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Old 07-21-2010, 12:06 PM   #1
DeyBwah
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Default Film Score with REAPER - Seeking Guidance

Hey all,

I recently met someone at a wedding who has a silent film that needs scoring. It's a 15 minute film, very Charlie Chaplin in production/style/humor.

I'm basically looking for any information or guidance regarding scoring a film with REAPER.

I'm interested to hear people who do film scores with REAPER to chime in with any resources(links) or advice.

I've yet to touch REAPER's video features. I'm in the dark regarding that, where do I begin?

Also, any tips or workflows in general for scoring a film is appreciated.


Here's how I'd like to approach the scoring. (all subject to change depending on responses here)

I want to load the film into REAPER. Bust out my VSTi and start searching for the sounds I know I'll be using in the score. I figure I'd take a good 3-5 runs through the film while searching for sounds.

Once I have all the sounds/instruments I think I'll need to lay down the majority of the score, I'll start a few scratch takes with the main instrument that will most likely be present through the whole film. I'm thinking this instrument will be a violin or strings or something like that. So I'll take a couple runs and get ideas.

The film has distinct cuts and scenes so I'll definitely be marking the timeline to organize the different scenes/cuts that will require a different emotion/feeling. I'll also definitely need to work on each scene individually but regardless, I still do want to do a few start-to-end takes as I mentioned, just to get the feel of how the scenes tie together.

It seems like scoring a film is a very complex project. I have so many beginner questions.

Should I work with a tempo/snap/grid?

How do I determine the tempo for a particular scene?

Are there hard and fast rules in the order/workflow for scoring? Or are there a billion ways to get to the end, like with regular music that's not a score for a film?

Man.. I don't even know what other questions I should ask... so that'll be my last question.. what else should I be asking?
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Old 07-21-2010, 12:47 PM   #2
herniaface
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hi

if its a silent film then its likely the whole thing will need music with only small gaps of silence..so if its 15 minutes thats a lot of music to come up with..

my advice would be to approach it from an organic point of view. do what you suggested, which is put down rough 'feel' track on one particular instrument ( piano is usually best). this will give an idea where things need tempo changes, different moods etc..

id forget tempo, snap etc. but what i would do is create regions. go through the film looking for distinct scenes or changes of moods and create a region for each. ther maybe 20, 30 , 50 within those fifteen minutes!

ideally you need a 'theme' - a melody that runs through the film but changes according to scene. normally you would hear the the theme in its full form near the beginning of the film and then it would alter through the use of inversions and key/mode changes so that only a keen listener would realise its still from the original theme..

the tricky bit is getting the music from one scene to move smoothly into the next..but thats just trial and error, practice etc..

once youre happy with the melodies for each scene - bring in other instruments that match the scene..

hope that helps

good luck!
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Old 07-21-2010, 02:05 PM   #3
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Hey HerniaFace... lol..

Thanks for the great ideas.

I think I'll take your advice and use the Piano as the first instrument. I can always swap it out later, but you're right, Piano is the most neutral instrument I could use to figure out my melodies and motifs.

Also will take your advice on creating a region for each scene in the film. That should help me reduce the project into smaller bite-size pieces.

Of course, I'll still take a few one-shot throughs before I get down to the nitty gritty.

Anyone else have 2 pennies?
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Old 07-21-2010, 06:01 PM   #4
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Make sure the video item uses 'Time' as its basis, not bars and beats. See the item properties for that. Everything else can be Bars and Beats, but that should not be.

Keep the timeline offset and video locked. When you're talking to the director you have to be referencing the same timecodes after all .

Video item -> Time, not Bars and Beats
Timecode offset and video position locked.

It'll pay to have a template session with just the video and all the proper settings that you can just throw up, save as a new session and get composing with.
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Old 07-21-2010, 06:16 PM   #5
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Very first step is to watch the vid and drop markers down where important things happen as a reference.

One of the tricky things is setting up your tempo track so that your cues start where you want and run at the speed you want. Play with the "create measures from time selection" action to figure out how this works. Your music cues need to have beats/bars timebase, your sfx dialogue etc need time timebase. remember that any beats/bars stuf will change when you change the tempo track, so lay tempo from the start forward, if that makes sense!

REAPERs regions are cool - if you have a tempo change at the beginning of a region you can drag the region around and it will create fractional bars so that it starts where you want it and preserves the tempo of its contents

another cool feature (even if its not quite reado for prime time) for laying cues into a soundtrack is PiP. PiPs have their own tempo info, so you can record say 8 bars in a certain feel as its own project - open it in you soundtrack as a PiP, and you can scoot it around stretch it or whatever to lay it in without screwing up any stuff you have later.
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Old 07-22-2010, 02:40 PM   #6
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Quote:
Originally Posted by semiquaver View Post
>> another cool feature (even if its not quite reado for prime time) for laying cues into a soundtrack is PiP. PiPs have their own tempo info, so you can record say 8 bars in a certain feel as its own project - open it in you soundtrack as a PiP, and you can scoot it around stretch it or whatever to lay it in without screwing up any stuff you have later.

