Quick Tips – Page 2 – Shie Rozow – Composer, Music Editor

Quick Tip: Editing Soundtrack CDs

At the end of a film, I often have the pleasure of cutting the soundtrack CD. I find this part of the process to be especially fun because there are no more picture constraints, no hit points, no sound effects to compete with. It’s all about the music. It’s also challenging to pick & choose which pieces to keep, which not to include, where to edit (if at all) and in what order they should play. Here are a few quick tips that I use when cutting soundtracks:

1. Start by building a session with all the cues in show order. Trim any empty space in the fronts and ends of the audio files so they are nice and tidy.

2. Shoot for a soundtrack that’s about 45 minutes long. Less seems short. More can be too much. This isn’t a hard rule, if the soundtrack feels right at 44 minutes or 47 minutes that’s fine. Trust your instincts.

3. Get rid of cues that are repetitive or based on other cues. These make a lot of sense thematically in the film, but if they are very similar there’s typically no need for more than one in the soundtrack album.

4. Trim the fat. Writing for film often means vamping, looping, stretching & holding in order to make a hit. Those types of things can be trimmed or entirely cut out of a track for soundtrack purposes. If there’s a phrase that, for example, is in 4/4 but has a 5/4 bar somewhere which was clearly added to accommodate picture, get rid of the added beat.

5. Pick a cue order. Start with the show order and take a listen. If there’s a lull, move things around. If there are awkward key changes that bother you, move things around. There is no formula or science to this – just play around and use your judgement. When you play through the soundtrack and time flies by, you know you’re in good shape.

6. Establish the spacing between tracks. Now that you have everything in order, adjust the spacing between tracks so it feels just right. Again, there is no magic formula. If you’re going from a big action cue into a quiet emotional cue, you may want a longer space between those cues than you would going from two similar cues. Again, do what feels right.

7. If you have the time, leave the soundtrack along for a day or two, then go back and re-listen. It’s amazing how much perspective you gain by revisiting it after a bit of time.

8. Finally, a technical tip. Work with the highest quality mixes you have, and deliver those to mastering. Never down-sample before delivering to mastering. If the mixes are at 96k, deliver 96k and let the mastering facility down-sample to 44.1kHz/16 Bit.

quickIf you have any questions, feel free to contact me, or add a comment.

Quick Tip: Accepting Criticism Gracefully

Quick Tips

It is inevitable when working in film-music that on occasion (or sometimes quite often) we are subject to critiques and commentary of our work. Whether we’re soliciting input from someone, or the criticism is offered uninvited, it is something we must all deal with.

Being able to take criticism gracefully is a useful skill to have, and one which can be learned. There’s really not much to it. First you must keep in mind that musical taste is entirely subjective, and therefore so is all feedback relating to it. So if someone doesn’t care for your music, or your choice of a temp track, or your choice of how to edit something etc., they are simply expressing their opinion, which in the grand scheme of things matters no more or less than yours.

Second, keeping the first thing in mind, if the comments are coming form your director or producer (or other employer), then it is their opinion that counts for that particular project more than yours. And naturally they will criticize what they don’t like more readily than praise what they do like. They’re there to tell you what’s wrong so you can fix it, not to stroke your ego. So keep in mind that the criticism is not personal, but professional. After all, they hired you in the first place, so they like you enough to have given you the job, and they expect and trust that you can handle their notes and address them.

If you disagree with a note or criticism, ask yourself – do you disagree because your feelings are hurt? Or based on your professional opinion. If it is the latter, by all means discuss your thoughts regarding the criticism. The best way to do it is to ask leading questions – i.e. “so when you say it’s not doing it for you, do you mean it’s not exciting enough? Not energetic enough? Not hitting picture right?” Help them explain the issue in more detail – you’ll be surprised at how often what seems like a huge criticism at first turns out to really be just a request for a minor tweak.

If your feelings are hurt, then you’re not able to be objective at that moment, and it’s best to leave it alone and come back to it after you’ve had some time to think. Just respond gracefully with something like “Thank you for your notes” or “I’ll see what I can do” or “Let me think about it” and move on. The worst thing you can do is confront the person offering their criticism and tell them they’re wrong.

If they are just a friend or colleague or professional critic offering their thoughts about your work, then it really doesn’t matter. If you disagree that’s fine, who cares? It’s just their opinion, remember the first thing I told you – it’s subjective. If they are your employer, or someone you reached out to for input and advice, confronting them will only make you seem stubborn and unwilling to listen. Taking some time to gather your emotions and then revisiting the cue at a later time can do wonders.

