Life Update

I'm a bit ashamed of myself, but I'm proud at the same time. I have a good excuse as to why I haven't had any blog posts the past few weeks: life, school, and work. Through SPARK at Full Sail, I've been put on a few projects that I'm working on. June came around, which initiates a new class, group of assignments, and schedule. So, I do have valid excuses as to why I haven't been able to post anything. I've tried to blog, but it's been very difficult. Nonetheless, here's an update on what I've been up to this past month or so. 

Through SPARK at Full Sail, I was placed on a project for the ASPCU (now CECU). This project entitled a hand-selected group of seven people in SPARK. Our duty was to create a 20-minute, utilizing the resources that were provided to us by the ASPCU. Not only did we successfully complete the video, but we "blew it out of the water," according to the president, Steve Gunderson. On June 6th, we attended a luncheon at a beautiful resort here in Orlando, Florida. We Full Sailors were treated like royalty, and our video was ranted and raved about by everybody. It was so, so amazing to be recognized by the "higher ups" and various professionals. As I'm sure you've heard me say, "hard work does pay off!" 

After they played the video that we created, we were called up to the stage and awarded a certificate of appreciation, a $50 gift card, and a thank you card. Again, being recognized for hard work feels so good! 

The incredible group that I had the honor of working with during this project.

Also through SPARK, I'm currently waiting to receive some information from the Winter Park fire department so we can record their instructional video. I'm looking forward to helping with that. I may even become an actor for a few minutes! 

A classmate of mine sent me his beat that he sampled and produced to mix and master. I've always thoroughly enjoyed mixing and mastering music, and it was great to mix and master something other than my own stuff. Having a fresh set of ears on a piece of music can make all the difference to a track - it gives it new life and a whole new perspective. It was a smaller session and project, so it didn't take all that long. It was a ton of fun to do, though! Hopefully he sends me some more stuff to mix and master! If you're interested in listening to it, you can listen to it below. 



On top of class, homework, spending time with friends and family, and SPARK projects, I'm working the WWE events here on campus. They get to be long, long days, but they're so worth it. The people that I work with teach me so much, and I have the best crew to work with! They're fun, energetic, and extremely hard working. Work is fun when you work with a bunch of friends! 

In the coming weeks I'm hoping that things slow down a little bit so I can do a few more blog posts and get some side projects finished. I can feel myself slowly re-ordering my priorities, and that's both a good and bad thing. It puts aside my working side to have a little fun. But I have to remember that school work comes first. I am spending a lot of money to be here, so I need to soak everything in.  

I'll keep this short and sweet, so we'll end here. Hopefully I'll have some posts up in the coming weeks. Stay tuned! 

Peace out,

Lennon
Student
Bachelor of Science, Music Production

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Game Music Composition: Angry Bots Project

Our new assignment this week is composing the music for a game called Angry Bots, and I may have had a little too much fun with it. We were to go with a really kind of industrial feel (and for good reason; look at the space we're in), and give things a really gritty feel. I may have gone too far, but I really like how it sounds so I'm going to roll with it until I get some feedback from my instructor and peers. 

We were to create a 1-2 minute ambient loop that would be played when we weren't battling the bots. Then we had to do an 8-bar loop for each of the bots, giving them each a unique melody and feel so that you know which bot you're fighting. There are also three stingers that play when each of the robots' themes start. Can you differentiate each of the bots' themes?



Lennon
Student
Bachelor of Science, Music Production

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Game Music Composition: 2dPlatformer: Sound Effects

One of this week's assignments was to remove the sound effects from last week's project, 2dPlatformer, and replace them with sound effects that we either record, create, or find on a sound library. I haven't had to do a lot of sound design for interactive media since my Interactive Audio course back in November of 2015. So this turned out to be a lot of fun! 

I've embedded a screen recording for the assets that I created for this assignment below. 

Here's a screenshot of the assets that we had to deliver.

