# AdvBrass + Jackman = Magic!



## NoamL

"The Waterfall Jump" from _Jumanji: Welcome To The Jungle_ (2017)
Music composed by Henry Jackman
Mockup by Noam Levy (@NoamL) and Eugene Latsko (@Grim_Universe)
(Transcription & MIDI Mockup by Noam, Mix & Master by Eugene)



Hello everyone! It's another episode in the Equals Magic series, this time starring Henry Jackman's excellent score for _Jumanji._ (Previously: CSS + Elgar = Magic, and CSS + Williams = Magic).

All feedback & critique is appreciated, and thanks for listening!


----------



## Saxer

That sounds really fat! Great stuff!
CSS & Adventure Brass? What else did you use?


----------



## NoamL

Thanks!

The brass is Adventure Brass with some "reinforcement" from Berlin Brass and Jasper Blunk's Fortissimo Brass Freebie. The strings are Adventure Strings similarly backed up with Cinematic Studio Strings, Cinematic Studio Solo Strings, and Performance Samples Fluid Shorts.

Percussion and winds are mostly Hollywood Orchestra with some Heavyocity stuff.


----------



## patrick76

Sounds really wonderful! A great collaboration.


----------



## Ben E

Amazing


----------



## Paul T McGraw

@NoamL once again I am impressed! Great midi-performance and great mix. Your "= Magic" series just proves how close a good team can actually get to the sound of a live orchestra! I am not a fan of the adventure series usually, but it sounds really great in this track.

Where did you find a score for Jumaji?


----------



## Rob

wonderful... 
a tiny tiny bit more ambience maybe?


----------



## fixxer49

NoamL said:


> "The Waterfall Jump" from _Jumanji: Welcome To The Jungle_ (2017)
> Music composed by Henry Jackman
> Mockup by Noam Levy (@NoamL) and Eugene Latsko (@Grim_Universe)
> (Transcription & MIDI Mockup by Noam, Mix & Master by Eugene)
> 
> 
> 
> Hello everyone! It's another episode in the Equals Magic series, this time starring Henry Jackman's excellent score for _Jumanji._ (Previously: CSS + Elgar = Magic, and CSS + Williams = Magic).
> 
> All feedback & critique is appreciated, and thanks for listening!



out-f-ing-standing


----------



## NathanTiemeyer

NoamL said:


> "The Waterfall Jump" from _Jumanji: Welcome To The Jungle_ (2017)
> Music composed by Henry Jackman
> Mockup by Noam Levy (@NoamL) and Eugene Latsko (@Grim_Universe)
> (Transcription & MIDI Mockup by Noam, Mix & Master by Eugene)
> 
> 
> 
> Hello everyone! It's another episode in the Equals Magic series, this time starring Henry Jackman's excellent score for _Jumanji._ (Previously: CSS + Elgar = Magic, and CSS + Williams = Magic).
> 
> All feedback & critique is appreciated, and thanks for listening!



INCREDIBLE mock up! Wow! Very glad I was able to introduce you to this score! This recreation certainly lives to the "magic" mentioned in the title!  I also feel the need to play around with Adventure Brass again because you've made it sound so incredible!


----------



## NoamL

patrick76 said:


> Sounds really wonderful!





Ben E said:


> Amazing





Paul T McGraw said:


> Great midi-performance and great mix.





fixxer49 said:


> out-f-ing-standing





NathanTiemeyer said:


> INCREDIBLE mock up!



Thank you! 



Paul T McGraw said:


> Where did you find a score for Jumaji?



I transcribed this by ear.



patrick76 said:


> A great collaboration.





Paul T McGraw said:


> just proves how close a good team can actually get to the sound of a live orchestra!



Yes! The work Eugene (@Grim_Universe) did on the mix & master was crucial and excellent. And, it was a LOT of work on his part. This mockup has 147 audio stems because of the duplicate libraries; the Potter mockup we created together only had 87.

