Star Fox (SNES) Game Clear -WIP-

[DZComposer]

I recently got EWQLSO gold pro XP, and this is the first real thing I have done with it.

I'd say it is about 89% finished. I still need to clean it up a little bit and add some phrase shaping. It needs some EQ love too.

http://www.corneriasound.com/betamusic/gclrsam003.mp3

I need to get a subwoofer for my studio monitors. These things are coming out with a little too much bass....

Changes:

Adjusted the breath emulation intervals on the solos.

Added a couple of parts in a couple of places.

An ending.

Replaced Xylophone with Marimba at 3:10

Changed samples near the end to match the musical style.

What do you guys think?

[Antipode]

Listening now. Ahhh, this is nice and nostalgic. Good intro.

1:50 was a bit of a sudden jump, but I love the way you worked that idea into the background at around 2:05 and layered the starfox theme in. This is my favorite section so far.

At the climax if you added in the better samples that would be great. And...argh! I must hear how it ends or at least continues! I can tell you that so far I'm really, really enjoying your arrangement. Excellent harmonies and ideas.

My only main suggestion might be that 1:50 could use a bit of a change, maybe in the instrument that is playing that main descending line.

Anyway, please continue!

EDIT: I ought to add that after listening again I think it might sound a bit "empty" in certain sections, as though it might need more layers to it. You might want to work on that a bit, but it didn't seem to be too serious.

[Goten X]

I personally enjoyed it, though it seemed rather flat throught the whole listening. That COULD be just me. I think you pointed out everything I would have said is wrong. Good luck with writing an ending and with fixing those touches in the song.

|GX

[DZComposer]

It has an ending now!

I'd say it is about 89% finished. I still need to clean it up a little bit and add some phrase shaping. It needs some EQ love too.

http://www.corneriasound.com/betamusic/gclrsam003.mp3

I need to get a subwoofer for my studio monitors. These things are coming out with a little too much bass....

Changes:

Adjusted the breath emulation intervals on the solos.

Added a couple of parts in a couple of places.

An ending.

Replaced Xylophone with Marimba at 3:10

Changed samples near the end to match the musical style.

[Hale-Bopp]

I have very little experience with orchestra packages, but this sounds top notch. Color me impressed. I am wondering if maybe the snare rolls near the end (4:03)could be a little less machine gun-ish and vary a bit more in velocity for a more ultra realistic feel. Also, I don't know if the jump in volume at 4:25 is natural or not, but I thought it was slightly jarring. That's about it. Excellent arrangement!

[polar-]

Sounds pretty nice. Love the corneria theme in the middle section with the harp and all. The snares in the end sounds fine to me. Overall i think the production is good!

[DZComposer]

Interestingly, those snare rolls are sampled rolls (they recorded someone doing a snare roll). I'm too lazy to program my own. Though I never noticed the machine gun effect. Maybe it's because the roll is behind the chord and you only hear certain hits that simulate the MGFX.

I using the EWQLSO Gold Pro XP set with some of the percussion coming from Virtual Drumline 2.

[cobaltstarfire]

I like it, my only real beef is that its very quite (not dynamicly) but everything about it is really quite, had to turn up my volume to twice its norm to hear anything much...

[DZComposer]

I was having some clipping issues during the ending, so I had to adjust the gain a bit.

I haven't run this piece through a compressor. Speaking of compressors, does anyone know of a good tutorial on how to use them? Every time I run a piece through a compressor it screws up the balance.

[Nutritious]

There was a good tutorial by Zircon in the Remixing section, but it looks like it's a broken link now (probably due to forum restructuring). Anyway, I'm not sure that you'd want to put a compressor on your entire song, especially on an orchestral piece. Rather, I'd pick out which instruments are peaking out and put a light compressor on them - strong enough to prevent clipping, but not too strong as to distort the sound too much. Here's my (very) basic (and probably not very accurate) understanding of compressors, I hope this helps:

Threshold: What level you want the compressor to kick in at. For example, setting it at -1dB won't affect your sound until the sound reaches a noise level of -1dB - pretty straightforward.

Ratio: Almost like the intensity that you want the compressor to act on your sound. Example, ratio of 3:1 will only allow 1dB of sound through for every 3dB your sound exceeds the threshold level. The higher the setting, the more compression is taking place.

Attack: The delay in which the compressor will kick in after the threshold is reached.

Release: Similar to attack except on the back end of the sound. (If you can't tell, I'm a little fuzzy on Attack/Release. Someone can probably explain them a lot better)

Gain: Once the sound is compressed, gain will allow you to bring the entire sound (not just what reaches the threshold level) up to whatever it is set to. In a sense, this allows you to turn up the volume of the track while using the other settings to prevent it from clipping.

I hope this helps.