How did you make the music?

[Frits]

Hey there,

I have been listening to Machinarium's soundtrack a lot, and I love it; I can't wait for the EP! I don't know if you (you guys in the credits, especially Tomas) browse these forums yourselves, but as I don't know any other place for this I'll post it here. I have been playing with digital audio etc. a little, and since hearing this music and some other things recently, I am seriously considering delving into to it a lot deeper. I am very much interested in learning more about how you make your music, not so much the intellectual process, so to speak, but rather the technical aspects of it. Things like what DAW you use, where you get your samples - through MIDI/keyboard+software instruments/from included loops/get them somewhere else? - , and how many people were involved in making the music for Machinarium.
The info on the net, as far as I can find, is decent but very specialized, full of jargon, and it does not give me a good overview of what the actual procedure of making music this way is like. I am certain that you have a lot of experience in the field though, and I would be very grateful of you would be able to share some of your insights with me.

thanks,
Frits

PS: I read that you chose not to include some songs from the game in the soundtrack, because they didn't fit in; why did you include the End (Prague Radio)?

[ABoretz]

I have been listening to Machinarium's soundtrack a lot, and I love it; I can't wait for the EP!

Then buy it!      http://innerfx.ithinkmusic.com/my-store/detail.php?page=LR&r=9645
(you may also find this discussion interesting)

And, yes, Tomas (Floex) does check in on us from time to time.  I'm sure he'll reply as best he can to your technical questions.
Actually, today (11-11-09) both he and JD are presenting at the BAF Animation Festival in the UK.  Wish them luck!   

[Frits]

Thanks for your quick reply! I had bought the music already, I bought the game from the Machinarium site

I see I should have been at BAF myself, haha. In any case, with a product like this you shouldn't need much in the way of luck, though you have all mine

[ABoretz]

I had bought the music already, I bought the game from the Machinarium site

That's great!  But I hope you also noticed the info I was trying to direct you to about the unreleased tracks.   
It's my fervent opinion that fans of Floex's music would enjoy spending some time listening to ALL the tracks he composed for this project. 

[Frits]

Aah yes, I know about them, but thanks

[floex]

something about my studio:

i use logic,
for sound experiments max msp.

for the basic sound stuff i use native eqs and compressors from logic etc.
i use a lot sample based material (esx24)
it is both my own banks and also some commercial.

i am recording lots of real instruments which i have in my studio
piano, clarinet, metalophones, melodica, kalimba, acu guitar, shakuhachi flute,  etc... actually recording everything what is possible including lots of nonmusical stuff.

the rest is really not easy answer lots of plugins and sound experiments...
it is a lot in sound designing, creating interesting chains of plugins - editing, transposing it...
not the magical synth... maybe i also spent quite a lot of time over the work on each music...

some favourite and free or cheap plug-ins (for osX)

smart electronix
michael noriss spectral stuff
tal
ohm force (frohmage)
pluggo stuff
soundhack
tone2 filters
opcode fusion plugins (already discontinued but so cool...)

*

hardware i have now microkorg, and korgz1
i also used old roland sh01, nanoloop, yamaha mu80, akai sg01v


*

i put some shortened version of one interview on my blog... there can be some more additional info.
http://floex.cz/en/blog.html

*

tomas

[Frits]

Thanks so much for your reply, this is great!

I understand how every task requires a different approach, but it's great information, also your interview. Actually, I have settled on Logic already, haha. I have a mac and logic is very powerful so it was kind of an obvious choice. Is it necessary to use external plugins, as in, is it impossible or practically impossible to get the sounds they give you by just using things built features of logic? Like for example using Sculpture, and of course the built in plugins?

I have a last question, it took me a week to get to the point at which I thought I could give it a shot to try to really make something with logic, and then four days to make it haha. Now I have a short track which I think is pretty good, as an experiment. I was hoping that you could maybe listen to it and tell me if you think I have any talent at all. Please PM me if you would be willing to do that. Maybe it's too much to ask, I want to thank you anyway for your reply again

Frits

[GEAR]

Tomas the ingenious musician!