Eino Keskitalo

Wehey, another finished project to look forward to! Congrats! --Eino

Owen Pallett kicks ass. --Eino

Looking forwards to it! --Eino

Thanks! I'll probably try extending it, but not just for length's sake. If it won't work, then that's the structure. --Eino

Thanks for the replies again! So far everyone has mentioned the plain/basic/cheap sounds (here and elsewhere), so they do need to be beefed up. I don't want to have a realistic sound, I want to keep the tracker feel, but at the same time it shouldn't sound plain. Mak, those were some inspiring ideas, marimba could well work! =) SonicThHedgog, I don't have any midi.. it's made with Renoise tracker. Thanks for the offer anyhow! --Eino

Hey cool, some replies! Thanks, SonicThHedgog (took a while to type that right), I don't think it's quite up to the par to the posted ReMixes yet. But glad you enjoyed it! mak, you probably listened to the source. Click the box above the "source" link, the one which says "click to listen". --Eino

Congrats on getting it done! --Eino

No avatar, no sig, no personality. <3 edit: oh wait, I do have a sig --Eino

Oh yeah, that vibe definitely is there, I did think that the piece works very well on acoustic, and reminded me a bit of Alice in Chains. --Eino

I can hear 00:14-00:39 is the main riff, that begins the source. I think it's transposed a bit too. I personally liked it being slightly rough, such as the slight detuned bits around 02:19-02:20 and 02:24. --Eino

Sounds pretty nice, the playing is all right. The problem I have with this track is that I keep waiting for something else than the strummed guitar to come along. I don't feel that it keeps my interest on its own. Cool to interpret that source on an acoustic guitar though! While I say it doesn't really keep my interest, it does have a lot of variation in the arrangement and the intensity. Good luck with the panel. --Eino

It sounds a bit better now I guess, but still pretty squishy, which is probably Youtube but if it wasn't, we here wouldn't be able to tell you. --Eino

Very nice! I couldn't give feedback like PrototypeRaptor.. but I'll say I enjoyed this quite a bit. In the first part I lose track of the rhythm easily. Not sure if it's anything to worry about - as long as it's preformed tightly it shouldn't be a problem. Overall this track sounds pretty mellow, slightly bitter-sweet.. good for the "voyaging" theme! --Eino

This was so cool to hear, thanks for sharing. Pretty well orchestrated to the instruments as far as I can tell. My favourite bit was 01:55-03:37, it seemed to combine many source tunes in a very natural manner. --Eino

The mp3 sounds much better than the youtube stream (naturally). The bassier part after the intro sounds a bit heavily compressed to my ears. Really enjoyable sound overall. "Robot synthonic" sounds like an awesome idea, and now I feel I get what you're going for. You have an idea you're going for, and you should definitely keep it. The fact that people giving feedback (me included!) didn't quite get the idea at first does mean it needs a bit work! You certainly shouldn't make it more realistic, as that goes against your own original idea. I think the robot synthonic idea isn't obvious enough for the listener, and I'm thinking the problem is that the sound is actually too good! It's too full, and has this nice reverb and panning. So instead of making it "better", you could try making it "worse", filter it to make it more flat and noisy - give an impression that the sound is coming from a cheap TV used to play 16-bit console games. --Eino

Yeah, I can see the appeal. There's another way - keeping it for the effect you like, but trying to make it overall sound better. Kind of like some people use SNES-style strings to a great effect. I don't have specific ideas or advice how to achieve that though, but it might be worth (and fun!) looking at. --Eino

The intro didn't feel remotely as good as what followed. Once the beat comes in and pan flutes and the tuned percs are added this sounds really nice, the piece has its own character. Sound quality doesn't feel awesome, but that could be Youtube. On the intro, I hear you that you don't want to make it realistic (I think that's cool) but it wasn't up to the same standard as the rest of this track (which is pretty great, really enjoyable).. The timing and dynamics of the instrument doesn't feel satisfying, they don't have to be realistic but they do need to sound good! There's also a string part around the 2/3 point of the track which has the same problem - no need to sound real, but the timing and dynamic feels kind of, well, I think Gario put it correctly by saying they feel "stale". I feel they're undercooked, and a bit lumped on. I mean, they definitely fit in in the idea level, but need more work! I probably sound really negative going on and on about them, but that's only because (a) this is a really, really good track that I'm enjoying and ( the string parts don't seem to have quite the same quality as the rest of the track, and are bringing it down a bit, while they really didn't need to! But overall, really great work - I enjoyed this track a lot (after not expecting to after the intro) so kudos! Source-usage wise I thought you definitely put your own spin on it with the sound, structure and feel of the track. Can't say what judges would say, but I do think this is worth (1) taking a look at making the strings sound awesomer, (2) posting an MP3 version so people can hear the real sound quality, (3) getting a moderator review and (4) submitting to OCR. Good stuff, thanks for sharing! --Eino

