Taking it into the future of gaming, audio and music
The August issue of Develop magazine is available now, including an article with SCEE’s Creative Services Group’s principal audio programmer, Nicolas Fournel talking about his vision of the future of game audio programing:
Nicolas Fournel has an impressive 20 years’ experience developing commercial digital audio software. He started out coding Amiga sample editors in assembler and went on to build audio technology for Factor 5 (including the GameCube SDK audio tools), Konami Hawaii and Electronic Arts, Vancouver before arriving at his current senior position within SCEE’s Creative Services Group.
So, how does he see the current and future state of game audio programming?
He says: “A significant focus for me is audio analysis to help create smarter tools, improve audio engines and enhance or even create gameplays,” he says. “For example you can analyse the spectral content of your assets and export this information to the game as metadata. When sounds are triggered or modified at runtime, you update the spectral matrix – a representation of the game’s overall output in the frequency domain. The audio engine can then make informed decisions: how to dynamically mix the game, to apply (or not) audio shaders to a sound effect based on its audio properties, and so on.
Perceptual voice management is also made possible, supplementing voice priority systems, to decide whether frequency-wise, it’s appropriate to start a new sound or not. If there are already ten very low frequency sounds playing on the left you might not want to add more. Remember – audio engines are deaf. They take decisions that impact the whole gaming experience without ‘listening’.
“Analysis is also the key to creating higher- level tools. The more your application knows about the data you’re manipulating, the better because it can assist with creative choices. Content-aware tools can represent your assets in a meaningful and useful way – for instance, maybe for a debris sound effect
what is important is the distribution of the impacts in time and the overall envelope. For a pitched musical instrument it will be the harmonics and the pitch. Audio analysis can be used to extract all kinds of features from amplitude to spectral shapes and more.“As to enhancing gameplay, an example from my own experience would be when I worked on Lost In Blue, a DS game where the player is lost on an island and has to make a fire. You use the stylus to rub wood together
Read online – Issu.com
Download – Develop August 2010 (PDF)
Gary Numan tours the U.S.
And if one weird’s not enough, check out Barbie
Switchable Mono mini jack output
Green and Blue Ultra Bright LED eyes
Pitch Up/Down Control
Switchable Pitch Up/Down LDR
Mute the voices Switch (constant low noise synth sound)
Two Noise Synth switches – these noises react to Barbies voice and mounth movements, they add extra bass and noise to her voices and when Barbies voice is switched off it just leaves these sounds which are really good!
Up for some really weird stuff?
The Otamatone hails from Japan (had to really…) and is a ‘singing’ instrument, one hand on the neck controlling pitch the other hand opening and closing the ‘mouth’.
Greensleeves otamatone Otamaton I tried to play greensleeves on.
Endlessly analog
Inventor Chris Estes gives a quick overview of the Endless Analog – CLASP.
Time again for the Moog fest
Festival organizers AC Entertainment have released the lineup for MoogFest 2010. The three-day festival, celebrating the vision of Robert Moog, will take place Halloween weekend, October 29-31, in Asheville, NC.
The MoogFest 2010 weekend kicks off on Friday with performances by the previously announced MGMT and Big Boi, plus Girl Talk, Panda Bear, RJD2 and others. Artists joining Massive Attack, Thievery Corporation and Jonsi for Saturday at the festival will include Four Tet, Caribou, Emeralds, and Matmos. The festival’s final day will be a Halloween party like none other, with performances by Hot Chip and Pretty Lights topping the bill.
Also confirmed to appear at MoogFest 2010 are EL-P, Dan Deacon, School of Seven Bells, Saturn Never Sleeps (Featuring King Britt & Rucyl), Dâm-Funk, Nortec Collective Presents: Bostich & Fussible, the Octopus Project, Jon Hopkins, Mimosa, Kuroma, Mountain Man, DJ Spooky and Two Fresh.
Information regarding MoogFest 2010’s workshops, panel discussions, art exhibitions, installations and film screenings, will be announced in the coming weeks as well.
Tickets for MoogFest 2010 go on sale Friday, August 13th at 12 Noon Eastern Time. Weekend festival passes – along with tickets for each individual day – will be available. To purchase tickets and for more information, visit moogfest.com.
MoogFest 2010 Lineup:
Friday, October 29
- MGMT
- Big Boi
- Girl Talk
- Panda Bear
- RJD2
- El-P
- Nortec Collective Presents: Bostich & Fussible
- Saturn Never Sleeps (Featuring King Britt & Rucyl)
- The Octopus Project
- Kuroma
Saturday, October 30
- Massive Attack
- Thievery Corporation
- Jonsi
- Caribou
- Four Tet
- Matmos
- Dâm-Funk
- School of Seven Bells
- Jon Hopkins
- Emeralds
- Mountain Man
Sunday, October 31
- Pretty Lights
- Hot Chip
- Dan Deacon
- Mimosa
- Two Fresh
- DJ Spooky
Erasure on the move
Although I have pretty much gone tired of Erasure, I am still a bit curious if Vince has managed to re-invent the band, probably not, but I am still hoping.
Vince Clarke and Andy Bell have finished work on the rough versions of the new Erasure songs. The material has now been sent to Mute Records for input from Daniel Miller. Andy Bell has followed the post parcel and is now also back in the UK. The duo have however already been planning the next phase of the process that will see them turn the rough versions into finished tracks.
Stockholm Goes Alternative
Solitary Experiments.
In June, I gave you the news about Stockholm Goes Alternative, an outdoor festival for EBM, industrial, goth and synthpop in Vallentuna close to Stockholm on June 17-18, 2011.
Now, the SGA organizers tell us the first 10 (out of 27) live acts are: Assemblage 23, Funker Vogt, Solitary Experiments, Elegant Machinery, Autodafeh, C-lekktor, Lost Area, Cephalgy, XP8 and Marlow. At this early stage we have not received confirmation from the artists or their agents.
SGA says tickets will be on sale for the reduced price SEK 575 plus administrive fees on September 3 (regular price 775).
Circuit bent Pokemon
This you must see 
Chiptunes performance
A live chip tunes performance treat:
i decided to create a patch in pure data for my live chiptune performance. i wanted to trigger effects & receive visual feedback on the arduinome to avoid having to look at my laptop. sorry for the slightly rubbish audio/video sync drift. i’m still working on getting that more accurate on linux.
DATAMASKIN
