Anyone here composed a film score?

[andyriggle]

I'm working on my first film score for an indie film and had some questions on production and the whole process for anyone with a little more experience. Anyone out there want to help out??

Andy

[Wyatt]

I wish I could help, but I can't .

Anyway, what is the film called, and what is it about?

[andyriggle]

See, that's what I'm talking about. I don't even know the story line. All I know is it's a full length feature film called "The Wanderer." I got descriptions like "2:30 starts very dark, after 30 sec morphs into a beautiful wandering feel." So I ended up re-writing the opening credits 3x because they were too triumphant then too beautiful then I got it right. And I only had a month to write an hour of cues. Now I'm done writing, but have to get alot of clean-up work to do. Just wondered how other film composers work.

Andy

[Frederik.Sjölund]

I havent exactly worked on a film-score. I did, however make music for a demo-reel of an outsourcing cg/games company.
The way we did it at that point was that they gave me samples of what style they were looking for, but of course giving me free creativity to implement my own style. At the point when the tunes were finished they cut together and edited all the scenes to fit the music.

I know that Hans Zimmer works very closely with the director when he makes most of his music for films. It is important to know the exact mood, feel and what kind of events will occur in each scene in order to have a soundtrack that textures the experience of watching the movie.

Make sure you get enough info, it would probably help

[andyriggle]

Did you do any work in a professional studio after your score was done, or did you do all the mixing and mastering yourself? What kind of software did you use, Finale and Sonar? Did you use a DAW or softsynths?

I know I ask alot of questions. Just curious.

Andy

[Frederik.Sjölund]

I did it all myself.
I use Cubase SX and the samplings i use are EWQL Symphonic Orchestra Gold aswell as Stormdrum

[robmcw]

Hi Andy,

I composed music and sound cues for a indie film once. Same thing happenend to me. I got descriptions first, (which I like) then I had to do a
couple of rewrites, and yes, it had to be completed in a month. It seems

thats the way the film biz works especally in the Indie world. Music layback

is the last process in the chain so we musicians/composers have the least
amount of time to 'get it right'.
You described writing about an hour of cues and then alot of clean-up.Yup! I think everyone including 'Hans' goes through the same process.
You can really tweak away and get things just right during the clean up
process.
Most of my work is done on the Synclavier 9600 with Post Pro plus other
sound boxes. Sounds a bit old but the sound is amazing and it locks to
picture 'tight as a drum'.
Hope your film is a Hit!

Rob