Learning your first DAW is a challenging and memorable experience, and for those of us in game audio, learning audio middleware brings similarly insightful rewards. Not only can you experience the uncanny magic of syncing sounds to animations, you can also witness the characters and environments come alive with even the simplest of audio assets. Before you know it, you've … [Read more...]
Sunday Sound Thought #68 – Our Intelligent Future
A really compelling narrative running underneath all the other news of the world right now is the ways in which machine learning and neural networks are transforming data interpretation. And really, transforming everything. The core concept of machine learning, termed over fifty years ago now, is a process which "gives computers the ability to learn without being explicitly … [Read more...]
Making Mistakes Matter
Maneuvering the waters of a creative job, like most jobs, is often no easy task. As we navigate the ocean of a project, at the bottom of the swell of each task lies the craggy rocks of potential mistakes. We are often able to steer clear and sail smoothly, but sometimes we hit the rocks, or the rocks hit us. Mistakes are a fact of life and a part of any job; the key … [Read more...]
Sunday Sound Thought #67 -What is a Mistake?
Randy Thom recently posted on his own blog his thoughts on "mistakes" which are more thoughtful and eloquent than my own. So go read his and come back for the dime store version. This monthly theme of "Mistakes" got me thinking. Mistakes to me can be a negative outcome to an intended or an unintended action. Something called a "dictionary" says mistakes can be "an action or … [Read more...]
Sunday Sound Thought #66 – On Lifting The Veil
“Where was the microphone when Woody met Buzz?” That’s usually my short answer when trying to describe what I do for a living. Most of you reading this probably appreciate the facade that is sound for film. That being, that the microphone on set didn’t actually pick up everything you’re hearing when you watch a movie in the theater. Yet that’s often what most movie-goers … [Read more...]
Monthly Theme: Mistakes
Oops. Whoopsie. Oh no! Sh#t! There are multitude of mistakes: User error, slipups, happy, egregious, colossal, harmless, fortuitous, technical, creative, social, financial... Much like in the photo of broken glass above, there can be beauty in mistakes as much as there is regret. Please share with us how you handle mistakes. Rolling with them, embracing them, fixing … [Read more...]
Nate Brenholdt interview
Nate Brenholdt is a Sound Designer/Composer/Audio Engineer who probably owns more hardware synthesizers than you do. His passion for synths is infectious. The first time I met Nate five years ago, he showed me some sound effects he was creating with his new Serge Modular synth (whilst surrounded by others synths) and then showed me pictures of a wall of synths at his home … [Read more...]