Some of the sounds may have been difficult for you to hear throughout the video, as I haven't really mixed them yet. I'm not entirely sure how to go about mixing individual oneshots like this for a game, so that will come later. However, I did get them to somewhat sit and not fight with each other. 

In case you couldn't hear everything, we had to create sound effects for the bomb exploding, bomb's fuse before it explodes, picking up the bomb, setting the bomb down, three grunts when we kill an enemy, a gunshot, the health box pickup, three jumps, "ouches," and taunts. I had fun with the bomb's fuse, enemy deaths, jumps, "ouches," and taunts. I got to get out my microphone and do some recording. Then, I went into Pro Tools and did some pitch shifting to make them sound more alien-like. Tons of fun, especially when you're creating sounds for something as ridiculous as a bean who's ship has landed in London and being attacked by aliens. 

As always, I'm open to suggestions on how to make things better. If you noticed something that seemed off, please let me know so I can tweak it.

I don't think I've enjoyed "homework" this much before!

Lennon

Student

Bachelor of Science, Music Production

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Full Sail University's 7th Annual Hall of Fame

Every year since 2009, Full Sail University has hosted an event called "Hall of Fame." This is an event where a multitude of entertainment-related companies, Full Sail alumni, and soon-to-be "Hall of Famers" come in and talk about their duties and jobs within the entertainment industry. To be inducted into Full Sail's Hall of Fame you have to have worked 10+ years in the entertainment industry, worked on a project that the world recognizes, and have given back to the community in one way or another - regulations that truly recognize those who are dedicated and extraordinarily passionate about what they're doing in the industry. This is my second Hall of Fame experience, and I'm going to try very, very hard to sum everything up into this blog post. 

"Position yourself as the only logical choice." -Demo Castellon

For me, it all started on Friday, February 12th, 2016. I received an unexpected email with my name on the call sheet to work at 10a.m. the following morning until 7p.m. I remember scratching my head and thinking, "I don't remember signing up to work this week. I signed up for next week, during the event." I later found out that the SPARK coordinator hand-picked a handful of hardworking students to assist in the load-in and setup. I was pretty excited to work because I knew I'd be working with the amazingly fun and talented Full Sailors in SPARK, but I had no idea how much work truly went on behind the scenes. This was quite eye opening.

After working early morning until the evening on Saturday, Sunday (Valentine's Day), Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday (today), I realized how exhausting live sound events are. I attended the Hall of Fame events last year, so I had a pretty solid idea of what was going on throughout the week. And I also knew how much knowledge was spread out through all of the events - it was incredible! I thought last year's Hall of Fame was great... 

After learning a ton from the freelancers and other students on the audio team, having an absolute blast with the audio team setting up the audio in each room, and learning and being the front of house engineer during the events, I've come to the conclusion that this Hall of Fame was one of the best events that I'll attend while I'm here at Full Sail. I learned an incredible amount of stuff, so much so that I have a headache and I'm leaking brain juice. Not only did I learn a bunch of stuff from the people working the Hall of Fame events, I learned a lot from the people that spoke at panels in the room I was engineering for. I'm absolutely blown away by it all! 

"I never need to ask permission to do art." -Jeff Unay

To name of few of the talented panelists (also Full Sail graduates) that came through the room I was in (Full Sail On Air; you can also click on their names to view more info on them), I've compiled a pretty decent size list of the extremely talented and inspirational Full Sail Hall of Famers:

