zirconMusic » events

PAX East 2010 Report

zircon — Thu, 01 Apr 2010 21:07:50 +0000

Last weekend was the first ever Penny Arcade Expo East in Boston, MA. I had the pleasure of being a speaker there along with a number of others from OC ReMix! Unlike GDC a few weeks ago, PAX is a consumer-oriented event that is less about networking and more about having a good time with other gamers. Not only did most of the OCR site staff go, but three of the Space Whales as well!

The panel I spoke on was about OC ReMix; our recent accomplishments, what we’re working on now, and where the site is headed. We had a live name-that-tune competition and a Q&A session afterward where I got to meet some old friends and fans. The day before the panel, myself and three other site staffers threw together a band and played a few songs at the “Jamspace” mini concert venue, hosted by MAGfest, another East coast convention I highly recommend.

Check out some pics of the event below!

Performing “Still Alive” from Portal with Deia Vengen (DragonAvenger), Amy Hsieh (diotrans), Jesse Taub (Vigilante) and a pickup drummer who was absolutely excellent. We also played Dr. Wily Stage 1 from Mega Man 2.

Myself and a number of other OCR site staffers getting interviewed for Machinima.com!

The OCR panel, from left to right: Larry Oji (Liontamer), diotrans, Vinnie Prahbu (Palpable, sitting), Vigilante, me, David Lloyd (djpretzel, in back), DragonAvenger, José Felix (José the Bronx Rican) and Wesley Cho (Bahamut.) We joked around that if something happened to the convention center, basically all of the OCR staff would be gone. :P

Enjoying some games of Smash Brothers for the Nintendo 64 several blocks from the convention at the TEP fraternity near MIT and Berklee (of which Vigilante is a member.)

Game Developers Conference 2010 Report, Monkey Island 2 Score

zircon — Mon, 15 Mar 2010 19:43:14 +0000

I’ve just returned from the annual Game Developers Conference in San Francisco where I spent five days hanging out with some of the nicest people in the video game industry! This was my first time at the SF GDC, an event that is geared toward video game industry professionals (or aspiring professionals), audio guys included. It is also home to the Game Audio Network Guild award ceremony, hosted by Paul Lipson and Tommy Tallarico.

Before I go into more detail about GDC itself, I’m very excited to announce that I’m working on the soundtrack to the recently-announced LucasArts game, Monkey Island 2 Special Edition: LeChuck’s Revenge! Much like the first Monkey Island Special Edition, MI2SE is a remake of the original MI2, featuring all-new high-definition graphics, an integrated hint system, improved controls and, of course, an updated musical score. I’m working with Dan Reynolds, Jeff Ball and Will Roget on this project, which spans over 80 minutes of music. The game will be available this Summer on XBLA, PSN, PC, iPhone and iPod Touch!

Anyway, getting back to GDC, I can’t even begin to list everyone I personally met and spent time with. While there is an expo component to the event, where larger video game developers, middleware manufacturers and related companies show their wares and sometimes look for fresh talent, the real purpose is networking. Events like the IASIG mixer, parties at Pyramind, panels, workshops, and 2am dinners at Denny’s introduced me to dozens of talented composers, sound designers, music implementers, studio owners and everyone in between. I hope to stay in touch with many of these folks over the years and collaborate with them (both as a composer, producer and sample developer) whenever possible.

In preparing for the event, I whipped up three new demo reels with the help of my wife, Jill, who was also at the conference. These genre-specific montages have been added to the Services and Music pages, but you can also download them here:

2010 Dramatic Montage
2010 Casual and Retro Montage
2010 Electronic Montage

Enjoy!

2010 – Year of the Zircon (New Tutorials)

zircon — Wed, 06 Jan 2010 16:37:30 +0000

Happy New Year to all… and a great year this is going to be. 2010 is hereby deemed “Year of the Zircon.” Every week – at a minimum – I’m going to be releasing something new: video game remixes, original songs, albums, video tutorials, articles/guides/e-books, sample libraries, projects, you name it. If you think I’ve been busy before, you ain’t seen nothin’ yet.

This week, I’m starting off with a pair of tutorials for the Zebra 2 synthesizer, one of my all time favorite plugins. I’ve started with the basics of the synth and its oscillators, but future tutorials will cover just about every aspect of it, as well as some tips on sound design. Check out the first two videos below.