Beyond Good and Evil 2

Great choice! Your next step should be to develop some clear ideas about what you want to do for specific moments - sort of like a "sound story board." If you could bring some of these ideas to class tomorrow, we can begin to suss out the specifics. Also bring your past sounds from class, and we can see where some of those could potentially go.

Nice, I love the video choice! It's a little hard to critique since I don't know what you're planning to do yet, but it definitely seems like there are opportunities to do some cool stuff with the video. There is a lot going on in the video, though, so it might be easy for the video and audio to clash.

The motif is a great start, Amber. I think it is evocative of ancient eastern music, with a modern flavor. Adjusting the tempo up or down can also offer some variation throughout the piece to help with the faster or slower musical moments we were discussing in lab today. Great job, and thanks for posting process updates!

Now you will have to do the analysis of the video with the exact timings. You should mark all them, the parts, things to synchronize with music (there is a lot going on in the video, you can select just synchronize few things), in Logic as it is explained here below. The motive you compose is a good start. But I can tell you that a more epic/battle kind of music would fit the images very well.

As you have done (well done!), I recommend to compose something simple at the beginning (just the main instrument melody, the leitmotifs, and drums and so on), and then think what you would expect to listen apart from that, as background: a bass line? Some string chords? Other melody (countermelody) to accompany nicely the main one in a different instrument? You decide. If you would like to get ideas listen to music similar to the style you want to use and listen to its instrumentation and rest of characteristics to create your own piece with your own decisions, with your own taste (not a copy!).

Here some general ideas to help you build the music: Think of the functions of the music for audiovisuals that we studied at class and also the composition concepts. Start with analyzing the video precisely and setting its parts and the mood and characteristics of the music for each part. Plan your instruments. Remember that to make a crescendo you can add instruments apart to make them play louder and vice-versa with decrescendo. Select a good tempo that goes well with the images (beat per minute), though you might change it in some section if you think it is going to fit better. To open the video in Logic: File-Movie-Open Movie. Then mark the sections of it in the next way: Logic Pro-Preferences-Advanced Tools and activate all except for Control Surfaces and Surround (and score if you are not going to use it). Then Track-Show Global Tracks and in the Arrangement Track you can establish the sections, for example:
- Introduction: objectives (mood to set, things to remark with music...), Function/s of the music in this section (set the mood, present the main character (you can create a leitmotif for it), place the viewer in the physical place where the action is (country, region, etc.), underline the time the action takes place...), Composition concepts to get the objectives and music functions: crescendo to begin, tempo that fits, kind of music to set the mood, instrumentation that fits with the place and time,...
- And something similar to the other sections: note that the mood can be the same for all the video or that some functions can be in all the sections (in your case setting the place with the eastern kind music)

Also in the markers track you can put markers to synchronize important moments in the scene to synchronize with the music, example: evil monster appears suddenly (remark with its leitmotif or with some low tones, or drums, etc)
The process should be that: set the objectives, set the music function/s, set the composition concepts to get them, compose the music starting from something simple, just the melodies, leitmotifs, etc. and then "decorate" it with the rest of elements and instrumentation you think that fits (it might be string/brass chords, bass line, drums, other melodies with other instruments...)

Using music inspired from Japan is a great idea. I enjoy your current approach. The song you are planning to emulate in the background would benefit the trailer greatly if more intense instruments were used (unfortunately I can't feel the intensity with the current draft of the music you have), as the trailer is action packed until our hero flies away on the helicopter. Very good choice and good luck on your project.

I really like how this turned out! I agree with your critique, more instruments might have helped as the environment is very layered in the video. I wasn't a big fan of the instrument (xylophone?) from 0:09 to 0:15. It didn't really feel like it fit with the rest of the piece, but other than that I really like this one.