Sound Design Contest Finished!

After around a week of working I managed to get this the way I liked it. I started out with a single poizone synth note, modulated the cutoff, and jumped into a two note chord. From there I used a different poizone synth and made a three note chord. I created the two note chord to fade out as the three note chord started and created an automation clip so that the three note chord would fade out appropriately. Enjoy!

Sound Design Contest

The next 6 seconds I am making may just be the hardest yet. I have begun the sound design contest for the "Image Line" Video logo. It requires me to make a 6 second track to go along nicely with the logo. I would say I'm about half way done at this point. I have my sounds picked out, ideas of how I want it to be laid out, and have already started implementing said ideas. I will finish this project before next week is over.

Fnished White Knuckles Remix!

It's finally finished and ready to be uploaded. After a few months of working on it, I have gotton it the way I like it. From the start, I knew I wanted it to have an electronic feel with a heavy bass to boot and also to use just the vocals and 1 specifc guitar riff from the song. After numerous false starts (forgetting to change the base, completely changing the intro, cuting up and ultimately piecing back the vocals, etc.) I finally got the song moving. I was inspired by a developing band (1 person using a similar progam to Fl Studio I believe) named Mirrored Theory and their (his?) song named I Dare You (). The idea for a bass alternating with a lead synth seemed like a great idea to me and I incorporated it into my remix as such. My lead "synth" actually ended up being a non-default Slayer running tandum with a Sytrus Electronic Guitar Synth. The final result turned out the be exactly what I was looking for. I also wanted to have a rising and falling synth to fill in any gaps. I settled on a Sytrus Techno sound (Dark Xpad). With it I coupled 2 automation clips on the x and y filters. Continuing to work, I added in numerous voulume automation clips to lower and raise the sound of specifc parts of the song at specific points. After all of the tinkering, I added a Compression using the Fruity Limiter in Edison. The final product ended up containing 4 different drum loops, 4 different guitar patterns, 1 seperate synth, 6 automation clips, 1 claps pattern, and of course... 1 Bass pattern. Enjoy the final product of much work.

White Knuckles Update!

This is fairly close to the finished version. Just some finishing touches and compression needs to be done before this song is finished. Enjoy! (The Song starts around the 27 second mark)

Ok Go Remix Update!

This is my Ok Go remix as of 10/14/10. The drums are close to being finished and Im working out the bugs with my bass. After both are done I will start laying down some guitar, a few more synths, add automation clips, and then finally, compress. I am also considering taking out my current intro as it doesnt match the rest of the song. Enjoy!

Ok Go Remix... so far

Its not much... but its what I have so far. The intro is essentially laid out as well as the bridge into the first verse. The intro begins with the end of the song. I still have to get my drum loop done and then on to vocals! (Everything after 30 seconds is just blank.)

Project 6: Sytrus Part 1

For this song we had to make our own sounds in Sytrus. One of them had to be a modified saw wave. The other had to be a sine wave. I managed to created a very light, fluffy sound with the sine wave and a fairly light sound with the saw wave. Thus the tone of my peice was born. I decided to use my sine wave for the lead. When I heard the sound, it made me think of long, streched out chords. From realzing this, I decided to write as such. To let the full body of the chords be heard, I wrote a simple, quieter bass with the saw wave. Also, since this was a lighter peice I didnt think serious drums would fit right. I settled on just a simple maraca style shake every other beat and a drum stick tap every other maraca shake. This song make me think of water, just dripping slowly. However, I hope to get back to a more electronic sound with the next song as I wasnt really sure where to go with this lighter melody.

Project 5: Riff Machine

For this project our goal was to use the riff machine. When I started I didnt know exactly what song to you. But when in doubt, I turned to the sytrus and used the Guitar Harmonics sound. It turned out to be a very light and fluffy sound. Not exactly what I was going for... but I found a riff to match it perfectly. Building on this riff I decided to go with a simple SimSynth for my lead bass. Continuing onwards, I used FPC for my drums and found an FPC loop that matched my riff nicely. With the song having a light and fluffy buildup, I then decided to drop it into a drum solo and have it come back with a turn on the rock side. I copied the lead bass into a slayer part, and finished it off with the slayer solo. Enjoy!

