Tag: music

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How to make video games like movies!

It was a long time that I did not write any thing in this blog. Now, I decided to write a topic about “video games” (as I wrote in my Persian blog). I was member of a game development team for about three months and I learned a lot. At least, I know the way they were doing the job was “How to not make a video game”. So, When I left the team, I decided to research about game development process. In this topic, I explain everything I found (experience and research result!)

When I was in the team…

It was in October (2017), a person sent me a message in Telegram, and the message was like this :

Mr. Haghiri, we need a musical composer for our game, we did a search and we found you. Please come here Wednesday 4:00 PM to talk about the project and your role.

Wednesday, I went to their office. That guy greeted me so nicely and started talking to me, about their project. I found the game is a horror game (horror games are popular in Iran, but there’s no “good” horror game “made in Iran”.) and it made me happy! Because it was the first time I heard about an indie team decided to make such a great game. They let me two weeks to research about “Sound and Music” in Unity Engine and I did it. I composed two pieces and also I tried to learn some tools for mixing and mastering sounds in the game (But it wasn’t actually my role, I just did that as a sample!).

After two and half months, they said “Mr. Haghiri, you don’t do what we wanted you to do”, anyway, they haven’t paid me even a “rial” in those days and expected me do great music composition, and they also wanted me to do what wasn’t my actual role. And this was not a good experience actually. But in those two months, I learned Unity game engine and I also met other “game developers”.  And, I decided to publish my experience on my blog.

Why movies?

Recently, I read a book called Making Short Films : Complete Guide from Script to Screen, by Clifford Thurlow. In the book, I found great names like “Salvador Dali” or “Charlie Chaplin”, and also great movies and books also mentioned in the book, like “One Flew Over Cuckoo’s Nest”. Everything was perfect, In I think about process of making a video game! It’s so similar to process of making a movie!

But I realize game and movie have lots of differences. The biggest difference is that games are interactive and players interact with the environment or other characters, but movies are not. Anyway, the main procedure – I mean “writing” – is %90 the same! So, I decided to mention some movies I watched, then tell you how I make a video game like them!

Great movies gave me ideas!

An Andalusian Dog

Movie is written by Louis Bunuel and Salvador Dali. I think these names are enough. But, after I watched the movie (it’s now available on YouTube and other video-sharing platforms, you can easily find and watch it), I discovered “product of a melancholic and depressed mind”. And both “Melancholia” and “Depression” are good subjects for a story or game.

Phantom of The Opera (Musical)

The book is about a musician, in a better word, a “genius” and smart person who hided himself. Andrew Lloyd Webber, just made that sad and creepy story to a romantic story by his music! First time I watched the movie, I could not understand it well. Because it’s not following the book’s story, and I’m not a native English speaker! I watched that movie 4 times. I watched the live performance 2 or 3 times and finally, I got the concept.

It has “Misanthropy” and “Romance” at once. I think these two things are also good for people who want to make video games (Please go and check “INSIDE” by Playdead! It’s the Misanthropy! Pure Misanthropy!)

School of Rock

It’s a bit different, School of Rock is comedy, and it’s also attractive for children. Because the topic is about a guy who teaches a bunch of 4th grade children to ROCK! Yes, he teaches them how to play electric guitars, bass, drums and keys. I think the concept of “Music” can be a good idea, too! Specially if you plan for a game like “Guitar Hero”.

Only Lovers Left Alive

If you like Vampires, please watch this movie. This movie has no “teenager” content, but it still tells stories about two vampires who married for centuries. Movie is directed by Jim Jarmusch and he also made music for his movie, in his rock trio SQRL. This movie has two things for game developers. It’s and independent movie and it can be a good idea bank for indie developers and also, it has “Romance” and “Fear” and “History”. All of these three factors can make a game great!

Ok, I talked a lot about movies! Let’s find “how can I make a game like a movie?”

Finally, let’s make a game like a movie!