• Jordan "DJ Swivel" Young: DJ Swivel has worked with artists such as Beyonce, Tiesto, The Chainsmokers, Jay Sean, Rita Ora, Rihanna, Mary J. Blige, Jay-Z, Jamie Foxx, and Britney Spears to name a few... 
• Keith Guerrette: Lead FX Artist, Uncharted 2, 3, 4; Senior FX Artist, The Last of Us & The Last of Us Remastered; FX Artist, The Bourne Conspiracy
• Phil Pallen: Branding and social media strategy for TV personalities, experts, and businesses. Phil is awesome. Check him out! 
• Ashish Manchanda: Ashish Manchanda is a noted mixing and recording engineer, remixer and music producer based in Mumbai, India, most credited for his work with Bollywood. He is the founder of the music production house, Flying Carpet Productions, established in 1999. Manchanda offers services in music production, composition and arrangement, sound design, film re-recording (Dolby surround), music recording, mixing and mastering, and remote / location recordings.
• Jeff Unay: Soon after graduation from the Computer Animation program, Jeff landed an artist position with Raven Software working on the Quake franchise. He later transitioned into visual effects for film where he worked as a character modeler at Tippett Studio and then as a lead modeler at Weta Digital in New Zealand. At Weta, Jeff worked on two Academy Award-winning visual effects films: King Kong (2005) and Avatar (2009). Jeff’s groundbreaking work creating the faces for the digital leading characters forAvatar led him to win a Visual Effects Society Award for Outstanding Live Action Character in a Motion Picture. In 2010, Jeff began working full-time as a director and cinematographer in Seattle, WA. He wrote, co-shot and co-edited Valve Corporation’s first feature film, Free to Play (2014), which went on to receive a record-setting 5.5 million views in its opening weekend. Jeff is currently directing his first independent documentary feature film, Greywater, which will be released in early 2017. The film has already received multiple accolades for an in-progress film including the Tribeca Film Institute/ESPN Prize and the 2015 Points North Best Pitch Award at the Camden International Film Festival.
• Dylan Dresdow: Grammy award winner, Emmy award winner, and multi-platinum tracking and mixing engineer. 
• Sebastian Krys: Producer, engineer, and graduate of Full Sail in 1991; started job at Crescent Moon Studios in Miami, Florida and began his award-winning career as an engineer/producer that has worked with Shakira, Marc Anthony, the Black Eyed Peas, and many, many more. 
• Demo Castellon: One of the industry's most sought-after engineers, having worked with artists like Madonna, Jay-Z, Justin Timberlake, Timbaland, Rihanna, One Republic, and dozens more. 
• Josh Gudwin: Producer and mix and vocal engineer for Justin Bieber and many, many, many more. Please click his name to read more information; far too much to type here. 

During Josh Gudwin's panel, my jaw was dropped to the floor. He mainly talked about working with Justin Bieber and his latest album, "Purpose." Being able to work with Justin Beiber, Skrillex, and Diplo is mind blowing, as they're a few of my favorite artists. He continued to reaffirm that working hard and remaining dedicated to your goals is extremely important, which is certainly what every Full Sail student needs to hear. I also got to shake his hand and visit with him for about fifteen seconds before we began the panel. So, I guess you could say I shook Justin Bieber's hand. :) (All of these sessions were recorded, so I'll link to them as they become available via Full Sail's YouTube page.)

I would like to extend a huge thank you to those who helped make Full Sail's 7th annual Hall of Fame event a complete success and a huge learning environment! You guys did a wonderful job! I would also like to thank the SPARK crew for being so amazing, supportive, and helpful. I'm so, so, so proud to be part of such an amazingly talented and spunky crew. We all work so well together and teach each other things we don't know. You guys have made my Full Sail experience truly memorable! Lastly, I would like to thank the Full Sail alumni and Hall of Famers for taking time out of their busy schedule to come back to Full Sail and share their knowledge with us students. It truly means a lot to see that all of you care so, so much about all of us! I can't thank you enough! Thank you, thank you, thank you! 

I learned an incredible amount of stuff over the past few days. I'm still in shock of how much talent the Full Sail graduates have and then put it to good use in an extremely tough industry. Hearing each of them talk about how they got their foot in the door to work with acts like Justin Bieber, Skrillex, Madonna, Beyonce and work on movies like King Kong and Avatar is incredibly inspiring and reassuring of how hard work pays off. As I've mentioned in previous blog posts, I live by the quote "hard work pays off." The Full Sail graduates who've succeeded in their industry are proof of that, and I won't stop until I am one of them! 

"I only do stuff that gets me to my goal. I always know where I'm going." -Demo Castellon

Lennon

Bachelor of Science, Music Production

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