Can you elaborate a little more on your PiP techniques and it's uses. Am I following you right when you say a Project in a Project travels to another project and keeps it's tempo properties? How does this work when you "stretch" it? If you could explain with an example I would really appreciate it. I've never gotten into the PiP thing but this feature sounds pretty powerful and useful. Thanks!
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Old 07-23-2010, 02:03 PM   #7
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Quote:
Originally Posted by semiquaver View Post
Very first step is to watch the vid and drop markers down where important things happen as a reference.

One of the tricky things is setting up your tempo track so that your cues start where you want and run at the speed you want. Play with the "create measures from time selection" action to figure out how this works. Your music cues need to have beats/bars timebase, your sfx dialogue etc need time timebase. remember that any beats/bars stuf will change when you change the tempo track, so lay tempo from the start forward, if that makes sense!

REAPERs regions are cool - if you have a tempo change at the beginning of a region you can drag the region around and it will create fractional bars so that it starts where you want it and preserves the tempo of its contents

another cool feature (even if its not quite reado for prime time) for laying cues into a soundtrack is PiP. PiPs have their own tempo info, so you can record say 8 bars in a certain feel as its own project - open it in you soundtrack as a PiP, and you can scoot it around stretch it or whatever to lay it in without screwing up any stuff you have later.
Wow, this post went over my head a little bit... :/

What's a tempo track first of all?

And how do I lay the tempo from the start?

Is there some kind of Working w/Video REAPER guide anyone knows about?

A few terms I could use clarification on also...

Cue
Timebase
Tempo Track
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Old 07-23-2010, 01:59 PM   #8
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Quote:
Originally Posted by airon View Post
Make sure the video item uses 'Time' as its basis, not bars and beats. See the item properties for that. Everything else can be Bars and Beats, but that should not be.

Keep the timeline offset and video locked. When you're talking to the director you have to be referencing the same timecodes after all .

Video item -> Time, not Bars and Beats
Timecode offset and video position locked.

It'll pay to have a template session with just the video and all the proper settings that you can just throw up, save as a new session and get composing with.
I think I understand everything except that last sentence. What do you mean set up a template session? Could you elaborate on that?
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Old 07-23-2010, 02:02 PM   #9
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Quote:
Originally Posted by DeyBwah View Post
I think I understand everything except that last sentence. What do you mean set up a template session? Could you elaborate on that?
He might mean have a shell session with the video track ready to go - so that you can "save as" different versions of it from then on.....?
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Old 07-25-2010, 07:11 PM   #10
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Quote:
Originally Posted by DeyBwah View Post
I think I understand everything except that last sentence. What do you mean set up a template session? Could you elaborate on that?
Build universal templates and project specific templates. Whatever needs to be set up in advance, do it and save that session away as a template.

If you set things up right once, you can't make mistakes setting things up later. People get tired or sidetracked and make mistakes. Basic mistakes like getting the wrong frame rate going for the timecode in your session will not help, neither will lining up the video incorrectly in your timeline. This is why frame grids are so important.

Films work in reels(so far). TV shows don't. The picture cutters pretty much determine at what time code a show or its reels start. Most TV shows in Germany for example start at 10:00:00:00. Film reels start at 01:00:00:00 for reel one, and so on. PAL is 25 fps, NTSC 29.97, film 24, HDTV almost always 23.976(24-0.1% or 24*1000/1001). In the US film is sometimes telecined to 29.97, which is 24fps slowed down to 23.976, then 3:2 spread to produce a 29.97 video, and this is done for film editing or just for sound editing. It's a fun ride in the US. These days you get Quicktimes more often, and they're a lot more handy to use.

Communication with the picture department is absolutely essential. Golden rule. No way around it. The check is in your hands, not in the mail with these folks. A good relationship with them pays off. Need the current cut in a Quicktime H264 uploaded to your FTP site to check if your music still works with that version of the film ? You talk to those folks.
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Old 07-25-2010, 04:41 PM   #11
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Quote:
Originally Posted by airon View Post
Make sure the video item uses 'Time' as its basis, not bars and beats. See the item properties for that. Everything else can be Bars and Beats, but that should not be.

Keep the timeline offset and video locked. When you're talking to the director you have to be referencing the same timecodes after all .

Video item -> Time, not Bars and Beats
Timecode offset and video position locked.

It'll pay to have a template session with just the video and all the proper settings that you can just throw up, save as a new session and get composing with.
Most importantly. Make sure you're running the same frame rate.
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Old 07-25-2010, 06:54 PM   #12
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No hard and fasts rules (Full symphony or just a rhythm section?) but... As a general rule good fast composers do about two minutes of completed music per day...depending on LOTS of variables of subject matter and instrumentation of course.
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