To show you all the difference, here is the "pre mix" version of the piece - all the libraries are out of the box, the different microphones have been set to rational fader levels but there is no EQ or any other post processing:



As you can hear there was a lot of work to do smoothing out the sound! 



Rob said:


> a tiny tiny bit more ambience maybe?



Haha! You are most likely right. After listening to my premix all the time https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NmGhuo5J06I&t=120 (and to the real soundtrack) (which is very dry, it was recorded at MGM/SONY) I worried a little if our final mockup was too wet!



NathanTiemeyer said:


> I also feel the need to play around with Adventure Brass again because you've made it sound so incredible!





Paul T McGraw said:


> I am not a fan of the adventure series usually, but it sounds really great in this track.



So... this was inspired by _*Hans Zimmer Strings*_ actually 

I was thinking about the 31 microphones including the bizarre ones (bottle mic, riser mic) which sparked some discussion here on VIC. As I understand it, the idea behind the library is *"mixing with mics"* instead of mixing with EQ or other plugins - that is, you can color the sound by bringing in an ostensibly "bad" microphone that only captures some of the sound spectrum, to emphasize certain frequencies. The resultant authenticity is appealing because all of the signal is still "real" sound.

So, I thought I could fake this approach with the brass, by combining Adventure Brass & Berlin Brass. Initially I just got the typical layered-library sound... you know, sort of indistinct and synthy. My breakthrough came from aligning the libraries exactly. I found mics in both libraries that sounded equally far away. Then I used a delay so the staccatos and other attacks in Berlin's microphone, lined up exactly with Adventure Brass. This had to be done independently for each of the Berlin instruments - IIRC the trumpets were only 5 milliseconds apart from their Adventure counterparts, but the tubas were 30 ms apart - and some instruments needed negative instead of positive delay.

When this is done, the ambient mics of Berlin really sound like extensions of the Adventure Brass sound. Here is a comparison, first just Adventure, then Adventure+Berlin:



Berlin alone doesn't _really_ have the high dynamics needed for the piece, but layered behind Adventure, you don't hear those limitations as much. The libraries complement each other nicely.


----------



## wbacer

Berlin alone doesn't _really_ have the high dynamics needed for the piece, but layered behind Adventure, you don't hear those limitations as much. The libraries complement each other nicely.[/QUOTE]
Great idea, I'm going to give this a try


----------



## Grim_Universe

Actually I didn't know that Noam recreated everything just by ear.. Incredible. What I want to say is that he is incredibly talented and has outstanding musical feeling. Thank you, guys, for your appreciation, it was a really tough work to do. I mean there are a lot of rebalancing, EQing, and other audio engineering stuff.


----------



## AlexanderSchiborr

NoamL said:


> "The Waterfall Jump" from _Jumanji: Welcome To The Jungle_ (2017)
> Music composed by Henry Jackman
> Mockup by Noam Levy (@NoamL) and Eugene Latsko (@Grim_Universe)
> (Transcription & MIDI Mockup by Noam, Mix & Master by Eugene)
> 
> 
> 
> Hello everyone! It's another episode in the Equals Magic series, this time starring Henry Jackman's excellent score for _Jumanji._ (Previously: CSS + Elgar = Magic, and CSS + Williams = Magic).
> 
> All feedback & critique is appreciated, and thanks for listening!




So finally..man that was a ride. I mean the composition is stellar..what can I say. Full of tensions and surprise and interest. Comparing it to the original, your version or the mixed one from eugene has definitely more aggression and impact, but that is cool. It is extremely well done, almost fools me, sometimes I can hear the samples limitations but most the time, it is really kick ass. What a work. I actually still like your premix also a lot which is a bit...more..raw :D

But man hats off to you both here. Magic? You both should open a label and work together, hehe! If you need a good coffee cuban style maker dude, let me know I would be interested!


----------



## Replicant

Mind-blowing


----------



## NoamL

Grim_Universe said:


> I mean there are a lot of rebalancing, EQing, and other audio engineering stuff.



I'm actually really curious what you did! Especially for the brass sound. Some kind of multi band compression maybe?



