# Composing video game stems with fader in/out technique (ASAP)



## Dracarys (Apr 22, 2017)

Hello all,

I'm doing game project, but for the first time I'll be working by creating stems, rather than full audio. I.e. low, medium, and high intensities.

These stems will be 1-2 minute loops, and the Devs wan't them to be seamless, and constant. I'm not 100% on how to go about this. Should these loops be completely constant and steady, and not evolve at all 

For example - a pad or bass arp for the full 1-2min with no gaps would be steady. Or quarter note staccatos for the full 2 minutes, and not switching to 8th notes in say bar 4 or 8. Should I just repeat 8 bars throughout the whole loop?

I could imagine running into serious issues if one loop at 45sec one loop begins to switch keys, notes, while another is not doing the exact same. However, if everything is stagnant, it seems like the music can end up being a bit monotonous. But then again, fading in another elements could spruce things up. There's also a concern about losing that natural Decay or Release of a sample, opposed to just lowering the volume when fading out.

Let me know your thoughts, any examples would be greatly appreciated.

Thank you!


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## MatFluor (Apr 22, 2017)

Depends how the dev implements them. I always do the implementation myself (FMOD or my favorite Elias).

In your case, you have no control what the dev does. I'll go through the questions:

*Seamless loops*
In post-production (e.g. in Audacity), find zero crossings and cut there (else you will have the classic "looping pops"). little small fadein/out can help as well (talking milliseconds). If the stems has a reverb tail, cut that off and lay it over the beginning of the file, se you have to correct reverb tail sounding when looping.

*Development in the loops*
This is tricky. Game Audio should not annoy the player, since I don't know where your music will be used, for my answer I think of them as "Tetris like" full on, no dialogue or the like.
You _can _have development and _should _have some. If the loop just repeats endlessly the same, the player will get annoyed, so you can make a bit of development, just listen to your stems in a loop mode of your DAW - if after 30min you still are not annoyed, you have done a good job (I hope you get what I mean).

*Issues on loop changes*
Yeah - unfortunately, this seems to be out of your control. Since mostly the dev won't switch at certain points (which FMOD and Elias can do - e.g. in Stem A only switch at bar 4 and 8, so if you have a Melody playing, you can make sure that it finishes before changing).
You should talk to the dev and raise these concerns. Most audio middlewares do crossfades, and a longer crossfade can "cover up" these issues to a certain degree. Since the transition won't be a musical one, you don't have much choice. I would say (given what you told here), you shouldn't switch keys like a frantic Jazz-maniac. Stay in one Key, try to develop without modulation (or go to the parallel major/minor key) to play it safe.
Another idea that I did in such a situation is to prepare some short stingers which act as transition pieces - meaning:

The Stinger starts playing while Loop 1 fades out fast
Stinger ends while Loop 2 fades in fast
You could that way cover up key changes as well to keep stuff interesting. The dev just needs to know what layer is playing - e.g. "Layer_Am" changes to "Layer_Eb" then your stinger "Stinger_Am_Eb" should play as transition, and in that short (just a few secs) stinger you can to a modulation to the goal key. Sounds fancy, it is, and it largely depends that you and the dev (or the Sound Director) really talk together.

*Clear up the vocabulary*
I think of stems like I think most here do: e.g. Low Strings, High Strings, Brass....
What will the dev do? Stems are nice because you can mix the sound as you wish (e.g. the High strings louder or the like). I think (in my head) you are talking layers - meaning you have variations which essentially are different intensities - e.g. Strings-A is a slow chordal movement and Strings-B is the same chordal-movement played fast and arpeggiates. Am I right?
If you in fact means stems in the sense I explained above, that means that the dev can mix/play low-intensity strings together with the high intensity Brass etc.etc. In that case - key changes are not an option, since all stems must be playable with every other. Since that doesn't make much sense for me in Game Audio, I think layer is what you mean - please correct me if not! 

*Bottom line*
Talk to the dev how he wants to implement the music. Raise your concerns and inform him. You can't control the implementation (if you don't do it yourself), but composing the piece to essentially be a 2-bar loop so it can be changed at any moment isn't too musical. If the dev wants that - that's a different story.

Please write of you have more questions, I'll try to answer as good as I can. I hope others with game audio experience chime in as well - remember: That's how I did my stuff and it's my opinion, not a gold standard of any sort


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## Dracarys (Apr 23, 2017)

Thank you for the quick and detailed response! Before I go on, this is the software they're working with. Is this considered middleware similar to Fmob? Also, do you recommend FMOD versus wwise and elias? It looks like they're be handling things on their side, but I should probably learn this thoroughly in case for next time.

Also, because I'm not using FMOD, should this tremendously affect my rates?



As for stingers and sound FX, that is being handled by the sound designer/dev. Thanks for the tip about fading out the pad and cutting at the right spot.

I'm still not 100% about the intensities, but as of now I feel a subtle PAD for low, medium might be an arp or lead/violin over the pad, and High could be a more driven sound such as percussion. All layered together and making sense for the final album which they want to release.


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## Dracarys (Apr 24, 2017)

Here's an example of complexity in stems. If you forward to 33:25 you will hear woodwinds come in L ear. First C# and G#, then E and A. This would be the same track in my mind, the first staccatos being 4 bars, and then the switch would be bar 4-8, and repeat for the full minute. However the bar structure here is weird in between woodwinds, 4 1/2 bars?


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## Dracarys (Apr 24, 2017)

I recommened 30sec loops to the devs and they're on board, so I'l keep it simple, repeating after every 4-8 bars.

Also, I may need to do intro/outro transitions. Could you explain this? Seems like I'm over thinking it and it's just a fade in or out at start/end.

Audacity issue:

When i import ambient loop back into my DAW, unless the loops are back to back, there is a pop at the end and start. Shouldn't it be silent at the end? It only does not pop if I have multiple wavs looping. I also edited the dots and brought them to 1.5db if that matters. Here is how the wav looks in cubase:

http://tinypic.com/view.php?pic=5x7tso&s=9#.WP6nZ_nytQI

However, in Audacity when I hit shift play, it loops just fine. Is that all the matters?

Thanks!


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## MatFluor (Apr 24, 2017)

Concerning Audacity:

In such a case I did a small fade out the bring in the Zero-Point. I mean small fade-out like a couple ms


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## Dracarys (Apr 24, 2017)

MatFluor said:


> Concerning Audacity:
> 
> In such a case I did a small fade out the bring in the Zero-Point. I mean small fade-out like a couple ms



You would do this at the very end once the loop is pretty much complete I'd assume?


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## MatFluor (Apr 24, 2017)

Exactly, yeah.

I test the loop by duplicating the audio and set it next to each other and play (I don't use the loop function for that)


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## Dracarys (Apr 24, 2017)

Very weird that I have to export audio instead of selected tracks when I do this, or else it will pop at the end no matter what. When I set a fade at the end, the yellow line is then longer than the wav itself, so I have to make sure to select the wav up until the fade, and not to the empty space between the end of wav and yellow line. If that makes sense..


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## MatFluor (Apr 24, 2017)

I really select a bit and go with the Fade out effect - on such a small scale, this linear thing is perfect.

I don't know what yellow line you mean?


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