timaeus222

You mean like this? http://ocremix.org/info/Submission_Standards_and_Instructions and this? http://ocremix.org/info/Direct_Rejection_Letter

Thank you for an awesome compo! I tend to have a lot of fun with these.

(1) Exactly! I think that's even the point of the reviews---to help the remixer improve. Not necessarily on the specific posted track (which might be a popular misconception apparently), but it can be applicable or generalized to current WIPs, or even just kept in mind. (2) I agree! I really think that it would be very difficult to figure things out on your own, and Plato agrees (Meno 80d, Paradox of Learning)! (3) Gee, thanks! (4) YES! It's just as helpful to yourself as it is to others that you give feedback. Not only does it allow a fresh perspective to someone else, but it also gives you the practice in writing refined advice. Being able to take advice is one thing, but how capable you are at articulating advice to others can influence how well they understand what you mean, or perhaps even how likely people will trust you.

I think this is coming along pretty well! I'm starting to get a sense of what direction the arrangement is going, how the dynamics evolve and the energy drops off, etc. I sometimes see remixers write something that has an unclear sense of direction, and this is improving in that aspect. You do have transitions at certain spots, but I'd argue that you can use a few more in particular spots, whether making it more obvious or just putting one at all. Specifically, I'd like to suggest the following: At 0:49, I get this short "breakdown"/low-energy section, but it doesn't quite connect with the previous section. I think it's because the reverse and regular cymbals can be louder there. I can kind of tell they're there, but only if I listen for them after initially noticing them. At 1:03 - 1:17, I think it would help if you made the drums less involved/busy here, while having a more explicit transition into 1:17. At 1:30, you've got that lone steel drum there, and it could be led into, for example, with a reverse cymbal or something similar (but maybe no regular cymbal). That way 1:30 could function as a "bridge" to switch up the mood you had going before to the one you have at 1:38. Nice transition at 1:36. At 1:52, the lead you have going right now is lacking the expression that I think it needs to attract attention as a lead. You could add some vibrato to it to add some motion to the tone, and that can accomplish part of the goal. If you imagine leads as choir members, have you ever seen choir members sing with no facial expression, but still you believe that they're interested enough in the song or that they understand the message of the song? My high school choir teacher said that if you're not smiling while singing a happy song, you don't understand that it's a happy song or you aren't really interested in the song as a song. Maybe think about it from that perspective and see how you approach writing for lead lines in your ReMixes. Also, it would help for that lead to be raised an octave to distinguish it from the frequency range of the other instruments. Right now it's blending in a little "too well". Lastly, I think the ending can be foreshadowed more; maybe slowly remove some drum parts as a "builddown" of textures? Right now it sounds like the last note is all that ends the ReMix.

If you're not confident that you know what you're doing, that's okay. I think you should comment anyway, and if you feel the need to ensure that the other person knows you're not confident, maybe make a disclaimer for instance, like "I could be wrong, but...", "Take my advice with a grain of salt, but...", etc. The more perspectives the better, IMO. Gives a broader view of what people think, and doesn't expose the ReMixer to only one or two peoples' methods. There are many ways/approaches to accomplish similar results, and some ways/approaches work more easily than others.

To more specifically answer these questions personally: 1. I usually do, but when I don't, it's because: I have to go do something else important and I put it off for the moment; then I might forget I don't have much of a reaction to the ReMix; I don't need an emotional reaction to feel the need to comment, but if I think the ReMix is so-so or "heard this before," I might not say anything; indifference, basically, but not dislike 2. This is a very difficult question. Any number of actions might help, but we can only hope it'll work. Here's what I would say or agree with: Instigate reviews through making some yourself, leading the way (WillRock) "Featured" or "Great" comments was a good idea (k-wix) and that's what I would suggest too; gives incentive to try harder Another judge tryout to get more on the panel? Tell your friends about OCR Integrate social media comment widgets/platforms/whatever as a possible option within the reviews forum (TO, Jorito) Have an "all comments received on reviews" page accessible (from your profile, for instance; Rozovian) Yeah, I definitely agree; I've been seeing some ReMixes that got people all excited over on YouTube, with very few comments on OCR.

Bruce Faulconer is the man when it comes to classic DBZ.

I'm just getting this feeling of lifelessness from the strings in the intro here. They're just sustaining. Try to inject some emotion into them with some volume swells, because real orchestral strings instrumentalists (violinists, violists, etc) change their note intensity within the same note. Honestly, the part where you start bringing in the acoustic drums and muted rhythm guitar is better than the orchestral intro before it. It's more texturally developed and more realistic. The leading guitars, though, are rather narrow, and feel like they're in a different room. They can use some slight room reverb to make them fit into the mix a bit better. Also, arrangement-wise, this section, while more developed texturally and more realistic, is lacking in that the drums are fairly autopilot and the muted rhythm guitar arpeggio just drones on throughout most of the passage. What that does to the mix is make it sound repetitive; the drums don't do anything particularly exciting, and essentially are "beat-keeping", while the rhythm guitarist sounds bored, in the sense of "going through the motions". I do like the subtle tibetan bell in the lower-energy "bridge". The transition into the rock section afterwards was a bit... cheesy. Like pop-dance-music-cheesy. Maybe incorporate some syncopation and rapid rolls/fills, in the way a more enthusiastic drummer would do it, to make it more exciting. The actual rock section kind of sounds like an "upgrade" to the previous "clean rock" section, but only in tone IMO. I'm just hearing not as much emotion as I thought I would hear at what I thought was supposed to be the climax. Where's the vibrato in the lead guitar? What about doing a solo? Overall, you do have some development in the dynamics, and a good start in the arrangement, but I think there needs to be more TLC in the orchestral intro using volume swells, the amount of emotion you give in the guitar performances, drum variations to reduce repetition and make things more exciting, and less copy+paste of the muted rhythm guitars, and a solo near the end would really help this.

