My Own Biggest Fan

Bear with me, I am really chuffed with this phone. However I am not chuffed with the fact that I have to pay $2 for a new ringtone. With a little investigating I found how to make just the right ring that tells everybody within hearing distance of me and my phone what kind of person I am, without spending a dime.

What you need:
A cellphone that plays polyphonic ringtones.
A way to get files onto your phone.
Quicktime Pro.
This Tutorial assumes you are using a Mac. Doing this on a PC would be similar to what I explain below, I would think.

First off you need to find out how to get files on and off your phone. I am using PhoneAgent. True, it costs $30 and I had said we wouldn’t spend a dime, but I am still in my shareware term and I haven’t paid for it – yet. (I do need it to get my pictures off the phone) If PhoneAgent isn’t compatible with your phone, don’t come crying to me. Google is your friend.

Then we need to search for the tune that says “Mason”. We Built This City by Starship will do nicely. For our purposes, we need a midi file of it, these can be tricky to find. Sure, they are always around when you don’t want them. Like when you are looking for nude pictures of Sarah Michelle Geller at 3 A.M. and suddenly the theme to Buffy comes blasting out of speakers because some nutcase wants to make their “Shrine of SMG” a multimedia experience. Very 1994.

I have found a couple of repositories of .mid files for you to use, so you don’t have to go searching for hours like I did. I wanted Trash by Suede – no luck. I guess I will take what I can get.

Midi Database
Midi-MP3.org

Ok, so we can’t just dump a .mid file onto your phone, those things take-up precious Kb! We need to trim off the section that captures the essence of the song that captures the essence of you.

Open your .mid file in QuicktimePro and stretch the window so it is really long and skinny. Like so: (click to enlarge)

Notice how I have highlighted part of the song? That is my ring. Or, it will be soon. On your file, highlight roughly what you want to be your ring. Then hold down the Command Key and press in succession, C, N, V. This will – in one easy step, copy that bit, open a new window, and paste that bit into a new window.

Now you probably have straggling notes on the beginning and end of your ring. Do what you did with the whole song earlier. (stretch out the window, select the bit you want, etc…) Cutting off the rest of the song gave you a much higher resolution to work with, and makes it easier to get the bit you really want. It is a good idea to just listen to the loop alone, so type [Cmd]+T to do so.

Repeat the [Cmd]+C,N,V combo.

You are ready to export it. Click FILE > EXPORT…

Make sure your window looks like this:

Use your phone manager to upload your new fandangled ringtone to your phone.

Now you can be indiscriminate with the songs you upload to your phone, and not worry about getting a huge bill from not only the ringtone supplier, but for air time as well.

Listen to my “Built This City” ringtone.