Extended Project

Friday, 20 April 2012

Final Evaluation (After Presentation)

At first I wasn't happy with my project and felt that I could have further developed it , I had met the proposal and completed four tracks but I did this with some time to spare and knew that I could do more work.
After adding a mixtape to the EP I feel that I added the extra something that the EP needed to be finished fully.

Research played a massive part in getting my EP to the standard I wanted , if anything it was the most important part , but thinking up a song is really easy but comunicating your ideas to a piece of software is alot harder so without learning how to use the software properly certain things become impossible.

I have learnt alot more music production techniques and skills since I started this project and I think that if I did it again I would produce an EP of higher quality , for now Im going to be giving the EP away for free on my soundcloud account www.soundcloud.com/trakscene .

Wednesday, 18 April 2012

Extended project presentation

View more presentations from 953495.

Friday, 30 March 2012

Activity Log

Week One - Spent time trying to get hold of the sofware I wanted so that I could make the tracks for the EP , but it was to expensive and I didn't want to download it illegaly.

Week Two - Realised that I was going to have to cope without the software and instead just decided to use the software I already have at home plus Reason 5 and Cubase 5 at college.

Week Three - Sat down and produced the first track on the EP , took a solid three or four hours , remembered to do all the printscreens and write down all the different procceses I went through to finish the track.

Week Four - I had planned to to produce another track this week but didn't manage to find enough time to sit down and produce for long enough.

Week Five - Produced two of the tracks on the EP during this week.

Week Six - Produced another one of the tracks , The EP is finished.

Week Seven - I started to think I could have added more tracks to the EP.

Week Eight - I added a mixtape , this was extra and I did not have to add it.

Week Nine - Wrote up and reviewed my EP

Week ten - I presented my EP to the class and explained the finished Artifact.

Thursday, 22 March 2012

Charlie MacArthur - Extended Project EP

This is the final product - 5 Original Tracks and a bonus mixtape of work from various other artists

Further Development Of Product

After finishing the project and feeling like I could have done more work I went to the studio two days before my final presentation and produced a brand new ten minute dubstep mix to add as a bonus for people downloading the EP . Im much happier with the finished product now as I feel that I have pushed it as far as I can.

Friday, 9 March 2012

Evaluation For My EP

After sitting down and planing out my ideas I came to the conclusion that I wanted to produce a four track EP foccusing on Dubstep with a twist of garage and Liquid Drum and Bass.

I realise now that Im finished I was a bit optimistic when I first planned out my timescales and have had to completely change them to make this project possible I thought I would be able to have everything done and sorted within a month but that had not been possible due to other work for college and software issues.

I put alot of time into finding the perfect research material i found it important to find video tutorials because I personally find it easier to learn something by watching a person do it , as apposed to just reading instructions or guides.

I then looked into artists that have also done the same type of thing as me e.g. other music producers that work in the same genres as I was. Although I have litstened to over a thousand dubstep track (Dubstep DJ) here are a couple example of the type of songs and artists that inspired my to create my EP in the way that I did. I also included a couple of drum and bass tracks that relate to one of the track on my EP.

"50 carrott - Secret Carrott Rave"

I like this type of tune because it has dark deep basslines

With powerfull kick and snare drums to bop your head to

"Zed Bias - Badness (Feat Skream)"

I love the heavy basslines that maintain an upbeat flare

it blends dark and light sounds perfectly.

"Noisia and Phase - Unveil"

The dark synth lines and strong build are aspects

that I want to have in my tracks

"Spor - Aztec"

This is an all time classic drum and bass tune

and is considered one of the very best drum

and bass tunes

To me listening to differnt songs it similar genres is the same as compiling a moodboard of pictures , it gives me an idea of what Im trying to create and the ideas and methods that Im going be following in order to achieve it.

It also helps to take a break during producing to compare it to famous artists work , following by example is one of the best ways to learn.

Im pleased with the work that I put in to produce this EP and pleased with the end product , although as a music producer I am super critical of my own work which means I feel that although alot of time and work went in to this project I honestly feel like I could have spent more hours in the studio and perfected the things like the post production e.g. the mixdown and mastering,

Money was also an issue because although I have access to music editing software at college I do not have access to these pieces of software at home because they cost around £150 each which means I would have to spent somewhere in the region of £300 and I just don't have that kind of money.

Given more time and the perfect enviroment for example a music studio I could have produced something of a higher standard , but Im pleased with the EP in that I managed to produce it using a standard quality laptop you would find in a home and the facilities available in the classrooms at Henley College.

Another positive thing about the EP is its seen some support from people than have listened to it online , responding to it by posting commens on the tracks and downloading and favourting them , to me this is a clear indication that Iv'e done something right.

This project has given me a good chance to practice my music production skills which is massively helpfull for my course as I am constantly working with software such as Cubase 5 and Reason 5 Editing and creating sounds and music.