The most basic thing you must have for a movie is “plot”. Plot is the main idea, it’s developed and tells people your concept, but it’s not a completed “script”. Writing plot in both games and movies is the same. To write a good plot, you need to study and read books, scripts and other plots. I prefer printed (and Persian) books in this case.

You will need research on the topic you want to write a plot about. For example, if you want to write about a middle eastern civilization (for example : Sassanid Empire or Ottoman Empire), you have to read history of Iran, Turkey, Afghanistan, Iraq, etc. If you want to write a plot about Satan, you have to search about Satan’s role in Judaism, Christianity and Islam, and find which belief is closer to what you want. So, you need to have a background.

After you wrote the plot, you have to write the script. But, writing script is different here, you have to clarify where and when the scene is interactive and when and where is not. The best example, is “Bioshock Infinite”. You know why? Because when you’re not interacting with the environment, you still can move camera and see what happens around you. I’m not a good script writer (But I try to be!) and I will write a post about how to write script from plot, when I manage to do that.

After you wrote the script, you have to make your basic ideas in the engine. Please! Please! Please! Call an experienced game developer before doing that, because the experienced one can help you find experienced character/concept and environment artist and game-play designer. After that, I can say you’re ready to start making your game! With a good team, you can make a good game!

Finally, I wrote this article but it wouldn’t be the last article about games in my English blog. I try to continue this, because I even couldn’t find good articles about being “game script writer” or “game director” even in English! I hope you like my post 🙂

 

 

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Composing using relative scales!

In this topic, I’m going to show you how to compose a minimal music piece using “relative” scales. But first, let’s talk about music theory. A relative scale, is simply “a scale with the same note as main scale”, there are two kinds of relatives, relative minor and relative major. So, if we consider this as D minor :

D – E – F – G – A – A# – C – D

We need another scale with the same notes. Let’s start from 3rd note of our main scale :

F – G – A – A# – C – D – E – F

This is “F Major” scale, and it’s “relative major” of our D minor scale. As you can see, if you start from 3rd note of a minor scale, you will have its relative major, and if you start from 6th note of a major scale, you’ll have its “relative minor”.

Now, let’s make some piece! In this topic, I use Ableton Live 9 as my DAW, and DSK Overture and ZynAddSubFX as my plugins. Let’s make music!

First, I play an orchestral piece in D minor using DSK overture, with “Strings section”, “Flute”, “Violin” and “Cello”. It will be D-F-A-F-D-A-E.

Sounds good, but It needs some decorations! We can do that using F major! in F major section, I want to use ZynAddSubFX. And my notes will be F – A- C – A – F – C – G.  So, this is our relative major :

Now, we can mix them! This is the orchestral piece with its electronic relative major :

And, I repeat this piece for 4 or 5 times, then make a song (with some audio engineering ), here is our final song :

I hope you enjoy this topic and song! Remember that this “relative” technique is useful when you want to use Ostinatos, specially on piano, you can play the ostinato on right hand and its relative on left hand.

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Ambient Music, Using usual instruments

In previous article about music,  I just explained what ambient music is, and we learned that this genre, is famous because its minimal, relaxing and unusual form.  But, in this article, I’m going to explain how we can use a usual instrument and classical music technique, to make this kind of music.

Before we start, I’m going to explain one important thing, ambient is a minimalistic genre of music, so we have to keep it as simple as we can. minimalism means we have to use only maximum three chords, and repeat shapes and melodies for a while. Minimalism is the most important characteristic of ambient music!

Now, let’s discuss about our goal : making unusual music with a usual instrument. I choose piano in this case, because I have a lot of good piano sounds in my laptop, I personally play guitar, but I have no good guitar sound (VST or soundfont or … ). I chose piano, you know, piano is used to be one of the most known instrument in classical music. Also, people used this instrument to play Jazz, Rock, Symphonic Metal, etc. You only need to install “Piano tiles” game and play it, to realize how people used piano in different genres and styles! So, when people used piano even in rap music, we also can use it in our modern and minimalistic style!