Project 4: Filters

With this project, I had a simple, electric feel in mind but with a very blatant lead. I also wanted it to be something original and have most of the sounds written by me. The only sound I was inspired by was a track from a video game for my lead guitar. I was tempted to begin with a simsynth. However, I wanted a new sound. I dug into the fruity sytrus and found the conquer sound. I used this sound and made a basic melody to create an underlying bass sound. Next I wanted to make a transition from my bass synth into my drums. It had to be something scale descending and quick at the end of a measure. I also wanted to be able to use it over and over again in the song. I considered having a drum transition, but after testing it, it just didnt seem to sound right. I ultimately settled on a simsynth for the transition. From there I moved on to my drums, for which I just used FPC and an appropriate ambiant loop. Next, I wanted a sound that would start to build up to my lead guitar. I turned to my good friend the simsynth once more. Now with my song continually building it was time for the lead. I chose to use a slayer. After writing my peice for the slayer I droped the song back into some of my other, previously used sounds. In the end I wanted this song to end with a bang. I decided to take the last 10 or so measures from my lead guitar and have them be the final, epic moments of my song. With the melody out of the way now I began working on the effects for the project. I put some filters on both my conquer and my transcending simsynth sound to give them a nice effect of evolving. I also put a sound filter on my lead guitar sound for some notes I wanted accented. For some reason the piano roll, note velocity changer doesnt have an effect on a slayer channel. Next, I put a resonance fruity filter on my descending simsynth. I decided to use this to have every transition alternate between louder and softer. Finally, I put an x y controller on my lead guitar to give it the nice effects of getting louder and softer at my disposal. Enjoy the song!

Project 3: Automation Clips

I started this project with an electric feel in mind. From there I created an upbeat FPC drumbeat with aptly placed kicks. Next, I began looking for my main melody. Knowing the SimSynth had a good electric sound to it I decided to use it. I found a single note I liked and chopped it. I went through many of the chop patterns, taking most of a period, until I found the one I liked. It reminded me greatly of the chorus from Somebody's Watching Me by Mysto & Pizzi (also known as the Geico song). Following patterns from my earlier projects, I used bumped up the main melody on the scale after a few measures to keep things from getting boring. Next, I began working on my drum break which was just another simple FPC and a custom beat made in the step sequencer. Finally, I had to get my bass down. I started with a jazzy style bass (BooBass) which didn't seem to fit the electronic sound I was looking for. After much much tinkering I decided to completely rip it out. The proceding period I found a better sound to use for my bass (PoiZone 2). I wrote a simple chord for it in the Piano Roll to go behind my main melody. For the bass solo I wrote a basic 3 note alternation pattern. As for my automation clips I used a few different ones on my main Simsynth melody (such as the bass of the sound) to give it the feel of evovlving and chaging as it went on. I also used a few main volume melodys. The first one I used gave the song the fade in at the begginging. The second one I used gave the drum break a nice pop at the end. The final one I use gave the song the nice accent at the end I was hoping for. I am very happy with my work in this song and feel as though it is my best work so far.

Project 2

For this project we needed to accomplish three tasks. Transposing, Using FPC, and using the chop function. Once I had found out that we need to do transposing in this peice I was instantly inspired by a song. In Take a Bow by Muse, one of the solo chords in the beggining of the song gave me the perfect idea of what to do for my lead guitar but just a litte faster. As for the FPC, I played around with it for a little while untill I got a drum beat similar to the one in Beat It by Micheal Jackson. Finally, for the bass I wanted something simple like something from an old 8-bit video game. Smashing these inspirations lead me to my final composition embedded above. Enjoy!

Drum Loops Project 1

I made this song because I was inspired by some of the drum beats I heard earlier in the year, at the football games. One night in particular I was walking back to the band room with some friends and I happened to be right near the percussionists. Their beats were so awesome I couldnt get them out of my head. I knew this was my chance to incorperate what I had heard, with alittle remix of my own.

Test

This is a test.