Finally, if you reach out and ask for someone’s opinion, you should just accept it and thank them for taking the time to critique your work, even if you think their feedback is completely wrong. It is just their opinion. And if you really can’t handle criticism, then you’re in the wrong business.

If you have any questions, feel free to contact me, or add a comment.

Quick Tip: Cue Names

Quick Tips

There are no rules when it comes to naming cues. However, here are a few tips I’ve come up with based on my experience over the years.

Make names descriptive.
Try to come up with names that are descriptive of the scene you’re scoring. That way everyone immediately knows what scene a cue is intended for. Here are some good examples from Laurence Rosenthal’s score to Master Spy: The Robert Hanssen Story. “Bob’s New Gun,” “Losing The Baby,” “Money Troubles,” “Ramon Contacts Russians.” When I worked on 9 there were several action/fight scenes so we used the names of the creatures that were being fought in the cue names – “Winged Beast,” “Slaying The Beast,” “The Seamstress.”
Make names unique.
This expands on my first tip. Often there are common scene types that happen in many films – titles, fights, chases, shootouts, credits, etc. As a music-editor I have an extensive library of soundtracks containing countless tracks named simply “Chase” or “Titles” or “Shootout” and so on. Adding a word or two to generic titles makes them unique. It can be as simple as adding the film’s name like “Hellboy II Titles.” Instead of “Chase” try a unique descriptor like “Chasing Across DC” or “Berlin Foot Chase” or “Studio Chase.” Here are some examples of “Fight” cues with better names “Airplane Fight,” “Alley Fight,” “Bank Fight,” “Bathroom Fight.” By simply adding one descriptive word, you get a unique name.
Keep names short.
When you’re working on a film, you print out spotting notes, master cue lists and various other lists. Keeping names short makes formatting these various lists easier. I try to keep names to no more than 3 words. There are often exceptions, but that’s what I aim for.
Use existing conventions.
Often by the time you join a movie and spot it, the director and editor and others on the team are referring to certain sections of the film by descriptive names they assigned them. If they’re already referring to a scene by a certain name, and you’re going to have a cue for that scene, use that name. This will eliminate any confusion by having different names when referring to the same scene. Instead of their name when talking about the scene and yours when talking about the cue for that scene, just use the same name they’re already using.
Use lines of dialog.
Sometimes it’s difficult to figure out what to name a scene. There’s no simple description that makes itself obvious as a great name. Often in those cases, there is some key line of dialog that everyone working on the film will know and associate with that scene. Using that line (or paraphrasing it into 3-4 words) is an effective way to name cues. Here are some examples from when I worked on Go On, and even though a couple of years have passed, these key lines of dialog still remind me of the episode and scene right away “May I Follow Ryan?“, “Porsche, Ignition On!“, “I Can’t Stand Being Alone“, “I’m Gonna Dump Him“.

If you have any questions, feel free to contact me, or add a comment.

Quick Tip: Remembering Names of People You Meet

Networking, Quick Tips

I have a confession. I’m terrible at remembering names. I suspect if people didn’t call me by it on a daily basis, I would forget my own name. Yet it is important to remember names, not to mention that it impresses people whom you’ve only met once when you know their name when you see them again months later. And in this business we meet people at networking and other events all the time.

Here are a couple of tricks I’ve learned over the years to remember names.

1. When introduced to a new person, repeat their name out loud – “Nice to meet you, John.” That act of saying their name helps commit their name to memory, at least to short term memory. When you part ways do it again – “It was a pleasure speaking with you, John.”

2. If they hand you a business card, take a moment to study the card and identify something unique about it – the color, the font, there’s a photo in the background or on the back, it’s an unusual shape, paper weight, whatever, and think of something about the person you’ve met. Then tell yourself something that connects the two. For example “John’s wearing brown shoes and has a brown business card” or whatever connection you choose to make. Making these little connections helps commit things to memory.

3. As soon as you can, add the person’s contact information to your address book and use the notes field to make a note about them that will help you remember who they are. For example “Met at XYZ, talked about ABC.”

4. Followup with an email within 24 hours of meeting. It can be a short email “Hi John, it was a pleasure meeting you and talking about XYZ lat night.” This email reinforces the above, which helps you remember them.

In my experience, that’s enough to either remember the person’s name, or at the very least remember enough so that when you see them again you can quickly look them up and find them in your contacts even without remembering their name.

Here’s an actual example of these tips from my own experience. I was at a Film Independent members night event, where I met about 20 new people. One was a young director, and after using the above tricks, when I got home a couple of hours later I copied his information from his card to my address book. Here’s the note I made for him “Met at Film Independent members night – recently married, has a film about being engaged.”