I think if I had to do this project again I would be alot stricter on myself as more or less lock myself in a studio for a week and get some serious work done , with full mixdown and mastering of every single track and serious scrutony of every single minor detail on the track wither it the SFX or effects on each indivudual drum.

Monday, 12 December 2011

EP Tracks Analysed And Explained

I produce music under the production name Trakscene
Here Is a Link To the finished EP
But I wrote My name as the title so its
clear that its actually me

http://soundcloud.com/trakscene/sets/trakscene

I had to change from my original plan of sitting down
and producing four tracks in two weeks , it was
an unrealistic target as I have loads of other work to be doing.

This meant I had to change and develop my plan to fit in with
all my other work. This involved moving dates when I
planned on being in recording session and using different software
than I had planned to because its more user friendly and saved
time.

Im happy with the finished product and I hope others are too.

Below are the explanations on how I produced each individual track
and where you can find links for each individual one, although the link
at the top will take you to a set I have made where they can all be viewed at once.
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I decided to make a a Dubstep/Grime Instrumental , hopefully later on in the project I will be able to find an artist who can provide vocals for my track which would be a win win situation for both of us.

I started my track my producing a simple SFX loop with a sort of electronic sound. I made sure that the loop was made to match the 140BPM mark so that it would be syncronised with the drums, bassline etc.

Here is a photo of the SFX Loop

Once I got further into the production of the track I decided to remove the SFX loop from the intro and bring in on the 2nd drop half way through the track , I liked the idea of having a change up as apposed to keeping the same SFX sound going on in the background throughout as it might bore the listener.

I then went on to produce two different drum loops each four beats in length and containing a kick drum , two different high hats , a snare drum and finally a clap.

I wanted to produce two different loops so that I place them into the track at apporiate moments for example at the end of every 16th bar I used the 2nd drum loop.

Here are photos of both of the different drum loops the 1st drum loop is on the top , and the 2nd on the bottom.

After producing the drum loops I wanted to produce a piano melody and a bassline. I began with the piano melody.

I had previously produced various different piano loops using Reason 5 and had saved them as mp3 files so whenever Im making a track I can just take those loops and throw them straight on without having to plan out the notes and chords , it helps me maintain my momentum when creating music.

I imported the loops I had made into FL studio and placed them straight into the "Playlist" with the drums I had placed in the intro.

Here is a photo of the drums and the piano loop on the playlist

When Finally mixing down the track and adding final samples and edits I felt should be made I decided to remove the piano loop as it didn't work with the bassline I created very well and the track sounded better without the piano.

I imported a bass loop that I had made in Reason 5 using the Malstron VST instrument and sliced it up to create a new intro. Once the track drops on the 16th bar I changed it back to the original loop I produced as to give the track a change up to give it some variation.

The first photo is the sliced loop that I cut up to create a different sounding intro and the second loop is simply a loop that I had produced earlier and had placed on this track without editing.

As you can see their is a massive difference beetween the two , despite the fact their all the sames sounds just rearranged in a different order.

I placed the bassline loops and the drum patterns in a structure I was happy with and then began to add SFX samples to the playlist for example I added a reverse cymbal before the 16th bar to build tension and make it clear that the drop was coming. I also used a sample of a sweep sound to fill the gap beetween the 7th and 8th bars where the drums stop and all you can hear is the bassline.

Here is a photo of both SFX I imported into my track , I bought a sample pack of the internet and these were both included in that pack.

This is a photo of the playlist once I had produced all the different parts that I would need for a song and then imported these other clips to add to the the track.

This photo also includes all the automation clips that I added to control volume on the track e.g. automating the master volume so the breakdowns and intro are not as loud as the rest of the track.

Once the basic structure was in place I decided that it would be a good idea to add effects to different parts of the song and I also used various different plugins such as parametric equalisers to get my end sound exactly as I wanted it to be.

Here is a photo of all the effects I put on the master Output

I also used several different effects on my bassline. Here is a photo of all the effects.

I borrowed a USB microphone from college so that I could record vocals over the track.

I found a grime artist who wanted to use the track because he liked it so much.

Here is a link to the track with the vocals on.

http://soundcloud.com/gms

Im not happy with the vocals I got from this artist I thought they were better at grime than they turned out to be. Im still pleased that I managed to use a microphone to put vocals over a track though.

We recorded all the vocals in silence directly to the zoom and then placed the files in the playlist on FL studio.

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This is the next track on the EP

Its a Dubstep Track with samples from

the movie "The Matrix" added

This is the artwork I used for this track online

I produced this track at home using FL Studio 9 so I more or less went through the same process as I did with the first track but using different sounds and layouts of patterns that Iv'e created , unfortunately I don't have any printscreens for this track but its been uploaded my soundcloud account where it is available for free download.