AlexanderSchiborr said:


> I mean the composition is stellar..what can I say. Full of tensions and surprise and interest.



Yes, Henry Jackman is so talented! His score develops nearly everything from character themes - even this fast-paced chase music.



About transcribing the piece - I got a PM this afternoon asking if I transcribed the piece by ear or "from a Jumanji score" and I wrote him/her some tips on transcribing. Figure it's safe to post the reply with the name removed 

Hi _____, Yes, I transcribed this piece by ear... However, there was a lot of "cheating." I certainly didn't sit down at the piano and put it all together like Mike Verta or some other people can do. First I created a click track / tempo map that was an exact copy of the recording, and 9 empty MIDI tracks (Violins, Violas, Cello, Bass, Trumpet, Trombone, Horn, Tuba, Woodwinds). Then I started listening to the piece over and over, creating empty MIDI regions on each track to mark where that instrument would have notes, which created a kind of "to do list" for the transcription. The trumpets and horns were the easiest so I started transcribing with those two. For the lower instruments, I used a pitch shifter plugin to raise everything an octave so I could hear the basslines better. For a lot of the string writing, I just focused on a small piece of audio at a time and slowed it down by 400% or 800% to hear the exact notes & rhythms. For some things, like the harp glissandos, I just guessed based on the octatonic feeling of the piece and the few notes I could hear. Similarly for the woodwinds I just orchestrated as best as I could. There's no doubt that the piece is not 100% accurate to the original recording but it's close enough. Also, this was an iterative process. It was only after completing a lot of the piece that I realized there are "holes" where the violas _should_ be playing, and then I was able to hear the notes that were missing because I was so familiar with everything I had already mocked up. Similarly I discovered some woodwind passages that I didn't even notice during the first pass of creating empty MIDI regions. Hope this was useful! Oh, one more thing - in addition to slowing down the piece when transcribing those tricky woodwind parts, I used a high pass filter too, which created a relative boost in their sound by eliminating all the cellos, trombones etc. However, again, I would be unsurprised if the woodwind parts have a couple errors!


----------



## fixxer49

NoamL said:


> in addition to slowing down the piece when transcribing those tricky woodwind parts, *I used a high pass filter too, which created a relative boost in their sound by eliminating all the cellos, trombones *etc.


dammit, this is clever and creative!


----------



## mike829

This is magnificent! Everything sounds very convincing except for the trumpets (which I'm sure is just a limitation of Adventure Brass). Horns, low brass and strings sound especially good. Bravo on the transcription! Your pre-mix sounds more similar to the actual recording (ambience-wise) but I like the final version better! This score was recorded a bit too dry for my tastes and in my opinion disservices the brilliant main theme 'The Jumanji Overture.' One of the more underrated scores from last year!


----------



## javarnayu

NoamL said:


> "The Waterfall Jump" from _Jumanji: Welcome To The Jungle_ (2017)
> Music composed by Henry Jackman
> Mockup by Noam Levy (@NoamL) and Eugene Latsko (@Grim_Universe)
> (Transcription & MIDI Mockup by Noam, Mix & Master by Eugene)
> 
> 
> 
> Hello everyone! It's another episode in the Equals Magic series, this time starring Henry Jackman's excellent score for _Jumanji._ (Previously: CSS + Elgar = Magic, and CSS + Williams = Magic).
> 
> All feedback & critique is appreciated, and thanks for listening!




Wonderfull. Congratullations


----------



## benmrx

Fantastic job!!

Oh, and thanks for the idea on mixing libraries. I've been on the fence regarding Adventure Brass because I was never sold on the sound. Today I took a part of their walkthru, loaded it into cubase, and layered it with patches from Spitfire Symphonic Brass using the ambient mics. It took a bit of fiddling to get the MIDI notes to line up with the audio from the walkthru..., but I was pretty stoked with the result.


