Videoguide on Timing:

BPM and measure as an abstract idea to orientate within music:

example: we will rock you

understanding silence as a sound, comparing the pattern with and without sound

identifying the recurring pattern

giving numbers for simplicity

Identify the big white tick as start of the pattern

differentiating between 3/4, 4/4 and other measures

talking about staying in-time

giving examples how it sounds like shit if I don't keep the speed

speaking about computermusic, studiomusic and livemusic

speaking about the T-method: first idea of what the bpm could be, offset almost always wrong, comparing security in hitting on time:
videocomparison of hiterror-bars

tutorial:
look for the first steady beat

reduce the tempo and try to find the perfect offset by placing a timing section via ctrl+p(delete the initial one via the timing panel)
once you found it, listen to the metronome to see whether it starts to hit late or early and raise or lower the bpm accordingly:
using round numbers due to the background of computer/studio-music

metronome aligning with the music -> allows a structured approach

Missing: What is beats per minute, explanation of red ticks and blue ticks, possibly 1/3, 1/6
Trusting instruments over singers, Offset-Resets

Hello and welcome to the first part of my mapping tutorial.
Today I want to go over some very basic music theory along with timing as this is the first step you have to take when mapping and I see many people struggling with it.
If I'm doing everything right and you're paying attention you'll hopefully learn from this video what a measure is, what the different colors of ticks in the editor mean, which kind of songs are suited for mapping, why timing works and how you can time songs by yourself.
We will start with an example you hopefully know. By Queen, We will rock you:
4x We will rock you pattern: low low high silence
So this is a very known pattern and it consists of 3 different sounds:
A low sound, a high sound and silence.
And understanding silence as an active part of the music is important to understand the structure of the song as it sounds entirely different if I skip that silence:
counterexample: low low high low low high low low high low low high
Now as you can hear this is a reoccuring pattern, I could play this for hours and the basic pattern is just this:
(slow and speaking while playing) low low high silence
The time between each of these sounds is the same and if we want to measure the pattern we give each of these sounds a number and call them BEATS. Instead of saying low low high silence we count
ONE TWO THREE FOUR and fast ONETWOTHREEFOUR
And this is the basic concept of a measure:
4 BEATS of equal length setting the underlying structure of the song being called four-four-time. Four because of four notes and the second four is based on a convention related to writing down notes but it doesn't matter for osu as you just have to count how many BEATS the reoccuring pattern has.
In the editor these are represented as white ticks and to give you an orientation where the structure starts and where it ends the white tick representing the ONE is bigger than the other ones and also referred to as the so called DOWNBEAT.
And this is kept even when Freddy Mercury suddenly starts to sing over this in a completely different rhythmic pattern:
Buddy you're a boy make a big noise
Playin' in the street gonna be a big man some day
You got mud on yo' face
You big disgrace
Kickin' your can all over the place
Singin'

We will we will rock you
We will we will rock you

A repeating underlying structure can also contain a different amount of notes, for example if playing a waltz the underlying structure might be
high low low high low low
which one would refer to as three-four-time as the reoccuring pattern is 3 beats long.
Measures different from three-four-time and four-four-time are relatively rare, the only other possible measures for osu! are five-four-, six-four- and seven-four-time.
You might see different measures in musicsheets like two-two- or six-eight-time but these can be written relative to four too: two-two can also be counted as four-four and six-eight as three-four.

The next thing I want to talk about is something I already took granted when talking about measure and that is the steadyness of the rhythm.
If I randomly change the speed at which I play my basic pattern it sounds terrible and for most music you can assume that the time between each beat is always the same which brings me to the next topic:
Kinds of music that are suited or unsuited for timing.
There are generally three kinds of music relevant for timing:
Music like vocaloids, techno, 8-bit and similar stuff is generated by a computer and therefore is perfect in timing. This kind of music is completely steady in timing and if it ever changes you can assume it as 100% planned. Due to the nature of this music you can assume round bpm-values for every timing-section of such songs even if there may be rare exceptions. I call this computermusic.
Next is music recorded by professional musicians in a studio. These usually use metronomes for orientation and end up holding a constant bpm with possibly planned bpm-changes that aren't random either. While this kind of music is less perfect in time compared to computermusic it is still very consistent and doesn't require more than one or very few timing section in the majority of cases. I call this studiomusic.
The last thing is livemusic and by nature this usually involves inconsistencies in timing. While the musicians will hold to an average speed very well, some sounds will noticeably deviate from this average speed making this very unpleasant to time. This doesn't mean that these songs are unmappable but you should be aware that timing such a song takes a lot of time which may or may not be worth it and also involves some special treatment for longer sliders later on.

Now let's get into the actual timing process.

When opening up the editor it will tell you to use T to tap to the beat while the song is playing and I want to show you why this won't give you the correct timing in the majority of cases.
The first thing is that people - and especially newer players - are inconsistent upon tapping to the beat. I will play a short example of the hiterrorbars here from myself playing the same song at different skilllevels or mostly accuracylevels.
As you can see I was very inconsistent previously and even though I got a lot better I'm still not a metronome.
However the "Tap to the beat"-method is still very effective to get a good idea of what the bpm could be even if it won't be on point. Based on my experience the final bpm is almost always within +-5bpm of the bpm you got by tapping.
To increase the accuracy of the bpm, tap during the section of the song you are most familiar with.

The first thing to do after using the "Tap to the beat"-method is finding the correct offset.
To do that you have to identify where the first steady beat is. Once you found that lower the replayspeed to 50 or even 25% in the bottom right.
Now scroll as close to the first beat as possible, look at the bottom left to identify the point of time you are at, open up the Timing Panel via pressing F6 and edit the Offset to the point of time your cursor is at. Listen whether it is early or late compared to the beat and adjust the offset accordingly, listen over it again et cetera until the metronome tick and the beat play at the exact same time.

Next step is adjusting the bpm.
Usually you can hear whether the bpm is wrong or not within the first 10s after the timing section. If the metronome is late, increase the bpm, if the metronome is early, decrease the bpm, listen over it again, rinse and repeat until the bpm is perfect. Due to the assumptions made earlier you should try round numbers first but don't be shy to try decimals if round numbers don't fit.


Once you got the offset, the bpm and the measure right you're set up for a structured approach at the beatmap.

Now a short summary:
A measure is an artificial structure used to have an easier time orientating within a song. Most of the time it is determined by the drum and it consists of a set number of beats that depends on the song, commonly 4 or 3. A Beat can be represented by silence. Beats are represented in the editor by white ticks on the top timeline and first beat of a measure is bigger than the other ones and also called the DOWNBEAT.
BPM stands for BEATS PER MINUTE and is a measure for the speed of the song. It is constant for most songs that are recorded under technical surveillance and for most songs in osu!.
The Offset marks the starting point of the first steady beat also called STANZA.
Correct Offset and BPM combined will make all your notes play at the perfect time.