Another cheap headphone listener here, I agree that something's missing in the lower end. Sounds quite cool and tight otherwise! --Eino

The crow sounds are fun. I like how you made a mellower version out of the original. Once the piece gets going the overall sound is quite pleasant, sort of lushy. I also like, at the end, when the bassline drops out, the sound is quite nice. I don't like the sound at the beginning - the bass sound is unimpressive when it's fully exposed, the mechanical repetition of the sample doesn't sound too good when it's exposed like that, though it does work decently later on. Maybe you could start with the palette you have in the outro, and add the bass later on. You also have a less mechanical, sparser bass part around the end of the first third of the song, that could work in the intro too. There's also a couple of spots where the chords are uncomfortably dissonant, in a way that doesn't resolve satisfyingly. It's great that you state your goals in your posting; I think you've done pretty well regarding them! I quite enjoyed the track, I wasn't expecting that based on the intro (or the source!) but it got a lot lot better. Good work! --Eino

What Gario says about the production and the sounds sounded spot on to me. Very cool arrangement! Recognizable, but definitely your own. I agree with Gario about the ending, but I felt the current beginning was ok, it just goes straight to business. It of course wouldn't hurt if you experimented a bit to try out some sort of an intro, effective intros are cool. --Eino

Final version I did the level tweaks Rozovian (edit: and -Dan) suggested and eased up on the limiter a bit. The changes sounded good to me. If you're interested in the Renoise project file, grab it here. old ------------------------------ Final candidate 2: here adjusted EQ to be less overly bright mix the pipe/organ/thing a little lower in places to reduce monotony one additional drum fill Workshop mod review time yo. Source Source breakdown: The vocal melody, used without the drone note and canon/delay: used mainly with the "organ stab note" instrument. Introduced in full 00:07-00:19. Used almost throughout: 00:21-00:47, 01:06-01:08, 01:14-02:08. More sparsely during the last minute: 02:11-02:13, 02:17-02:27, 02:30-02:31, 02:35-02:36, 02:40-02:47, 02:52-02:56. Starts to vary the original melody by following the chord changes from the bass line around 01:57. The lead is also based on the vocal melody line, most clearly 01:02-01:25-ish. Rest of the lead writing is "inspired by" rather than clearly referencing the original. Panned bell from the source used as a panned atmospheric noise, introduced at 00:04, used 00:04-00:48, 01:30-01:44, with about half-speed rhythm during 01:45-02:05, and towards the outro again fading in from 02:48-3:00. ---- oldishish: Final candidate 1: https://www.dropbox.com/s/rrh4kknr8itwd92/keskitalo-clockwork_groove-20120820.mp3 Finished! Well, final candidate 1 mixdown. Not quite sure about the overall EQ, seemed quite bright compared to some reference ReMixes, and I tried to tone it down, but these other headphones are quite shitty, either I succeeded or I can't tell the difference. For finalizing the mix, apart from a bit of master EQ to done the bass down just a little bit, I just used Renoise's stock Maximizer that I suppose must act as a limitter as well, got a good boost and can't hear any clipping (myself). (Other changes since the last version: shortened the intro a bit, tweaked levels/eqs of particular sounds, that's it.) Source Source breakdown: The vocal melody, used without the drone note and canon/delay: used mainly with the "organ stab note" instrument. Introduced in full 00:07-00:19. Used almost throughout: 00:21-00:47, 01:06-01:08, 01:14-02:08. More sparsely during the last minute: 02:11-02:13, 02:17-02:27, 02:30-02:31, 02:35-02:36, 02:40-02:47, 02:52-02:56. Starts to vary the original melody by following the chord changes from the bass line around 01:57. The lead is also based on the vocal melody line, most clearly 01:02-01:25-ish. Rest of the lead writing is "inspired by" rather than clearly referencing the original. Panned bell from the source used as a panned atmospheric noise, introduced at 00:04, used 00:04-00:48, 01:30-01:44, with about half-speed rhythm during 01:45-02:05, and towards the outro again fading in from 02:48-3:00. ---- oldish: https://www.dropbox.com/s/wkc8uppxe9do6s1/keskitalo-clockwork_groove-20120725.mp3 Textures added. Just started trying out stuff with the idea of adding little synth loop sort of thing to the background (kind of drawing inspiration from Brian Eno on David Bowie's "Heroes") and it turned out to be lots of fun. To me it seems it changed the piece quite a bit, but it was good to take that leap. The intro, while better, probably needs something to be done with the volume levels/fadeins, maybe. Also the main lead probably needs mixing tweaks, it's kind of overpowering/uneven. Turned down the bass a bit and I think that was good. Comments reaaaally appreciated on: * Production * Sounds/soundfield (too basic sounds? too skeletal/empty?) * Source usage (in the second half) The goal is to get this posted. --Eino ---- old: https://www.dropbox.com/s/15lm1nfpuvddror/keskitalo-clockwork_groove-20120724.mp3 More tweaks to the sound & mixing. I really should do that texture-adding that has been suggested so many times. ---- older: https://www.dropbox.com/s/b2o1p8cquxrqvt8/clockwork%20groove%2020120707.mp3 Comments from last time pretty good, and I actually can and should still apply them. I've tweaked the sound since last time and felt like I'd post this for some more comments. I do have things in mind to work on this, but not sure when I will, so I'll put this here for the time being. I'm happy with the structure - tried to extend it, but it felt forced. ---- oldest: This was a PRC compo piece (#174), which I've since extended. This was a pretty fun source in the competition, since it is so minimal. There's just one melody and the bell. I tried to incorporate the bell by playing this "atmospheric noise" sample in a similar manner the bell is used in the source. Other than that, I have the "stabby" organ in the right playing (a variation of) the melody most of the time. The proper lead also plays and varies it during the first half. There's less source in the second half, although it too is based on a variation of the melody on the organ. This is done with the Renoise tracker, and actually mostly with the demo samples. Hopefully that's not a concern. Sooo onto my concerns: * Production (I don't know what I'm doing or what I should be doing, so any comments and pointers are welcome) * Structure (is the ending ok?) * Sounds/soundfield (too basic sounds? too skeletal/empty?) * Source usage (in the second half) I'm personally happy with the tracker sound, especially the lead, but please tell how that sounds to you. Thanks! edit: I should also state my goal like Altermentality did in their Earthworm Jim mix post; I definitely want to submit this to the panel, eventually, so I need some ears! --Eino

