iPhone Ringtone Creation

I know that this is posted a lot, but I still know a lot of people who aren't comfortable with making ringtones yet.  It can be a pain at the start, but once you get a few settings tweaked it is cake!  And you know me, I love cake.

So here is my version of the instructions:

1.        First, check and alter your computer settings.  Go to control panel > folder options > View, and under advanced settings uncheck hide extensions for known file types. 

2.       Go to your iTunes and start playing a song that you want, have a pen and paper ready.  Take special note and write down the time when the part you want starts playing.  Get as close as you can to the right timing, and write it down.  Listen a few times if you have to.

3.       Right Click on the song and go to “Get Info”

4.       Go over to options and put in the start and stop time for your song.  My example is “Cups” from the Pitch Perfect Soundtrack so it would be (start time :21.5, stop time :36.5).  This song does not necessarily need half seconds in it, but some will to avoid odd start or end notes.  You can make it any part of a second, it does not have to just be .5.

5.       Hit ok and play the song again to make sure that it sounds how you want it to. For text tones, you will want to keep things at or less than 5 seconds long, or else you will have to hear all that song every time you get a text.  Ringtones are better at anything up to 30 seconds.

6.       Right click on the song and select create AAC version.

7.       Create a folder on your desktop for ringtones.  Drag and drop the song into the folder. 

8.       You should see .m4a on the end of the song.  Click the song twice slowly or right click and say rename, and change the extension to .m4r.  Click yes on the warning.  If you are making it a text tone instead of a ringtone, consider starting the name with Text-(name) or similar so you know which ones are which.

9.       Drag the song back over to iTunes and hover over the library sidebar and drop it. Drag and drop it your phone and enjoy!  You may want to delete the AAC version from your library (the 30 second or less clip) because if not it will play if you set your library on shuffle and really throw you off and make you wonder why only the chorus played.  You will also want to go back to Get Info on the original song and uncheck the start/stop times.  Been there, done that.

From folder to library.  Simple, simple!

Here are a few start/stop timings that I suggest, besides Cups as mentioned above:
Ringtones:
-"Ho Hey": Lumineers   ( :53.5 ; 1:05 )
-"One More Night": Maroon 5  ( 1:11  ;  1:31.5 )  This one arguably could be 1:11.5, if you are really particular, go with that.  Or at least 1:11.2.
-"50 Ways to Say Goodbye": Train  ( :44.8 ; 1:15 )
-"The Wind": Zac Brown Band  ( :31 ; :46 )
-"Home" Philip Phillips  ( :42 ; 1:15 )

Text tones:
-"Everybody Talks": Neon Trees ( 1:06 ; 1:11 )  This gets you "everybody talks, everybody talks, everybody talks too much"
-"Girl Named Tennessee": Needtobreathe ( 2:02 ; 2:05 )  first, if you haven't heard this song book it on over to iTunes.  Second, this clip will play "My sweet girl from Tennessee".  You can set individual text tones for people, and I think this would be a cute one to use.  To do that, go into your contacts list to the person of choice, hit Edit in the corner, and select a text tone or ring tone for them. 
-"Tonight, Tonight" Hot Chelle Rae ( :12 ; :14 ) to get "la, la, la, whatever"
-"Better Dig Two": The Band Perry ( :55.3 ; 1:01.6) to get "here lies a girl who's only crutch, was loving one man just a little too much"
-"Lazy Song": Bruno Mars ( :16 ; :21.8 ) to get "don't feel like picking up my phone, so leave a message at the tone"


Really think about the part of the song, and ringtones and text tones can give everything a little more personality.

Happy crafting!