I took this opportunity to create a page dedicated to clearly showcasing some of the specific things we chatted about, or Dezzi asked me about. If you would like to see more examples, just let me know!
Three things I wanted to present:
- Music Direction – to elaborate more on the process of bringing WGS music in-house
- Field Recording – small arms with 343
- Sizzle – Some good stuff I’ve done that aint up on the site yet (I think Dezzi said something about showcasing some ‘killer’ work)
MUSIC DIRECTION:
Supervising this music was so fun and it happened incredibly quickly and fluidly. Once we cut bait with our not-so-good composer, it was our moment to try to keep music in-house.
One of my initial ideas was to use two hooks–one rhythmically and one melodically, and hit them with it right off the bat (like old school arcade games).
So the initial transient is a fanfare blast of horns and percussion with the rhythmic hook. I referenced my alma mater’s ‘war hymn’ as an example for the rhythm.
Link – note five second section between 0:17 – 0:20
After only a couple of bars we go straight to the melody. One guy (Egan) brought in a number of prototypes and we keyed in on this one. He later pointed out its resemblance to the Army recruiting theme song, 🙂 Link
I developed a narrative to guide the composition. It is the story of two warring factions, which mirrors each of the two composers in this mixed media piece. In the opening, Kevin’s classical orchestration establishes the historical combat drama, but early on (27 seconds in), there is a confrontation from the other musical entity as Egan’s aggressive, noise-infested modern elements launch an opening salvo. This new voice represents advancements of technology. It has a corrupting effect on Kevin’s music, making it more caustic and brutal, and by the end of the song the industrialized music has almost completely supplanted the early twentieth century orchestration. The direct analogy: how warfare is getting more and more lethal as technology progresses.
*Good to know* The timeline spans of our game was from late WWI to plausible near future.
Below is the demo version we had ready in two weeks.
FIELD RECORDING:
The art of field recording is something I have dedicated a vast amount of energy toward, and I love to do it. Most recently, I participated in a sizable gun recording shoot with the 343i team here on my property in Carnation, where I own five acres of quiet rolling hills. My buddy Jason brought his arsenal (and some tannerite) for the job. Here are some videos I made to showcase these. *I’m aware of the terrible quality of audio in these videos–they’re from my co-workers’ iPhones, apologies.
SOME NOTABLE RECORDING SESSIONS:
- Recorded the Washington National Guard firing live rounds from an M1A1. It was awesome.
- I performed and recorded all the foley for Talion in Shadow of Mordor.
- I participated in a massive vehicle recording session at Reimers Ranch in Austin TX. We recorded 30+ vehicles rotating stations for Dynapac dyno, On-Road, and foley sessions.
SIZZLE:
To start, I’ll show off some of my raw recordings from a tank I recorded. Hear below:
Here’s some bootleg footage of our game at WGS. I did the mix, a lot of the sfx, project structure, tech supervision, and pipeline.
IMHO, I think great ambience is underappreciated. Ambience goes a long way in not just grounding the player in the “reality” of the game, but messaging the mood and emotional intent. *Hit the HD button, please. Playback is in 6 channel.
Stephen Brown 