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Contract Composing for Digital Games: How it REALLY goes down...
An in-depth look at the process of composing music for various digital game projects, including "Brothers In Arms: Hell's Highway" (2008, Ubisoft/Gearbox), a AAA game featuring a full live orchestral score recorded in Prague. 90min presentation, with 30min for discussion.
Multiple award-winning composer Duncan Watt is the founder and creative director of Fastestmanintheworld Music and has been been writing, recording and producing music for TV, film, digital gaming and national performing artists since 1993. Current projects include co-composing and orchestrating the original score to the upcoming multi-platform AAA title Brothers In Arms: Hell’s Highway (multiple platforms, Ubisoft/Gearbox), and Watt’s work was chosen for trailers for Brothers In Arms: DS (DS, Ubisoft). Recently, Watt composed and recorded the striking, evocative original orchestral score for Stargate Online TCG (PC, Sony Online) and the swashbuckling original orchestral score for Pirates CSG Online (PC, Sony Online) as well.
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We were thrilled to have Filippo Beck Peccoz and the Video Game Music Club hosting game composer Duncan Watt for our final forum of 2008. We've had a great roster of presenters and topics, and we want to thank everyone who has attended our forums. Duncan spoke on the topic of "Contract Composing for Digital Games: How it really Goes Down", and he shared a wealth of information on how to get into and work in the industry of video game music. He couldn't stress enough to sharpen your networking and business skills as these are just as important as your recording/mixing/mastering and implementation skills. Going to the Game Developers Conference and checking out indiegamer.com are imperatives! Check out Duncan's website at fastestmanintheworld.com.
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Learning Center staff Sohta Tsuchiya, Blair Pershyn and Chris Fitzgerald demonstrated tips, strategies and tools for mixing music. First considering mixing tools available, Blair and Chris explained mixing concepts, gear, and plug-ins such as compression, reverb and EQ. Next they brought up the importance of critical listening, played different songs from different genres, and opened the floor to discussion. Lastly, Sohta walked through every step he took to mix the music they had recorded in the Guerilla Recording Techniques forum.
In this forum we will mix what we recorded last week in the Guerilla Recording Techniques forum. Stop by for insight into how to approach mixing, and tools available such as compression, EQ, reverb and more.
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Thanks to Ben "Encanti" Cantil, DJ Baz, DJ Vinyl Blight and NoraJean for practical tips on real-world uses for Ableton Live, laptops and MIDI controllers. All 4 are established DJs, electronic musicians and Live afficiandos and each gave insight into their approach into the program. We look forward to ongoing events with Ben who hosts the Boston chapter of the Ableton Live user's group!
Don't forget, Ableton Live is the prize for this year's Sound Collage Contest.
The contest is days away from wrapping up, so get your submissions in by Friday at 6pm! Click here to participate.
Missed the forum when Ableton Product Specialist Huston Singletary was here? Want to get an in-depth look at the prize you are competing in the Sound Collage Contest for? Don't miss this forum!
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Guest presenter Andrea Pejrolo went into great detail discussing the functions of the EXS24 software instrument, the sampler that ships with Logic Express and is available to all Berklee students as part of their laptop software package. Andrea demonstrated sample mapping, waveform editing, sample looping, filtering and modulation assignments. After exhausting the features of the EXS24, the presentation turned to the Ultrabeat instrument. Like the EXS24, the Ultrabeat drum machine is included with Logic Express and is available to all Berklee students. It is possible to utilize synthesized drum sounds or sampled sounds and the Ultrabeat comes with an impressive quantity of samples, as well as extensive filtering, distorting, modulation and side chaining capabilities. Many thanks to Andrea and all who braved a cold, rainy November night to attend the forum.
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In this forum, presented by Learning Center staff Blair Pershyn and Chris Fitzgerald, we covered what reverb is, different parameters of a reverberant space such as room size, early and late reflections and reverb decay time. We then discussed how these factors are achieved in audio recording, from specially constructed echo chambers and plate and spring reverbs, to digital and software based synthetic reverbs. Convolution reverb is the process of multiplying samples from an incoming audio signal with the samples of an impulse response, which is an audio recording from a specific space that captures its reverberant characteristics. We looked in depth at two specific convolution reverb plug-ins, Logic Pro's Space Designer and Digital Performer 6's Pro Verb.
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This semesterly forum will address the many considerations to take when choosing equipment, deciding upon techniques and getting set up to record digitally. The presentation is specially addressed towards anyone who has beginning to intermediate recording skills.