----------



## NoamL

benmrx said:


> Fantastic job!!
> 
> Oh, and thanks for the idea on mixing libraries. I've been on the fence regarding Adventure Brass because I was never sold on the sound. Today I took a part of their walkthru, loaded it into cubase, and layered it with patches from Spitfire Symphonic Brass using the ambient mics. It took a bit of fiddling to get the MIDI notes to line up with the audio from the walkthru..., but I was pretty stoked with the result.



I did the same technique with strings too. Here are the violins & violas, 1) mix, 2) Adventure Strings, 3) CSS+CSSS, 4) Fluid Shorts.



Altogether this gives 7 mics to mix: one from AS, three from CSS, and three from FS. I guess three more if you split out the CSS Solo Strings.

The Adventure Strings are the most aggressive, and only have one mic. The CSS mic mix can therefore be tilted towards the rear mics a bit, i.e. the AS mic kind of substitutes for the CSS close mic. The Fluid Shorts are mixed in only at a low level to add a little wideness and brightness. Can't mix them very loud because they only have spiccatos - so in this mockup they drop out completely for trills, tremolos, etc.


----------



## Cass Hansen

Hats off to you and Eugene on this one. I was impressed but not blown away with your last one, the Harry Potter track because for me it just lacked vitality in the performance. I realize these are two completely different genres, but in this case you hit the nail firmly on the head. Riveting and full of expression and I'm talking about your work with the mics and balance and the rendering and mixing here. Yes, the composition is also great but I really am blown away by the actual rendering of the whole thing. 

I also really appreciate such open candor on how you went about doing this. So many try to "hide" their secrets which is silly when you think about it because we're all so different and unique as composers as far as the actual music we write, we'll always be individuals, but the virtual rendering we all must master. So a special thank you on taking time to explain your process. Wonderful!

And just when I firmly believed that virtual orchestras would never or could ever come close to the real deal you both post this track and change my mindset. 

Kudos to you both!!
Cass


----------



## DMDComposer

NoamL said:


> So, I thought I could fake this approach with the brass, by combining Adventure Brass & Berlin Brass. Initially I just got the typical layered-library sound... you know, sort of indistinct and synthy. My breakthrough came from aligning the libraries exactly. I found mics in both libraries that sounded equally far away. Then I used a delay so the staccatos and other attacks in Berlin's microphone, lined up exactly with Adventure Brass. This had to be done independently for each of the Berlin instruments - IIRC the trumpets were only 5 milliseconds apart from their Adventure counterparts, but the tubas were 30 ms apart - and some instruments needed negative instead of positive delay.
> 
> When this is done, the ambient mics of Berlin really sound like extensions of the Adventure Brass sound. Here is a comparison, first just Adventure, then Adventure+Berlin:
> 
> 
> 
> Berlin alone doesn't _really_ have the high dynamics needed for the piece, but layered behind Adventure, you don't hear those limitations as much. The libraries complement each other nicely.




Hi Noam, fantastic mockup. I was wondering if you could touch a bit further on this point. Are you

1) Using mulitple mics from Berlin or just their "Ambient" -- AB/Surround mics along with Adventure Brass.

2) Are you just combing like BBR's Sustain Imm with Adventure Brass so it plays smoothly? Or are you actually still changing every articulation with BBR.


----------



## NoamL

DMDComposer said:


> 1) Are you using mulitple mics from Berlin or just their "Ambient" -- AB/Surround mics along with Adventure Brass.



My rough premix is:

Adv Close -11
Adv Room -6
Berlin CloseOne -14
Berlin CloseTwo -2
Berlin ORTF -1
Berlin AB +1
Berlin Tree +3
Berlin Surround +3

However, keep in mind, Eugene has complete control over each of these stems in his mix, so the final version is better because of his work! 

Oh I also forgot to mention that there is Hollywood Brass in this mockup, for the muted horn parts.

I do not recommend loading all the mics and trying to bounce the entire session... it's not even physically possible on my poor Macbook (16gb memory). So, once the actual mockup (i.e. MIDI) is done, I split everything down to "bouncing sessions" where I load all the mics for just one section and bounce the stems. It's a really stupid way of working but... I can't afford a supercomputer!










