Music for the Media
Origins
Film and game music has been around since films and computer games have been around. The purpose of the music is to add atmosphere and set tone for the film or game.
Musical Fingerprints: Film
Instrumentation: the first silent films would rely solely on a live pianist to provide the music for the film, however, once films started to incorporate sound, full orchestral arrangements were favoured. Over time, film composers have more heavily relied on synthesisers to provide music for film.
Melody: usually designed to be simple, catchy and easily recognisable. Heavily thematic; specific musical motifs to represent a character, a place or a feeling.
Textures: Can vary to match the mood of the film; thicker textures for ‘epic’ scenes, thinner textures for ‘gentler’ scenes etc.
Harmony: Harmony is very important for film composers to be able to set the right tone for the film/scene.
Musical Fingerprints: Game
Instrumentation: Game music started off being purely synthesiser based, using 8-bit technology, but as computer games developed, full orchestral scores could be written and recorded for games.
Melody: Commonly composed in a way that keeps the player’s attention; catchy and easily recognisable. Can be thematic; different themes and recurring motifs to represent places, characters etc.
Texture: As with film music, the texture varies to fit the ‘feel’ of the game; thick textures to fit with intense games, for example.
Rhythm and Tempo: Originally very simple rhythms due to 8-bit restrictions. Tempo to suit the type of game; fast tempos to suit ‘high intensity’ games.
Technological Fingerprints: Film
Orchestra plays and is recorded in sync with the film; before DAW technology, composers would have to be very specific with their timings.
DAW technology has allowed film composers to match their compositions to the ‘rhythm’ of the editing of the film, through the use of click tracks.
DAW technology has also allowed composers to test out their compositions with the film using synthesisers, before the music is committed to paper and the orchestra is recorded.
Some composers, specifically Hans Zimmer, use lots of creative effects to form unique sounds and atmospheres.
Technological Fingerprints: Game
Originally, game music was all chip-tune, or 8-bit, made using a programmable sound generator sound chip within the games console.
Each sound chip would contain 5 channels that could be programmed to compose music; it is all explained in this handy little video here...
Once computers could handle more data, video game music composers began to record their soundtracks using real instruments, most likely full orchestras. These would be recorded digitally, due to the time at which it was being recorded.
Artists: Film
Hans Zimmer, Ennio Morricone, John Williams.
Artists: Game
Mick Gordon, Koji Kondo, Nobuo Uematsu.