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Josh Whelchel

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Posts posted by Josh Whelchel

    Top Software Choices & Companies

    in Music Composition & Production

    Posted

    As soon as you can afford Izotope, I'd get that - if you have any ear at all for mastering it will help a lot. A lot of people however will still prefer to outsource their mastering, which ultimately I recommend, but when you have time and budget constraints - Izotope is the way to go. (Just avoid presets, use them as starting points only)

    CALL FOR MUSICIANS - Songs for the Cure '11

    in Recruit & Collaborate!

    Posted

    Would you accept a song
    ? Or a bad? Orchestra-backed acoustic pop? Metal? Rap? Surely there's some restriction on the genre, or the language content, such as profanity. I'm just asking, I wasn't planning on using profanity or making rap. It's something people should know before starting if there's some kind of limitation on F-bomb racist gangster rap and such.

    I'm not sure if it's entirely clear, so I'll clear it up here - I'm not looking for submissions of original material until AFTER you've been accepted on the project. This should dodge the issues you've mentioned.

    But for the record, it's a PG album, and we're not interested in hardcore-rap, but pop/rap/r&b is certainly open to be included.

    CALL FOR MUSICIANS - Songs for the Cure '11

    in Recruit & Collaborate!

    Posted

    Songs for the Cure is looking for musicians for its third-annual compilation series.

    I'm looking for REMIXERS -and- ORIGINALS, but you can find all the details on the website for submissions here:

    >> http://www.jwmusic.org/sfc11-artists/

    >> Apply Here

    To clarify some of the information here, the DEADLINE FOR SUBMISSION/AUDITION is OCTOBER 3, but your music doesn't have to be finished until FEBRUARY.

    Any and all are welcome to apply, so please do! In the past we've had these OCRemixers participate:

    - Big Giant Circles

    - The Prophet of Mephisto (Brad. Burr)

    - Mustin

    - FFMusicDJ

    Thanks, y'all!

    - Josh Whelchel

    Final Fantasy VI - Wandering on the Moon

    in Post Your Game ReMixes!

    Posted

    Okay new update once again. Check it out and please tell me what you think xD

    stats.png

    Right off the bat, the opening shorter string bites need more... "bite." Go with a Spiccato articulation or something that effect.

    The synth is harsh and in the same as octave as most of your orchestration which makes it muddy and hard to listen to. All around with the synths actually, I can just never get behind any of them. Also, arrangement-wise, you really haven't done enough variation from the original for this to stand on its own for me, either.

    That said! The percussion is pretty good, I especially enjoy the tamb., the crescendos later on are also pretty fantastic. I'd say maybe take out all of your synths altogether and replace their ideas with something orchestral, see if that works because you have a much better sense of how things go together in that setting, and if not then go back and find a synth that sounds better. The point of that exercise is that hopefully you'll have found a more appropriate octave for the line.

    Hmm, okay, hope I don't sound too critical, because it's a good start! I do think you'd need a -lot- more deviation for this to pass though. (:

    Buying a new laptop- need help choosing features

    in Music Composition & Production

    Posted

    My advice: listen to them.

    I am still an undergraduate student, and I lived in the dorms on campus for two years. You simply are -NOT- going to get any musical good out of that laptop. I have a separate laptop that I do all my college/school things for my Comp Sci degree and my Music Composition degree that have nothing to do with the software I use for music production outside that realm.

    Here's a picture of my dorm room with my "gear" in it from 2009.

    whelchel1.jpg

    I simply took the dorm supplied desk, built the little "bridge" for my monitors and monitor (heh), and it worked very, VERY nicely. I mostly used the headphones really, for obvious reasons, and I'd also like to add that I shared this room with another person.

    I also err on the side of being more social and outgoing as far as school events are concerned - I attend football games, all that fun stuff, go out on the weekends. Doesn't keep me from knowing when to focus and get work done, which is an important balance you'll have to have. As far as needing your laptop for convenience, you'll find that online applications are making this super easy - but beyond that most software that you'll likely use for school was developed for really the crummiest of computers to operate on. If it's something high end like in the digital design field or something truly intensive, your school should have labs for you to work at - which, even with a desktop and laptop, I still use quite often.

    Just sayin', it can be done. (:

    EDIT:

    Also, EWQL Play will expel ROT all over your harddrive for how much use you'll give it, rendering a laptop's lifespan mooooterific.

    the Man with a Machine Gun

    in Post Your Game ReMixes!

    Posted

    Heyo!

    Likey, here's some advice:

    The synth that comes in in little pieces originally, that's a great idea, and the soundscape is full around it. But the actual choice of synth is poor in my opinion. It's a good start, but it definitely needs more 'bite,' or at least it needs it once the percussion picks up.