I went to his site, and watched his short film. Then I emailed him:

Hi _______,

It was a pleasure meeting you last night. I just wanted to drop you a quick line so you have my info handy. I just watched your short Dinner for Two on your site – such a great concept and well done. I think your idea for doing something exploring being engaged is really smart. Please stay in touch, and hopefully we can work together some time.

And congrats again on your recent marriage!

Best,

Shie

This email triggered a response and we went back and forth a bit, discussing his next film and possibly having me score it. A couple of months later, we were both at another Film Independent members night. When I saw him I couldn’t remember his name, but thanks to all of the above I remembered who he was. I did a quick search on my phone’s address book for “film independent engaged” and his contact came up, allowing me to get his name. A few minutes later I was able to greet him with “Hi ______, how are you?” He recognized me and remembered I was that composer guy he’s been talking to, but didn’t remember my name. He also commented on how impressed he was that I remembered his name.

His next film is currently in pre-production, and we are discussing me scoring it.

Quick Tip: Software Authorization Codes

Quick Tips

These days all software requires entering a serial number and/or activation or authorization code during installation. We have a lots of codes for different products to keep track of, and if we even need to reinstall anything, finding those codes can be a challenge.

If I have a physical CD or DVD installer, I print the code(s) using my label maker and stick the label on the installer disk. For everything else, and as a backup to the physical labels on physical disks, I created a contact in my address book called “Authorization Codes” and I use the notes field to enter all my codes.

It’s super simple, I can simply copy/paste the codes so there are never any typos. My address book syncs across my computers and are in the cloud so my codes are now available to me anywhere at anytime.

If you have any questions, feel free to contact me, or add a comment.

Quick Tip: Color Coding Folders or Files

File Management, Quick Tips

Working on a Mac, I love the fact that I can color-code files or folders in the OS. It’s a lovely feature, and I often use it as I work to mark things as “ready to go,” or “do not use” or whatever else might come up, I use them for lots of different delineation.

I tend to use green to indicate something is good to go, red to indicate something is not to be used or problematic and orange if I have to stop something part way through a process, so I know I’m working on it but it’s not done. I use other colors for specific delineation as appropriate. I find this to be a very helpful tool.

The thing is, it’s easy to forget what each color indicates, especially when I use them to indicate different things in different folders and if projects go on for a while. So I use a simple trick. I create a subfolder labeled, for example “zGreen = Ready to Mix” or whatever green might indicate, and make it the same color.

Here’s a screen shot form a recent projects. In this folder we have ProTools sessions for different cues that were recording using a string section. I needed to edit the strings to create the best possible performance before I could import them to our mix session. As you can see, when I took this screenshot, most were done, a couple hadn’t been touched yet, and one had issues. Plain to see, no need to wonder what the colors mean, and also helpful should someone else need to take over, it’s self exlpanatory.

Color Coded Folders

Quick Tip: MP3s

Quick Tips

Whenever I finish a project, whether I’m composing or music editing, I make MP3s of the complete score and make them available to the entire team. It’s easy to do and everyone appreciates having a copy of the score they helped create.

Quick Tip: Matching Tempi Using Serato Pitch ‘n Time

Pitch 'n Time, ProTools, Quick Tips

Serato Pitch ‘n Time Pro is one of my favorite ProTools plug-ins. In addition to being able to use it speed up or slow down tracks, and change their pitch, it has a very easy way to match tempi of two different tracks. Here’s how it’s done:

For this Quick Tip, I’m using a Drum Loop and a Tambourine Loop.

Here’s what the Drum Loop sounds like:

Here’s what the Tambourine Loop sounds like:

1. Import the two tracks you whose tempi you wish to match. Here’s a screenshot of my 4 bar Drum Loop (blue clip) & a faster tempo 8 bar Tambourine Loop (green clip)

Two Loops

Here’s what they sound like together, quite the train wreck:

2. Create a clip whose bar count matches the clip you want to match. Below is a screenshot showing how I split the 8 bar Tambourine Loop into two 4 bar clips, to match the 4 bar Drum Loop clip. You can see the Tambourine Loop clip is shorter than the Drum Loop clip because it is faster.

Match Bars

3. Open Pitch ‘n Time Pro from the AudioSuite menu. Highlight the tempo you want to match, and click Capture in the plug-in (about half way down on the right). The button will turn orange.

Pitch ‘n Time Capture

4. Highlight the clip whose tempo you want to alter to match the other. You’ll notice the tempo settings in Pitch ‘n Time Pro automatically change.

Pitch ‘n Time Matching Selection

5. Click the Capture button again, to disarm it. Then select augment your clip selection from just 4 bars to all 8 bars (or as much as you want to modify).