> 2) Are you just combing like BBR's Sustain Imm with Adventure Brass so it plays smoothly? Or are you actually still changing every articulation with BBR.



No, I'm using the full articulation set in Berlin Brass. So the actual MIDI mockup instructions are different for the two libraries. I used the Sustain Immediate, Staccato, Staccatissimo, and the one shot Crescendos. The horns are mostly the special Bells Up patches.

Stacking BBR+AB would indeed be possible... I have some ideas & have experimented with some technology that allows a composer to stack libraries seamlessly.

basically right now when you try to stack libraries the 4 problems you run into are:

*#1.* Actual volume mismatch; some libraries are crazy loud out of the box

*#2.* Different dynamic programming (e.g. modwheel 64 means _mf_ in one library and _f_ in another so when you send one MIDI message to both libraries you get two different dynamics back)

*#3. *Attacks and transients don't align because every developer cuts their samples differently.

*#4.* Different programming of keyswitches / extra controls between libraries.

What's funny is from everything I have seen, even the most professional composers are at the mercy of these problems, because "balancing a template" usually just means fixing the volume issue.

It is possible to fix all four. I have a piece of tech that does it. But adding libraries to the gadget's 'archives' takes work. I'd need one of the Actual Hollywood composers to hire me to do it, to really make it worth my while to implement it. In the meantime I just do different MIDI instructions for different libraries like everybody else. I am pretty certain that one day we will look back at this as the Dark Ages of VIs.


----------



## JonAdamich

Great work! Sounds fantastic. My only 2 cents is the trumpets, especially at the end (1:15), sound a bit too "mockup" for me. Other than that, amazing job.


----------



## DMDComposer

NoamL said:


> My rough premix is:
> 
> Adv Close -11
> Adv Room -6
> Berlin CloseOne -14
> Berlin CloseTwo -2
> Berlin ORTF -1
> Berlin AB +1
> Berlin Tree +3
> Berlin Surround +3
> 
> However, keep in mind, Eugene has complete control over each of these stems in his mix, so the final version is better because of his work!
> 
> Oh I also forgot to mention that there is Hollywood Brass in this mockup, for the muted horn parts.
> 
> I do not recommend loading all the mics and trying to bounce the entire session... it's not even physically possible on my poor Macbook (16gb memory). So, once the actual mockup (i.e. MIDI) is done, I split everything down to "bouncing sessions" where I load all the mics for just one section and bounce the stems. It's a really stupid way of working but... I can't afford a supercomputer!
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> No, I'm using the full articulation set in Berlin Brass. So the actual MIDI mockup instructions are different for the two libraries. I used the Sustain Immediate, Staccato, Staccatissimo, and the one shot Crescendos. The horns are mostly the special Bells Up patches.
> 
> Stacking BBR+AB would indeed be possible... I have some ideas & have experimented with some technology that allows a composer to stack libraries seamlessly.
> 
> basically right now when you try to stack libraries the 4 problems you run into are:
> 
> *#1.* Actual volume mismatch; some libraries are crazy loud out of the box
> 
> *#2.* Different dynamic programming (e.g. modwheel 64 means _mf_ in one library and _f_ in another so when you send one MIDI message to both libraries you get two different dynamics back)
> 
> *#3. *Attacks and transients don't align because every developer cuts their samples differently.
> 
> *#4.* Different programming of keyswitches / extra controls between libraries.
> 
> What's funny is from everything I have seen, even the most professional composers are at the mercy of these problems, because "balancing a template" usually just means fixing the volume issue.
> 
> It is possible to fix all four. I have a piece of tech that does it. But adding libraries to the gadget's 'archives' takes work. I'd need one of the Actual Hollywood composers to hire me to do it, to really make it worth my while to implement it. In the meantime I just do different MIDI instructions for different libraries like everybody else. I am pretty certain that one day we will look back at this as the Dark Ages of VIs.



Noam, that's amazing and well detailed, bravo and thank you. I hope you get hired if that's what you want because you know your stuff and I deeply respect that. 