    The guitar is a big NO for me, mainly because it's not real. I think if you a real guitarist to do it, it'd help a lot. Also, in the section where the guitar comes in, you could really benefit from changing things up a lot more from the source. Get really free with it - lead guitarists LOVE to improvise and run with ideas. Later you start to do this, but it takes a little long to get there in my opinion (but once you do, it's very good!).

    One thing I LOVED, and wish you had more things similar to: When the guitar in the second section goes out and the synth comes in, their timbres blend and crossfade in a pretty magical way.

    I hope that these comments don't discourage you, but rather you should set the bar for yourself a few notches higher and always strive to make it punch more. I definitely think you want more punch. Try turning down the reverb on a few of the not-so-important parts as well, that should help.

    The Making of a Video Game Soundtrack

    in Music Composition & Production

    Posted

    I've started a pretty involved series on how I wrote music to the game "GunGirl 2" on my blog. You can check out the soundtrack at http://music.jwmusic.org/album/gungirl-2-original-soundtrack before reading some of these indepth articles I'm writing on the composition and production elements of this soundtrack.

    PART ONE: Cohesion

    PART TWO: Making of Anomaly (Guitars and Violin and much much more!)

    Bonus: Score to "Libera Me"

    PART THREE: Working with Live Performers

    PART FOUR: Studio Gear

    PART FIVE: Mixing

    PART SIX: Looping and Mastering

    Enjoy (:

    EastWest Play issues

    in Music Composition & Production

    Posted

    DAW: Reaper

    Library being used: QLRA

    In the project I'm working on (which was playing back perfectly yesterday), my Play instruments have stopped working. They're completely silent.

    When I go to adjust the settings and click the "Streaming" tab, there is a red note at the bottom saying "This engine level setting has exceeded your available system resources. Try lowering your engine level or your audio buffer size, or contact tech support."

    Even when I set the engine level all the way down, I still have the same issue. I have 3 gigs of RAM, (actually 4 -- but one of the four sticks apparently isn't functioning), and this project does not have a huge number of instruments. Playback was working fine yesterday, so I suspect that isn't the problem.

    Any ideas?

    Welcome to hell, mate - I started getting this problem a while back in Cakewalk. I have to make sure that Play is the FIRST vst loaded in any project I use (until I upgraded from 2->4gb of ram). I haven't checked since i did that.

    I suggest reordering them if you can. Other fixes that I've done just to get a dumb VSTi to work include opening a blank project with just the VSTi I have a problem with, then close it and open my real project. I literally have a folder called bootup that's got NI's Battery, FM8, Massive.... etc. that I open one at a time before opening some of my projects. ;_;

    Productivity snatch.

    East West Symphonic Libraries

    in Music Composition & Production

    Posted

    Thanks for the help. You just sold me on the Gold Edition. It sounds good enough to use for accompaniment to practice some concertos. Maybe I'll even use it live and say "Screw the orchestra! you've been replaced by technology!"

    Nervous laughter all around. :<

    -Gar

    Good choice - I've been using this library for a while now (with a very long and slow learning curve too, I might add), and it's definitely not even worth it to get Silver. You pay only a little more to get Gold which has a LOT more articulations, and it's really all about your articulations. Get Gold Complete really if you can, and soon you can get the additional mic positions too (which is a nice addition). You don't need Platinum to get all the recordings, but you'll be limited to 16bit - anyway, it's not a bad route to go.

    You can do this: http://music.jwmusic.org/track/kyrie-immanis (:

    SUBMITTED: Final Fantasy 7 - The Planet is Dead

    in Post Your Game ReMixes!

    Posted

    This is pretty awesome, but technically I have a few suggestions:

    The drums are incredibly dry and a little loud in the mix, which kills some of the edge for me. It relies fairly heavily on the source, which is good, and the divergences are awesome - I'd like to see maybe some variation when you repeat the main motif (1 5 8 6 4 5). Maybe play with it or the rhythm or something to that effect to add ample variation and treat our ears with more play on the source. You do enough around it that's fresh that it's generally okay, but this is just my suggestion to go a little further.

    Yup, yup, !

    OCR02023 - Final Fantasy VIII "Shine Tonight"

    in ReMix Reviews & Comments

    Posted

    Blah.. I had a whole ranting post.. but then I decided to crop it to this to avoid being... ostentatious... or whatever that word is...obstinate?...Blargh?

    *cough*

    I liked the lyrics of this song, and I think that it is a new stepping stone for songs to come, or at least I will be comparing them to this one's performance. I don't care how well people sing when it comes to lyrics, what I care about are the lyrics themselves, and how they are placed in the music... mostly.

    *uncough*

    Oh my throat... don't ever try to do that in real life folks... hurts like the dickens if you succeed...

    *grabs throat and walks away*

    So you liked the lyrics? To be honest, I don't usually do the lyric writing, it's not my strong suite - but for this I was really venting some personal expression. Any critical comments about anything are always welcome! I'd love to make the next one better (:

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