GEAR
- microphones
- audio interfaces
- cables & accessories
TECHNIQUES
- stereo recording
- direct input of electric insturments
- miking techniques
- creating a rough mix
HOW-TO
- setup your gear and computer
- record with your laptop
For our popular Guerilla Recording Techniques forum we covered all types of microphones, audio interfaces, cable connections and miking techniques. Armed with this knowledge, we demonstrated recording drums, bass, guitar, saxophone and vocals mixed with a MIDI organ recording. Don't forget to check out part 2 of this series on Tuesday 11/18 when we demonstrate mixing techniques using these audio tracks we recorded.
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In two hours, Huston Singletary went through just about every nook and cranny in Ableton Live. An extremely easy to use and streamlined program, Live is a premiere tool for DJ's and audio editing enthusiasts. We are very excited to announce that Live Suite, Live, and Live LE are the 3 prizes for this year's Sound Collage Contest. Missed Huston's presentation? Catch Berklee alum Ben Cantil presenting our 2nd Live forum of the semester on Monday 11/17!
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Video Game Music Series 3 of 3: Video games garner bigger budgets and higher quality scores than ever before. Come hear the Video Game Music Club introduce techniques and concepts for implementing music into the game engine.
This forum covers topics such as:
- Introduction to implementation: what is it? What does it do? Why do we need implementation? What is middleware software?
- Presentation of various in game situations which require adaptive audio (footage from actual games)
- Brief overview of audio "middleware" solutions (wwise, fmod, etc.)
- focus on Audiokinetic's Wwise engine:
- bringing audio into the program
- linking events to audio and music
- trying out the results
Special thanks again to the Filippo Beck Peccoz and the Video Game Music Club for our ongoing forum collaborations. In this third video game music forum, Filippo demonstrated Wwise, a well known game audio integration tool.
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Video Game Music Series 2 of 3: Jeanine Cowen, experienced sound designer for games, and Assistant Vice President for Curriculum at Berklee, will share approaches and ideas for composing game music.
For part 2 of 3 in our fall 2008 video game music forum series, Jeanine Cowen presented an insightful look into approaches for composing game music. She integrated different pieces into a game system to test how effective they were, exposing which music was weak, and which was appropriate.
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Video Game Music Series 1 of 3: Video Game Music Club members explore the history and expansion of video game music. Check out their website at www.vgmcberklee.org.
In this part 1 of 3 forum series, Berklee students Filippo Beck Peccoz and Mike Hazani presented an in-depth look at how video game music has evolved over the last three decades.
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Special thanks to the Electronica Club at Berklee, and Emir Cerman and Jonathan Williams for the very cool Reason demo. They covered all sorts of techniques like routing individual Redrum channels to separate EQ devices, and then importing them into a Combinator to eaily create a complex patch. Using a Matrix to sequence bass patterns and then layering multiple Subtractors to fatten up a synth bass line. Complex routing of LFOs and envelopes, splitting and merging control voltage signals, automating device parameters and tempo, side chaining compression and much more. If you missed the forum, we plan on having them back, but be sure to go to an Electronica Club meeting. Also, you can download sample files that they used for the forum here.
During the forum Jonathan mentioned www.vengeance-sound.de as a resource for samples to download and use with your music.
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The Learning Center was very excited to book Dave Roberts in order to present the new features in Digital Performer 6. It seems the update will be available for Berklee students in the Spring 2009 semester. Students can look forward to a newer more streamlined look that is similar to the standard apple type user interface. In addition, DP6 ships with a new emulation of the coveted vintage LA-2A leveler as well as a convolution reverb, the best, most realistic sounding type of reverb, based upon reverb impulse response samples. Dave then discussed all of the current DP features that are available such as beat matching, audio quantization and pitch correction. Keep an eye out for the DP6 release to students, and we will invite Dave back again.
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Prince Charles Alexander shared his passion and knowledge of the music industry he has garnered over the past 30+ years. Insightful and practical, he covered approaching different types of production, and choices to make while navagating a career in the music industry, always landing back at the point to do your homework. He stressed listening to all types of music, understanding the current music market and what makes a successful recording, knowing and using the tools available with music technology.
Prince Charles Alexander has been active in the music business since the early 80's, receiving many professional accolades during that time. A short bio can be found HERE.
- B.A., Brandeis University
- Independent record producer/engineer
- Client list includes Mary J. Blige, Destiny’s Child, P. Diddy, Alicia Keys, the Notorious B.I.G., and Luther Vandross
- Received three Grammy Awards and seven Grammy nominations
- More than 40 platinum and gold certifications from the RIAA
- Winner of a Victoire de la Musique (French Grammy equivalent)
- Member of the NARAS Grammy Committee Board of Governors
- Member of the Recording Academy Producers and Engineers Wing
- Member of the Audio Engineering Society
- Member of American Federation of Musicians Local 802
- Former Virgin Records recording artist
- Instruments include wind synthesizers, flute, saxophone, and keyboards
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