Question Relating to Soundfonts

[+ HalestormXV 34]

Okay I am not a musician, but one of my teammates makes amazing original work. Now we are trying to understand somthing. We came across a site that seems to be fairly popular in the music community called WilliamKage.com. On this site he offers these things called "soundfonts" to download. Now once again I am not the composer, nor am I musically talented but my partner is phenomenal with this stuf. So I am curious. Could you download these "soundfonts" and use them commercially since he makes up his own compositions and music but is just using this soundfont.

 

The way I look at it from my perspective is that it is like a word document. You can copywrite a document becasue it is all of your work, your story your text etc. But you are just using the "Times New Roman" font. Pardon my poor view on it but as I said I am no musician so is this the same thing? He is creating his own document, it is his composition, is work, his arrangment etc, but just using a different "soundfont".

[Jonnie91 1,149]

It depends on the terms of the soundfonts, sometimes you can sometimes you cannot it depends on what "samples" were used. To be honest with you I wouldn't risk it, as they look like they are from commercial games, which would mean a big no-no. They tell you to contact an attorney. So that's what you should do to make sure. Personally I wouldn't risk it. 

 

There are various programs and software that have similar samples, for example for chiptune sounds you can use plogue chipsounds. If you're not one for spending much money then you can use this. There are various other alternatives. But the ones I listed above are ones I use. 

[+ randomstranger 60]

I see your point, but in the case of a Word document you got the right to use Times New Roman when you bought Windows/MS Office/whatever. There are tons of other typefaces out there that you don't have any rights to. Similarly, you can't just use a soundfont commercially without making sure that you have the right to do so (well you can, but it's not the smartest move). You'll have to contact the owner to find out.

[+ HalestormXV 34]

Alright points well taken. Yes, being that this is a commercial project I wouldn't want to risk anything. I have already received all my commercial licenses so it would be a big crapshoot if I went through getting my commercial licenses for EVERYTHING in the game and then because I thought some music would fall under fair use it all comes for nothing. Its always better to be safe instead of sorry.

[phraktol 23]

I Highly doubt that they are in any way trademarked or copyrighted. however as mentioned above, it's always better to be safe than sorry. An easy remedy would be to email the owner of the website and ask if you can use the soundfonts in a commercial project, or even offer a monetary bonus to let you use said soundfonts (Offer him 20 bucks, you never know lol)

 

Other than that, there's a lot of free soundfonts you can find online, and i'm sure there's plenty of stuff you could buy for a reasonable price. Then there's always VSTs as an alternative.