One thing I should mention is that the instrumentation is fairly close to the original, and while that gives you an easy way of retaining the feel of the original, it would be nice if you tried to reinterpret the notes as well to personalize the track and make it your own. You have some pretty decent samples to use, and I think you should work with them more and figure out how to make as best use of them as you can.

I thought about that being a possibility... Let's give it a shot, eh?

Yes to all of this, even 6. A different website centered on being a Q&A educational site just started trying a similar "Great Answer!" feature to motivate dedication to teaching.

Nice, I see by this point you're starting to make greater use of Juggernaut and Damage. For me the production was a bit too distant, but otherwise I liked the action-heavy style you brought for this. (Sidenote: there's a click at 2:46.) One thing I'd say is that you could pay closer attention to how much low end you do get from Damage and Juggernaut; that guitar section towards the end had some low end clutter from those two libraries.

The stop-and-go feel of this is rather interesting. At first I thought it was going to be straight punk rock or something, but the beat gets varied at apt times. I also like the "roughness" to the production. Not rough in the poorly-polished sense, but rather, in the grungy/crunchy sense.

This is a mix that basically takes its sweet time on a fairly simple oscillating melody, but to great effect. Well-developed dynamics, and though it has some somewhat stiff lead sequencing, still some good stuff!

Well, by my calculations, after searching for new members by Join Date (between Jan 1 2015 and Oct 27, 2015 inclusive, and the same for 2014, 2013, etc), 20 members per page, we've had: 2015 --- 4 + 20*(1626 - 1586 + 1) + 7 = 831 2014 --- 9 + 20*(1574 - 1526 + 1) + 1 = 990 2013 --- 16 + 20*(1515 - 1456 + 1) + 7 = 1223 2012 --- 5 + 20*(1440 - 1368 + 1) + 10 = 1475 2011 --- 15 + 20*(1350 - 1243 + 1) + 17 = 2192 2010 --- 18 + 20*(1220 - 1100 + 1) + 7 = 2445 2009 --- 19 + 20*(1072 - 995 + 1) + 7 = 1586 2008 --- 16 + 20*(978 - 913 + 1) + 5 = 1341 2007 --- 12 + 20*(896 - 834 + 1) + 11 = 1283 So yeah, it looks to me like there's a lack of new members. It's not to say that the more members we have, the more activity we'll have (depends on what these members want to do with us), but statistically, less people are joining the OCR forums per year, at least since 2010. :/

Could be anything, IMO, and I really think someone needs to do some reviewin'! Maybe it's the idea that the 'classic' ReMixers are in high demand for moar moar moar STUFF, and people want stuff from Sixto, zircon, etc. Maybe with the newer ReMixers coming in, people don't know what to expect because the person's brand new or rather new. Maybe it's because there have been ReMixes from "new" games that people aren't as familiar with, like Guild Wars 2, Beyond: Two Souls, and Fittest. Maybe people are more busy these days; I know I'm really busy these days.

Yeah, I agree that the leads were strangely bright/cheery, and contrast strangely with the darkness of the Meshuggah-style chugs. I'm not really feeling that contrast works though, and I thought the leads could have been darker. Other than that, I do like this metal adaptation. Tight playing, fun low-tuning shenanigans, and cool triplet rhythmic style.

Signed!

I can totally make it! Super hyped for you guys to hear my track too (if you haven't peeked early)!

I'm not sure; I would be ready to do it, but The Damned, is it still a yes? Brandon, you don't have to take off your mastering. I promise, if it takes minimal adjustments to get things consistent, it will be minimal, and I'm sure yours is like 99.999999999999999999% there.

Why are we still talking about me? I'm pretty sure you smashed your keyboard through the desk typing my name over and over again. Move on?

That's true to an extent; if you pay closer attention to the faults in your audio systems, then in understanding the faults, you have a better idea of what is acceptable on the particular system based on the characteristics inherent in that system. In other words, with experience, you can make mixing decisions on any decent system. However, training your ears on a good system first is where I would start, rather than trying to mix on many systems early on. Personally, I would trust your headphones more than your speakers if you have not done much to your room, because your speaker output is mainly influenced by the treatment of your room acoustics. Your headphone experience is not influenced by that.

Just wanted to agree with this and provide my take on what I ended up finding useful in my C++ programming class and applying to my quantum chemistry programming research: - Abstract Data Types (Classes, Structs, Public/Private variables, header files) - Arrays (declared in structs and dynamically allocated) - Pointers (such as for implementation of CBLAS and LAPACKE libraries) - Selective For loops (such as taking advantage of orbital point-group symmetry and class [core/active/virtual] or choosing only nonzero electron integrals and electron densities) - Functions (of course) - Other miscellaneous things Honestly, the specific functions I had to know how to write in that class weren't nearly as important as the concepts that I got out of it. I found some of the more memorable functions to be, "is this number prime?" (literally 5 lines or so), "alphabetize this", "check the balance of parentheses" (stacks and linked lists), and "find the largest/smallest number in this list", yet I didn't use any of them specifically. The most useful unit though was the last two or three months on Abstract Data Types, IMO, and that "large project" was an ADT calculator (nightmare to program with linked lists, stacks, command line input, and such; was pretty satisfied in the end though). Fun stuff.

AW YEAH!

You know, I don't really care enough to argue, so there's no point in my responding further than this post (with regards to argument).