Jessica Curry is a Director and Composer at The Chinese Room, a game development studio based in Brighton, UK. The studio shipped their first game, Dear Esther in 2012 and are currently hard at work on their third, Everybody's Gone to the Rapture. Designing Sound: Tell us a little about how you got started out as a composer? What kind of projects did you start out … [Read more...]
Audio Education – A view from the middle
Clearly the fates have decreed that I should not only be involved in the writing of a new audio degree as education month comes around, but that I should also be well into my own studies, working towards a Master's degree in Sound Design. However, in getting to this point, my own audio education has meandered along most of the routes one might take in the pursuit of a career in … [Read more...]
Vehicle Engine design – Project CARS, Forza Motorsport 5 and REV
With this article I really wanted to find out about the nuts and bots of vehicle engine sound design and implementation. So I contacted a few people and got some great responses and a fascinating insight into the process. My thanks to Stephen Baysted, Audio Director and Composer at Slightly Mad Studios, Greg Hill, Sound Designer at Soundwave Concepts, Adam Boyd, Sound Designer … [Read more...]
Spectral Analysis: Interview with Rob Blake
Many thanks to Brad Dyck for contributing this interview. You can follow Brad on Twitter @Brad_Dyck It was my pleasure to speak with Rob Blake, Audio Director best known for his work on the Mass Effect trilogy. Plants vs Zombies: Garden Warfare is available now for PC and will be available for PS3/PS4 on August 19th. BD: What originally made you move away from the UK to … [Read more...]
Critical listening, Creativity and Silence?
A number of years ago I took part in a critical listening exercise where participants where given a piece of music and 3 hours to provide a critical assessment of it. The piece of music lasted just over 4 minutes so during those hours I got very familiar with it, but I didn't really get much beyond scratching the surface of it, in terms of critical listening. The point of the … [Read more...]
The Story in Surround – Game narrative and sound
I recently came across the Frictional Games blog and have spent the last few weeks trawling through it’s archive. It provides a wealth of informaiton on game design, and in particular discussions on the point of game narrative. One particular post, 4 Layers, a narrative design approach, written by Thomas Grip, Frictional's creative director, raised the concept of the mental … [Read more...]
The Dickson Experimental Sound Film
Broken wax cylinder containing the 'first' film soundtrack circa 1894-1895 In 'broken' month I wanted to find out a little more about what's being done to fix (and preserve) some of the broken pieces of film history. The story of the Dickson Experimental Sound Film (link to view at the end of the article) seemed to be a good way into the subject and I am indebted to Ken … [Read more...]