For a moment there were dates in the judging threads; is that something you use in-panel to keep track of dates the pieces were submitted/paneled? --Eino

Are Fishy and zircon Jooj-Cat? --Eino

I checked the latest preview bundle, and it looked good. I'm especially looking forward to the track numbers. --Eino

The following games are listed as Windows games, despite being (first) released for MS-DOS: DOOM: http://ocremix.org/game/110/doom-win Released in 1993 for DOS as per http://www.mobygames.com/game/dos/doom and to Windows only in 1995 as per http://www.mobygames.com/game/windows/doom Star Control 2: http://ocremix.org/game/351/star-control-ii-win Released in 1992 for DOS as per http://www.mobygames.com/game/dos/star-control-ii - there's no Windows release at all for the original SC2 (contra the open-source Ur-Quan Masters). 7th Guest: http://ocremix.org/game/26/7th-guest-win Released in 1993 for DOS as per http://www.mobygames.com/game/dos/7th-guest and to Windows only in 1997 as per http://www.mobygames.com/game/windows/7th-guest Legend of Kyrandia: http://ocremix.org/game/342/legend-of-kyrandia-win Released in 1992 for DOS as per http://www.mobygames.com/game/dos/legend-of-kyrandia and to Windows (3.x) in 1993 as per http://www.mobygames.com/game/win3x/legend-of-kyrandia Doom 2: http://ocremix.org/game/111/doom-ii-hell-on-earth-win 1994 for DOS: http://www.mobygames.com/game/dos/doom-ii-hell-on-earth 1995 for Windows: http://www.mobygames.com/game/windows/doom-ii-hell-on-earth Highway Hunter: http://ocremix.org/game/503/highway-hunter-win Only a DOS release in 1995: http://www.mobygames.com/game/highway-hunter King's Quest V: http://ocremix.org/game/294/kings-quest-v-absence-makes-the-heart-go-yonder-win DOS looks like the earliest release platform (1990): http://www.mobygames.com/game/dos/kings-quest-v-absence-makes-the-heart-go-yonder Win (3.x) in 1992: http://www.mobygames.com/game/win3x/kings-quest-v-absence-makes-the-heart-go-yonder Mechwarrior 2: http://ocremix.org/game/278/mechwarrior-2-31st-century-combat-win DOS release predates the Windows release by a few months: http://www.mobygames.com/game/dos/mechwarrior-2-31st-century-combat vs http://www.mobygames.com/game/windows/mechwarrior-2-31st-century-combat Command & Conquer: http://ocremix.org/game/76/command-and-conquer-win According to Wikipedia, it was first released for MS-DOS: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Command_%26_Conquer_(video_game) (MobyGames only listed 1995 for both) --Eino