Let’s talk about technique, in this case, I want to use Ostinato , which means playing a melodic shape repeatedly for a while. And if you have read this article carefully, you will realize that ambient (and any other minimalistic style of music) has this characteristic. And again, we can find that every musical genre, even these modern, minimal and unusual ones, have roots in the classical music.

As an example, I’m going to write a simple song. First, we need to decide about progression. I want to use 1-3-5 in key of D minor, which means I need these chords :
Dm – F – Am
So, we need to play these chords, each bar (or measure, I really don’t know what it’s called in different parts of the world :D) , includes one chord. This can be our sample :

So, We just played chords, it makes no sense at all. If you play piano (or any other classical instrument) you know when we want to play a piece, we need to decorate our main line. So, I add some decorations to my piece, which will be my ositnato :

And for now, I just play this piece for 5 times, then I do some sound engineering (adding effects, etc) and what you will hear is :

Yes, this is a simple ambient song! A simple ostinato, with reverb and pitch shifting, fades in and then fades out. I used LMMS for writing song, and playing it on a piano, and I also used Audacity for sound engineering.

I try to write more about ambient music in my blog, because I know it’s one of the most popular musical styles, and I know a lot of people who want to play this kind of music, but they don’t know how to start.

Good Luck!

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A very short introduction to Ambient Music

In my Persian blog, I had written a lot about operating systems, computer architecture and digital electronics. I have plans for English blog and I’ll write about computer science and engineering in future, but, I decided to explain my experiences in music for now. In this article, I’m going to talk about ambient music, and how it’s produced. Of course, this is not a music theory or musical software tutorial.

Let’s talk about ambient music, what is ambient music? Ambient music is a minimalistic, modern and electronic genre, which is invented by “Brian Eno” in early 70’s. Ambient is actually a subgenre of electronic music, but after years of evolution, it’s known as an independent musical genre.

Characteristics

Ambient music, is highly dependent on the environment. You will realize this when you hear the name. Actually, this genre is based on John Cage’s theory, Everything we do is music and his 4’33” is one of the best ambient songs ever! Four minutes and thirty three seconds of silence, the composer asks you to listen to ambient noises. It means, you can record any sounds and then make it ambient music. This is true, but, not every sounds. A lot of ambient tracks are just recordings from nature, and a simple melody is played over that sounds. Some others are electronic productions, based on natural sounds and atmospheres. This means, ambient is some kind of avant-garde music, you are free to do everything you want!

Styles

You know every musical genre, can be played in different styles. In this section, I just explain some of ambient music styles. I’m sure there are more styles, but these styles are my favorites :

  • Dark Ambient :
    This is one of the most known styles of the ambient music. Sometimes people think that dark ambient is a subgenre of ambient music, but it’s actually not. Because it’s the same concept, but with scary, depressing or dark atmosphere. Sounds like someone plays his/her music in an abandoned and haunted place 😀
  • Space Ambient :
    This is another style. If you’re a fan of outer space life, science fictions and movies like Star Wars or Star Trek, this is your kind of music. In this style, musicians use effects which can make you feel aliens are in your home! And this is what makes this style awesome!

There are more, but I usually listen to these styles. So, I can explain these two better. For more information, you can find ambient musicians on YouTube, Soundcloud, Jamendo, etc. And ask them about their style!

Subgenres

And now, we are going to take a look on subgenres of ambient music. These genres are created to show us how minimal music can be perfect!

  • Drone :
    My most favorite subgenre of ambient music, drone music is just sustained chord, note or sound. Also, artists may decorated the sustained sounds using small melodies, or a single melody is repeated on the drone sound. I’ll explain drone music in future.
  • Lowercase :
    This is the most artistic form of ambient music. Artists record sounds from nature, or daily activities, and then, amplify them and edit them to make a melody. Lowercase music is one of the most minimalistic genres, and one of the most amazing ones, too!

In this article, we talked about ambient music and which kind of music we can call ambient. In future, I’ll explain more about making an ambient track and I’ll introduce my favorite ambient artists.

Good luck!