Importing NIFF files 1998-02-25 05:00 am I have been looking at the Midiscan program (www.musitek.com), which can scan sheet music and export it to MIDI or NIFF. The advantage of NIFF over MIDI is that you don't loose notation information.But how can I import NIFF files into NoteWorthy Composer? Quote Selected
Re: Importing NIFF files Reply #1 – 1998-02-25 05:00 am Does this really work? This could save a tremendous amountof time. I'd like to hear about people's experience with this. Quote Selected
Re: Importing NIFF files Reply #2 – 1998-02-25 05:00 am Pretty much, download the demo from www.musitek.com and make up your own mind. A 300 dpi optical flatbed scanner recommended, feed through is of, hand held-forget it. Flatbeds are cheap. When you import set reolution to equal the smallest note / smallest rest in the scanned converted piece. Quote Selected
Re: Importing NIFF files Reply #3 – 1998-02-25 05:00 am Currently you would have to import the MIDI file produced from a scan.The NIFF format has not been widely adopted by developers of notation software as yet.I guess when they do NWC will follow.The big advantage is that all you marks, dynamics, repeats etc. are included in the file transfer.I posted a request for info on NIFF in the forum last year and followed up a few of the replies.There is some info available at http://www.musitek.com/niff.html but if you want a full description of the proposed spec try http://www.jtauber.com I'm not sure of the extensions after that - could be /music/encoding/niff/spec (I'm sorry, the full URL is truncated on my printout).Anyhow try the site to for more info. Quote Selected
Re: Importing NIFF files Reply #4 – 1998-02-25 05:00 am niff is also supported by Lime, which still freezes and crashes on me (though the version you pay money for may be more stable). I heard (somewhere) that Niff will be supported soon by another manufacturer, but apart from that, no one else seems to be announcing any moves. So I wouldn't expect to see it in NWC for a while. A brief overview of niff revealed that NWC would be able to fully implement about 90% of the spec. 5% more could be kludged.The last 5% (eg hairpins) may come when they get implemented in nwc.A Quote Selected
Re: Importing NIFF files Reply #5 – 1998-02-25 05:00 am Midiscan converts tiff>mnod>midi, NIFF is not an issue. I know of no other music scanning software. Quote Selected
Re: Importing NIFF files Reply #6 – 1998-02-27 05:00 am Have a look at http://www.softpart.co.uk They market Midiscan,also a German notation program, Capella, and its linked scanprogram, Capella-scan, with which the scans can be edited theneither exported as MIDI files or imported directly into Capella.I have to admit that Capella is more advanced (at the moment anyway!)than NWC in its use of graphics and depth of musical notation, BUTof the Windows notation editors I've looked at, namely Capella, Mozartand NWC, only NWC came over for me as having a truly intuitive interface,with far and away the quickest and easiest method of note entry -surely the single most important factor in any notation program. Andit plays back much better than the other two! Quote Selected
Re: Importing NIFF files Reply #7 – 1998-03-23 05:00 am I have Midiscan and it's stability and accuracy is a bit dodgy. It seems a rather clumst product.I've looked at the demo version of Capella and the methodology seems much sounder than Midiscan. It's also a good bit cheaper. Quote Selected
Re: Importing NIFF files Reply #8 – 1998-03-26 05:00 am I purchased MidiScan, some time ago and after using for about 1-2 hours, I packaged it up and took it back--actually got my money back.After scanning music, looking at the scan was OKAfter MidiScan finished with it, it looked nothing like the scan: missing time sigs, bar lines placed randomly,just general garbage. The amount of editing required would have been excessive. Would be easier to compose or play in music. Sorry for this report, but this was my experence.Don Ruckman email ruckdr@jps.net Quote Selected
Re: Importing NIFF files Reply #9 – 1998-03-26 05:00 am I had heard similar, though I'd hoped things would improve as they refined it. I'm sure it depends on the complexity of the music and quality of the scan, but it is still not an easy task even with dot perfect scans.A Quote Selected
Re: Importing NIFF files Reply #10 – 1998-04-28 04:00 am I've just recently started using Pianoscan to scan and convertmusic to midi but find that when i import the midi into NWC themusic requires a lot of editing. I have had better luck whenconverting to NIFF and importing into lime but find that limeis very cumbersome to use, especially when adding finishing touchessuch as lyrics. NWC is so much easier to use for editing; Ihope that NIFF capability will be added to NWC. I have found that the quality of the original sheet music hasa big impact on the accuracy of the scan. Quote Selected
Re: Importing NIFF files Reply #11 – 1998-07-13 04:00 am I have just recently purchased Midiscan. The program is very easy to use and the implementation of the NIFF file format gives Midiscan an edge over so many apps. In fact, I was getting poor recognition until I actually broke down and called their tech support. WOW. Those guys are great, I actually talked to a person and he walked me through the whole process. Yes people, some tech guys do know their product. I love the fact that you get Lime with Midiscan for free, the current version 5.0, not some crappy shareware version. Quote Selected
Re: Importing NIFF files Reply #12 – 2000-03-19 05:00 am 2 years later...Noteworthy composer still isn't importing NIFF and I still like Noteworthy more for editing than Lime.I recently discovered Sharpeye, music OCR, I would love to use it in combinartion with Noteworthy.It works to export to Midi files and import the midi in Noteworthy, but I feel NIFF import capability would add a lot of value. Quote Selected
Re: Importing NIFF files Reply #13 – 2000-05-15 04:00 am I've used SharpEye and it was very accurate (i.e. after scanning and viewing it looked identical to the original) however after exporting it as MIDI and then importing it into NWC I had to put in quite a lot more work to get it back to the original... Support for NIFF in NWC would be very useful. Quote Selected
Re: Importing NIFF files Reply #14 – 2000-11-29 05:00 am I've been using Cakewalk Scorewriter for some time to produce finished work. I'm trying Smartscore (son of Midiscan, I think) but am getting a bit frustrated by the lack of a common format bewtween the two, other than midi which loses a lot of format including repeats. I wrote to Cakewalk a year ago suggesting incorporation of a scanner into the product. Some expression of interest, but I doubt whether it comes to much, and wrote again a few days ago suggesting incorporation of options to import from NIFF and ABC. No reply as yet. I would have thought that it was in the interests of vendors to support as many formats as possible, in order to boost software sales, as has happened with graphics and audio formats. Any information on conversion from NIFF to SCW would be welcome. Quote Selected
Re: Importing NIFF files Reply #15 – 2000-11-30 05:00 am Cakewalk no longer develop Score Writer.They "service" the product - which means they'll sell you a copy and may one day get around to answering your enquiry but don't expect any upgrades or enhancements. Quote Selected