Making a UST from a MIDI

To open a MIDI file into the UTAU program, go to “File>Import” and select your MIDI file.
Pick the “3x0sc” Track, as that’s the one you worked on.

When you import it, it’ll probably look something like this:


Not to worry! This always happens.
Scroll to the beginning of the UST, right click on the top of the UST, over by the blue “500000.00” and click “Remove Tempo Marker”. Then go up to the “Tempo” Bar and insert the correct number, the tempo you used when making the MIDI.

(Note: I’m using a different MIDI than the one shown in the MIDI tutorial).

Now it’s usable!

UTAU has this quirk where it’ll place vibrato on every note at first. (I believe this has something to do with setting custom vibrato settings, and then UTAU deciding it’s the default for everything, Your version of UTAU may or may not do this.) Regardless, it’s good to also set the portamento (“Red tuning lines”) For sake of playback.

To do this, Select the entire UST (CTRL+A) and then right click and go to “Pitch”. Uncheck then re-check the portamento box, and un-tick the Vibrato box, then hit OK.

Now your UST is ready to have lyrics inserted into it!

Inserting Lyrics

Finding lyrics isn’t usually too difficult. Often they’ll be included in with the Off vocal download of the song itself, Romaji available on youtube or on translation blogs. Niconico douga also has “NicoKara”, where it subtitles songs with hiragana/furigana versions of the lyrics, played across the screen.

When inserting the lyrics, you type them into the lyric bar, and then hit the button next to it to insert those lyrics.

 

You can do this both with Hiragana (Recommended), or you can also insert lyrics with Romaji, though you have to space out the romaji sounds or they’ll end up as a long string on the first note. Continue this way until the entire UST is complete. If you get stuck, render and export the wav, and play it against the original to see what went wrong.

You may have to edit the MIDI file you made in the UTAU program, adding or removing notes to match the lyrics. As you practice and improve at MIDI making, the lyric insertion process will get easier and easier.

Once that's done, the Main UST is finished!