks like you have not mixed down your file yet. The mixdown will turn the file that Aviary uses into an .mp3 or .wav. That way you can download and listen to it on your computer. Open the file back up and Choose the File > Mixdown command. Once that is done you should see the correct links to download showing up.
There is no link that says view at full size? I don't want to save an image, I want to save an audio project to my computer.
Hi chibiansem,
You have to mixdown your file before you can export it to your desktop. See my comment above to Hayley.
oh okay thanks, how long does it usually take to do this? its been taking around an hour
Nevermind, it worked thanks!! great website by the way.
What exactly is a mixdown?
When I go to mixdown my creation in myna, it says 'error 2032' at about 33% and stops. It also looks like it's not saving... since when I logged back in after finishing my full project only half of it was there :(
Hi Mathur,
A mixdown is a process that converts the format that is used in Myna a .egg file, to a .mp3 or .wav file. Essentially it prepares the file from Myna so it can be listened to on you computer.
OK Thank you... ingenious site by the way
Hi chibiansem02,
That was probably caused by a temporary server error, can you please try again.
does anyone who has done audio editor with a windows computer. i need help importing my song onto a dvd and it won't let me do it. I did it twice but need one more piece of material and am stuck. can anyone help me????
i have made a creation that i want to save to my computer. i tried what it said in the first few comments, but when i right-clicked it said "save target as..." so i tried that, but when i clicked to open it, it just came back up with the website. how can i save it to my hard drive?
Hi, Im having trouble downloading the audio file as an MP3 or a WAV. I went through the motions described above for <tintinay> and I dont have a 'Save link as...' button.
I have a 'Save Target as..' button and it save it as a Chrome HTML document....? Please help asap! Cheers!
I just read the comment above mine - I have the same problem! Please help!
Thank you for a fun day! I finally got to spend a little time learning how to put together clips.
Your clip library is awesome. Can any of my creations be used on my own music videos?
Thanks again!
Hi Drummergirl777
You're welcome to use the Quantum Tracks library for anything you want, as long as it's not for commercial gain. If you have any other questions or want to check in with us about a specific use, let us know!
does anyone know how to download and be able to put into itunes? need asap!
Thanks for the info. I hope to have fun learning. This is Great!
how to download into itunes?
this isn't really related to any programs but when editing my bio I couldn't figure out hoe to change font size( I used basic HTML scripting). Is there a way to change the font size?
Hi Alpha13Wolf,
You are only allowed a few BBCode tags to format your text on the site, and unfortunately font size is not one of them. You can find all the available tags here.
http://www.aviary.com/thread?tid=1236
How can u make your new mix into a MP3 format? My windows player says your format is not supported
Hi erod1023,
Are you downloading the mp3 file or the raw .egg file?
in myna, how do i change the tepmo of the tracks? i want to play a few songs overtop of each other but all of the songs have a diferent tempo. how can i make some tracks go faster or slower?
Hi sheridanhancock,
You can stretch or shrink the tempo of any clip by first holding down the SHIFT key. You will notice the handles in the upper corner of the clip will change to clocks. Now when you drag on the handles the clips timing will be stretched instead of the clip being trimmed.\
I understand everyone can use this program but our teachers still don't that EVERYONE has the licensing. I would like if you could post below "AVIARY IS FREE FOR EVERYONE TO USE IN A NON-COMMERCIAL FASHION" or something like that depending on what it really is but i need it extremely clear. If you could do that it would help me so much and i love your programs they're so helpful and best of all, FREE :D
i cant download my creation but i need it by tonight :S i tried right-clicking on the file, but there is no download mp3 or download wav option
Quick question: When you click the "Download MP3" button, where does it save the file? Thanks!
I deleted a piece of work that i was really happy with and was using for school by mistake...is there any way for me to retrieve that image? plz help thanks!