Pitch ‘n Time Full Selection

6. Click the Render button in Pitch ‘n Time Pro (bottom right). This will adjust the tempo of the selection. In this example, it slows down the Tambourine Loop to match the slower Drum Loop clip.

Pitch ‘n Time Render

7. That’s it, you’re done. I chose to duplicate the Drum Loop so I have 8 bars of both the Drum Loop & the Tambourine Loop.

Done

Here’s what they sound like together once the tempi are matched:

If you have any questions, feel free to contact me, or add a comment.

Quick Tip: Control, Option & Command Keys in ProTools

ProTools, Quick Tips

ProTools makes excellent use of the Control, Option & Command keys to modify the behavior of things while editing. Understanding what they do while in the arrange window will help speed up your work.

Control Key
The Control key snaps the beginning of a selected clip to the cursor location. This can be useful in two ways:

Quickly move a clip to a specific location. Set the curser at the desired location, the hold down Control and click on the region you want to move & it will snap to the location of your cursor.
Prevent a clip from accidentally sliding out of its position when moving it up or down to a different track. Simply highlight the clip, click Control and drag the clip up or down to the desired track. You’ll notice the clip won’t move sideways because it’s locked to your cursor position, which is the beginning of the highlighted selection.

Command Key
The Command key simply modifies the above Control key behavior so that things line up to the end of a clip or selection instead of the beginning.

Try the above two examples, but this time use Control + Command.

Option Key
The Option key copies clips.

Need to copy a clip to another track or location on the same track? Hold down Option and simply drag the clip to the desired location.

Want to copy a clip to the location of your cursor? Add the Control key: Hold down Control + Option and click on the desired clip. A copy of the clip will snap to the location of your cursor.

Want to make a copy of a clip that ends at the location of your cursor? Add the Command key: Hold down Control + Option + Command and click on the desired clip. A copy of the clip will appear ending at the location of your cursor. You can use this trick to copy loops backwards – click here for my quick tip about looping backwards.

If you have any questions, feel free to contact me, or add a comment.

Quick Tip: Looping Backwards in ProTools

ProTools, Quick Tips

When working with loops, ProTools makes it easy to loop a region. There are two methods. My favorite is to simply highlight the clip I want to loop and click Command + D (Edit Menu > Duplicate) as many times as I want the region to loop.

You can also click Command + Option + L to open the Clip Looping window (Clip Menu > Loop) and use the Clip Looping window to loop the clip as desired.

Both methods work well when looping forward, that is adding loops following the original clip. But what if you want to add a loop backwards, that is add a loop before the original clip? Luckily there’s a key combination that makes this possible.

Hold down Control + Command + Option and then click on the clip you want to loop backwards. It’ll work just like Duplicate (Command + D), except the new clip will appear in front of the one you’re looping.

If you have any questions, feel free to contact me, or add a comment.

Quick Tip: Finding the Tempo of a Track in ProTools

Quick Tips

Here’s a quick and easy way to identify the tempo of a track using ProTools:

1. Import the track into your ProTools session.

2. Create a region (Command + E) of several bars – I like to use at least 4 bars. Be as accurate as you can when identifying a downbeat (see image below).

Separate Clip at Selection

3. Select your new region and Click Command+I (Event menu > Identify Beat…)

Event > Identify Beat

This will open the Add Bar | Beat Markers window.

Command + I

4. In the Add Bar | Beat Markers window, enter the start and stop bar of your selection along with the time signature. In this example I made a region that was 9 bars long at a time signature of 6/8.

Add Bar | Beat Markers

ProTools will automatically move the song start marker to the beginning of your selection and insert the calculated tempo, in this case 96.1398.

Tempo Identified

It’s not uncommon for the tempo to be slightly off. ProTools is sample-accurate and calculates the tempo based on our selection. But us humans are not sample-accurate, so our selections will likely be slightly off.

In the above example, the beat was identified as 96.1398. It is actually 96. You can change the tempo manually if you wish. The longer the selection you use to identify the beat, the more accurate it will be. And here’s For King & Country, the track I used for this example:

If you have any questions, feel free to contact me, or add a comment.

Quick Tip: Auto-Play? Don’t!

Quick Tips

Many music players allow you to automatically play music when your website loads. If you’re considering using an auto-play feature, please don’t!

Someone may be visiting your site while at work, or in a public space, or while listening to other music, or watching TV, or some other situation where auto-playing would be disruptive, not to mention it’s just plain annoying.

If a visitor wants to listen to music on your site, they know how the click the play button.

If you have any questions, feel free to contact me, or add a comment.