So you think this would be possible on a smaller scale by using half the mics from BBR? I'm fortunate enough to have a master/slave combo but even then loading all 6 mics on the brass, and then going into strings+winds my setup wouldn't be able to handle that in real-time unless I bounce to stems like your process.

If I'm understanding correctly, your also using the extra mics and combination of libraries to gain their ambiance or "room"? So then, you wouldn't need a room reverb lets say just an overall reverb?

I appreciate your thoughts and answers to my questions. Just trying to figure out a great way to apply this and balance my template. My idea for time reasons on projects is to manage a template that I can bounce and skip the mixing stage.


----------



## nicktacular

Would you do a similar process (writing in stems) if you are writing original music? Or do you have a fully orchestrated sketch already written out


----------



## NoamL

DMDComposer said:


> If I'm understanding correctly, your also using the extra mics and combination of libraries to gain their ambiance or "room"? So then, you wouldn't need a room reverb lets say just an overall reverb?



Yes precisely. I think spatialization and reverb are two different steps. The trumpets will sit X feet behind the strings, no matter if they're in a concert hall or a dry scoring stage. 



DMDComposer said:


> So you think this would be possible on a smaller scale by using half the mics from BBR?



Yes. I think you could do it on the cheap by combining the Room or Mix perspective of Adventure Brass with the Close2, Tree and Surround mic of Berlin.



nicktacular said:


> Would you do a similar process (writing in stems) if you are writing original music? Or do you have a fully orchestrated sketch already written out



Piano sketch with tempo map -> rough orchestration with one library per instrument -> breakout sessions to layer / redo libraries


----------



## Steve Martin

sounds fantastic! Wow!!!

thanks for sharing.

Steve


----------



## jonathanparham

Just reviewing this. Wonderful. I was just listening to a Henry Jackman interview. I really enjoyed his scores for Kong and Jumanji. Impressive. You show so many things I'm learning and thanks for being transparent about your transcription process. Transcription, layering of samples, mixing, collaboration; a toolbox-its primer of information in your art!


----------



## jononotbono

As per usual, your music sounds pretty shit and embarrassing.


----------



## Paul Cardon

jononotbono said:


> As per usual, your music sounds pretty shit and embarrassing.



lol what the fuck


----------



## Farkle

jononotbono said:


> As per usual, your music sounds pretty shit and embarrassing.



Dude, easy goes it. Noam's putting his stuff out there, and, BTW, he's working in LA. If you want to be a professional (meaning PAID) composer, maybe learning from the cats that are doing that is a good way to grow.


----------



## desert

jononotbono said:


> As per usual, your music sounds pretty shit and embarrassing.


i have a feeling this is supposed to be italics..


----------



## desert

@NoamL and @Grim_Universe well done on the piece, it sounds fantastic.

Noam thank you for sharing all this knowledge so openly.


----------



## InLight-Tone

I'm sure Jono is being very scarcastic and/or very drunk... (Gotta add those wink emojis).


----------



## Farkle

jononotbono said:


> As per usual, your music sounds pretty shit and embarrassing.


Wait, you're doing fun sarcasm, right? I apologize, I misread. My bad, man! 

Mike


----------



## jononotbono

Who isn't?





Who isn't?






You mean "Growl"


----------



## rottoy

jononotbono said:


> Who isn't?
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Who isn't?
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> You mean "Growl"
> 
> More of a jungle Cat myself haha


----------



## jononotbono

InLight-Tone said:


> I'm sure Jono is being very scarcastic and/or very drunk... (Gotta add those wink emojis).



Looks like you can read a room. haha! Happy New Year.


----------



## HardyP

NoamL said:


> For the lower instruments, I used a pitch shifter plugin to raise everything an octave so I could hear the basslines better.


Ah, thanks for that one also... 
Great stuff, I think bringing some of that process in a screen cast, you would be able to sell it.


----------



## Soundbed

NoamL said:


> I have a piece of tech that does it.


Is it ... a magic wand?


----------

