New movie scorer...

H

Hanan Townshend

New member
Hi my Hanan Townshend,,, Ive only just signed up to dvx. Im currently studying composition at Victoria University, New Zealand..

I have scored for several small budget short and feature length films, but am looking to hopefully be able to work with some international film makers..
I have a few short "thematic" demos loaded up on http://www.soundclick.com/bands/pagemusic.cfm?bandID=684300

Please let me know your thoughts.. I would really love to work with some of you in the future.

Hanan Townshend
hanan.townshend@gmail.com
 
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I like it!
only suggestion would be to get a better trumpet sample (or just brass in general). the one you use in "clash" and "return" sounds too synthesized.. makes it sound more like something out of final fantasy games than a movie, but the music itself is good. definitely has a cinematic feel. good work!
 
Hey thanks for the feedback... Yer some of the samples do have a slight synth sound to them,, I use East West libraries as well as Garritan Personal Orchestra and some other small libraries.. But the East West brass samples a definitely without a doubt a million times more realistic than the Garritan samples..
Thanks
 
Beautiful work mate!

You'll need to work quickly. In this day and age, you get 15 minutes to do twice as much work and budgets range from $24.95 USD on the low side to around $49.00 when the sky's the limit.

Some fools like me add dialog, ADR, Foley, sound design, mixing and mastering which means I'll (sometimes) be "granted" an additional 3 or 4 minutes, however then the endless promises for even more future work (read carrot dangle) becomes even more deafening.

Welcome to the world of music/audio to picture! :beer:
 
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Hey yer thanks man i realise that... And i have no trouble writing music in a short amount of time, if you want the music to be "average-ish". I cant write spectatular music in 15mins though.. Haha
Thanks
 
Hanan Townshend said:
I cant write spectatular music in 15mins though..
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Won't last long in this business then :)

You got some very nice work there. What do you work on?

Try posting your introduction in the job section. More people will browse through there when looking for a composer.

Cheers
 
Trust me.. No one can write spectacular music in 15mins! Well certainly not orchestral music. Im talking about commercial quality music here, not a simple backing score for a short film..
Thanks
 
VERY nice ! Welcome to the forum, looking forward to hearing lots more of your work. Any chance anything you've scored is up on the net??
 
Hanan Townshend said:
I cant write spectatular music in 15mins though.. Haha
Thanks
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Best signature I've seen in years is the waskly one himself - Wabbit's:

"Fast, cheap, good. Pick any two."

Just yankin' the ol' chain. You'll do great (& I might just call you myself). Keep up the awsome work. Is that East West library samples?
 
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Haha.. Wicked thanks man..
Yer I use mostly East West.. The piano is from NI Akoustik Piano sampler... Its not bad..

I also use Garritan Orchestra, but prefer East west expecially for brass samples..

Thanks for your comments... Im certainly not a "slow" composer... But for example, i would struggle to write a 4 minute piece for a full symphony orchestra in 15mins... Lol.. Unless its just simple sustained strings...
Thanks man
 
Hanan Townshend said:
Haha.. Wicked thanks man..
Yer I use mostly East West.. The piano is from NI Akoustik Piano sampler... Its not bad..

I also use Garritan Orchestra, but prefer East west expecially for brass samples..

Thanks for your comments... Im certainly not a "slow" composer... But for example, i would struggle to write a 4 minute piece for a full symphony orchestra in 15mins... Lol.. Unless its just simple sustained strings...
Thanks man
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Ah Nice! I'm using the entire Vienna Symphony and sometimes East West. I created the Holy Grail piano (on Giga Studio). Gotta dig you up a copy.

Just wanted you to know, I wasn't referring to the tempo of your music (I TOTALY loved that BTW), it's just that I've been a grouch lately because it seems so many film makers, producers, clients, directors want the music to happen as fast as driving through a fast food joint. Been irritating me so I've been on a rant about it. See my thread entitled "I have $24.95 and want my graphics to look like Star Wars".

After doin' this as long as I have (& I've been hearing the "how fast & how cheap can you do it?" for over 20 years) it just breaks my will to live every once in a while. Ya know, us musicians put our entire heart, soul and emotions into this and then along comes some snot who wants it with a side order of fries by the time he's out of the "drive through" lane.

Yeah, yeah, :violin: I'll live. Hehe.

Best with all things, oh and send me a PM with all your contact info - I was indeed, serious when I said; I my need to call you myself & hire you for some work. Ducky huh? :cool:

Best tip I can give you; compose a library of emotions, happy, sad, incidental, non incidental, traveling along, military, action, rage, depression. Try and keep them in the same key and score lots and lots and lots of them so you're ready for the "drive-through" clients.

Mix and seperate the stems out (I ask for and deliver them this way as well):

Percussion:
General
Various, like bongos, jungle etc
Bell trees and high clangy perc (clients tend to either hate or like that) High hats fall into that catagory as well.

Bass Synth bass, Bass guitar, Upright (you COULD also mix cellos and DB's here, but see below)

Strings:
Staccato
Legato

Brass:
Staccato
Legato

Winds:
Staccato
Legato

Synths:
Rhythm (sequencer grid type crap)
Melody
Pads
Leads
Effects

Guitar:
Rhythm
Lead
Effect chords

Vocal Choirs (VOTA etc)

This way the stems can be moved, muted, turned up etc and customized to the piece.
 
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Hey thanks,
Yer the Holy Grail sounds like wicked piano - how could it not be with a name like that,, the thing with East West is that i've only had it for a week or so now, so im still trying to find the magic samples in it... I find the strings - although they sound wicked - tend to have a really slow attack, even on the marcato and "fast" strings..

I now understand what your saying about scoring in such a short time haha.. I do have a lot of "templates" which i simply save to disk for later use, but i cud definitely do with more..

Thanks heaps for your comments... I can see that the world of film is a bit more hardcore than it is in the little world on New Zealand.. But im here to work, so hopefully i wont have a huge problem haha..
Hanan
 
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Hanan Townshend said:
Hey thanks,
Yer the Holy Grail sounds like wicked piano - how could it not be with a name like that,, the thing with East West is that i've only had it for a week or so now, so im still trying to find the magic samples in it... I find the strings - although they sound wicked - tend to have a really slow attack, even on the marcato and "fast" strings..

I now understand what your saying about scoring in such a short time haha.. I do have a lot of "templates" which i simply save to disk for later use, but i cud definitely do with more..

Thanks heaps for your comments... I can see that the world of film is a bit more hardcore than it is in the little world on New Zealand.. But im here to work, so hopefully i wont have a huge problem haha..
Hanan
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We took tons of grief for that name. It was published under QupArts back then.

I take care of our mates down-unda, so I'll send a ya PM with my email & you can give me your agent, or whatever, contact info. I get soooo buried I OFTEN need help. You get on my FTP site and we'll exchange stems and MPEG1 graphics, you send me an invoice and it gets paid. 60 days net. Simple. I got one other guy in Germany who's my main hired gun but he gets burried too and often he gets, like ZERO time, to turn synced music to picture.

The guys at EastWest - Nick's a chump but Doug Rodgers is from your neck of the woods, so right out of the chute he becomes a mate just for that. :beer:

BTW I hate the EW plug-in (Samples are cool - recorded at St Thomas & Benaroya Hall in Seattle - same place the samples I recorded for Emu Systems) but there's far too much delay and slugishness in playback, so get the Giga studio if/when you can. I'm a Mac guy and use Logic but the sampler rack is all Gigastudio!

Ok we gotta stop the thread hi-jack. Back to you guys. :Drogar-Mark-04(DBG)
 
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