How do i go about deleting some work, i just started and im not sure what im doing, the have some work saved twice and i would like to delete the copies, and How would i be able to mix all my work together
please help :]
thank you
Hi masterofplagues,
Go to the creation page of the file you want to delete and use the Delete Creation command in the right sidebar.
Okay, I probably sound like an idiot, but, how do I add a vocal thing, to the track??? Sorry if I don't make sense, plz help though.
Greetings!
Last week I submitted a request for private student accounts for my high school music students. How can I check on the status of my request? Thanks so much!
Okay, so when I try to save this graphic I'm super happy with, the save button works and all but it only saves half-way and then it won't finish saving! It's really annoying and I've tried everything I can think of to figure out what's wrong!! Please help!
will there be a charge in the future? or it will remain free for a life time? so far i like what am reading
I notice the aviary logo always appears on new image creations. can i remove that without violating your terms of service?
Yes you can remove the Aviary watermark without violating the TOS. If you create an account through the site you can set your user preferences to allow you to remove the watermark or even make your own.
-Mike
hi is there any way i can change the chord melody in the loops the software comes with
I'm sorry, but I've looked everywhere and tried everything, and I still cannot download my music creation. I've done everything everyone says, but I'm never given the option to "download mp3" or "download WAV". Please help. this is getting really irritating.
Hi Santino,
I see that your creation has not been mixed down yet. If you open it up in the audio editor and mix it down (save first, then mixdown when prompted), you'll have two options for downloading your song. You can either use the mp3 and wav links that show up in the dropdown at the top of the page after you mix down, or you can go to your creation's detail page (you can always access this through your profile on aviary.com) and use the download links in the sidebar on the right side of the page.
If anything isn't working as it should be, please do submit a support request at the top of this page so we can help you out!
Thanks,
Maya
when i go to my creations page and try to play some of my previously saved roc beats, they will not load. When i go to edit it says there is not a mixdown but i remember creating all of the songs i have. is there a way to recover them or are they lost forever?
Hi, I made a song which i want to download onto my PC and put onto my phone and iPod, but whenever i try downloading, it isnt an mp3 file, it is a white page and it is just called a file, how can i save it so i can have it on my Ipod???
Hi Looneytunesman,
This sounds like a temporary server glitch which is making the files not load correctly. Give it a few minutes and it should fix itself. If this problem still persists please send us a support ticket and we will investigate further.
How do I change my file to an .mp3?
It keeps saving it as an .EGG
I know how to get it onto a CD from the mp3 point, it's just getting there that I can't do.
when ever I try to save it, the save and save as buttons don't work. All i have for available options are the 2 egg ones.
Hey. I need some help. I just signed up today and I already made a song creation by using roc. I have it saved, but my question is how can you send your creation to your phone? If anybody could help it would mean alot.
I just signed up and it looks great, but I'm looking for information I can't find (yet). I want to know how to start with a blank template and add letters, such as "JOE SMITH FOR PRESIDENT". I'm trying to do a template for a bumper sticker. I'm a total newbie so if this information is here already, sorry to bother anyone. It would be nice to be able to add a small picture as well.
Thanks!!!!
hey i am new and have just uploaded and would like people to comment on my things so may you guys please look me up
Buenas tardes, he creado algunos afiches con esta plataforma que empiezo a conocer y me ha sido muy útil.
Hoy me encuentro ante un problema... no logro quitarle el fondo blanco a una imagen... ¿Me ayuda alguien por favor?
¡Gracias!
i already did the mixdown of my track but i cant find the option that lets me download it as an mp3 file... please help!!
in myna i cant see alot of imported audio i've uploaded. why?
Es muy complicado hasta llegar a crear una canción o trabajo completo.Y no solo esto. Lo veo en las preguntas que mucha gente no entienden lo basico. Algunas aplicaciones o posibilidades me recuerdan a un juego sofisticado.la idea no esta mal pero por el momento es mas una cosa para profesionales.
How can I remove the blue header? It's been getting in the way recently.