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"1 week - 1 minute" challenge
Hey folks!
I decided to start a small challenge for myself to boost my skills a bit.
Music is my hobby, and I usually create 1–2 finished tracks per year — half originals, half covers. So whenever I start a new track, I don't even remember how to compose. And whenever I start a cover, I don't remember how to play instruments 😊
So I decided to focus some effort on composing only, and write a 1-minute track every week. To narrow the scope, I set some limits:
- Everything is written/composed in a DAW, without playing instruments myself (maybe with the exception of guitar chords, if I need them)
- The result should be a ~1-minute YT Short. I'm going to use some simple static visuals or maybe Visual Synth visualizations, if I manage to get something going there
- Genre limits: I still want to follow inspiration, but I'll keep myself to three "areas": lo-fi chill pieces, synthwave, and funky melodies
Honestly, no idea how it'll go 😊
But here's the 1st sketch I've just finished to kick things off. I actually started this one before I came up with the challenge idea, about 3 weeks ago — but it's better to start with something!
Fun part, it looks like the engine of this forum can't paste YouTube Shorts inline...
Comments
Well, it had me bopping my head. I like it. Keep on going.
Lovely idea. And nice track right off the start
Thank you very much for supporting
Very nice!
I really liked this short. I'm interested to hear more from you mate.
I love the idea. Subscribed, here and YT. Reminded me of a driving or walking scene from a 60s movie. I imagine a couple walking down a Paris street window shopping. Nice arrangement and you were able to share a lot in one minute.
Hey, thank you! The next sketches may be simpler because I had more time for the 1st one, but let’s see how it goes
I went to your post on YouTube and used these steps to get a link:
https://youtube.com/shorts/zHKnvDkxarM?si=t0czRsTN0Wr6kRYz
Hmm… didn’t work the first time but did the second or maybe after a few seconds
Or on a page refresh. Are you seeing the YouTube embedded or the text link?
If you see the link, then refresh the page and what do you get?
Hmm, I can see the video in your post. Magic! Thank you for the investigation.
I originally tried to insert a raw text link, but it wasn't replaced by an embedded video in the preview. So, I decided to hide the full link behind the title at least. I'll try posting the raw link next time. Maybe it only works after publishing...
Apparently, maintaining speed is difficult. It's probably not "harder than I thought", but it's still "exactly as hard as I thought"
Anyway, here's a new sketch, this time completely done end-to-end this week. I only had to wait until today morning to record the video at 4am.
https://youtube.com/shorts/przzcyZS-h4?feature=share
I really dig this. The arpeggios are beautiful. Love the gritty, melancholy sound. Keep going!
“Everything is written/composed in a DAW, without playing instruments myself (maybe with the exception of guitar chords, if I need them)”
I really like this approach. You can compose without the pressure of having a fully fleshed out full length finished product which will sometimes lose its appeal in the process. Speaking from personal experience of course.
I’m interested in how you’re getting these melodies “to tape” if you’re not playing the instruments yourself. Sequencing, midi etc? Forgive my ignorance. I’m old school and trying to get educated here😉.
Two well done shorts by the way.
Thank you
Unfiltered Audio Needlepoint helps a lot with such sound
Yes, exactly. I had larger things but it takes much more effort on different stages, so I don't feel like I gain a lot of experience and practice, and at the same time start feeling like a captive of undone work.
Thank you
. I do this by "drawing" them in the DAW in the piano roll. First notes, then velocities, midi CC automations, then FX automations and so on.
I found out that despite being kinda quirky in some places, the MultiTrackStudio works pretty nice for this exact task because of multi-lane MIDI editing (when you see and edit all the MIDI notes from several tracks at the same time), automation drawing (great with Apple Pencil), and nice chord identifier when you select several MIDI notes (doesn't work sometimes, but usually it's quite useful). And for creating raw chord sequences - Scaler 3. Basically that allows me to sit somewhere in the park with just an iPad after work and create things. And for instrument playing practice I have another routine with own goals and plan
A couple of very nice little tracks.
The leads / melodies are impressive given that you’ve ’drawn’ them in your DAW.
Looking forward to more please !
Thank you for nice words!
I already have a track for the next sketch, but stuck a bit with visuals (decided to use this chance and practice some animation aaaand got distracted by other things I have to do)
Unfortunately I guess I’ll have to adjust own deadlines for this challenge, because life happens without asking about my plans
Aaaand here it is! Finally finished it!
While working on the 2nd sketch, I decided that the ticking clock wasn't good enough, so for the 3rd one, I made a clock synth in Drambo with several types of ticking sound. Then I played around with the rhythm in Beat Scholar and created a 7/4 pattern. Since it's already quite experimental, I wrote piano and viola parts for this rhythm, picking different harmonic techniques from my old notes (e.g. "What if we replace this chord with its harmonic mediant and that one with a tritone substitution?"), focusing just on voice leading and following the pattern. I also had to "glue" some parts together with short 4/4 bridges
.
Since I was already being experimental, I decided to take it even further and create a custom animation for the visual part. I had never made animations before but had always wanted to try ToonSquid and DaVinci Fusion. I prepared the basic shapes in Affinity Designer. Then I exported them separately, animated a one-bar loop in ToonSquid and exported the animation in several layers (separate clips for the different textures and outlines). Finally, I composed them again in DaVinci Resolve, where I could do color correction and add some Fusion FX, like a transparent glassy pendulum. And finally, it's done!
I have no idea when I'll find the time to do the next sketch though. "1 minute in 1 week" sounds like a good "marketing" slogan. However, I seem to gain more experience when I increase the deadline to 1.5–2 weeks, especially with regard to the visual aspect. (And also life sometimes happen, so I simply don't have enough time for this)
https://youtube.com/shorts/jJOQTPAXTLc?feature=share
Magic Clock was absolutely… magic !
Way too short.
The violin bowing towards the end was a neat touch.
Video was excellent as well.
Hi Tony! Thank you very much
For now, this is the sketch that I like best.
And here's a new one!
It was inspired by a street saxophonist who was playing in the park while I was working on the previous sketch.
https://youtube.com/shorts/hRR5Gza7NwI?feature=share
I’m enjoying these. Being a ‘don’t put off until tomorrow what you could put off until the day after that’ sort of guy, perhaps I should try your challenge?
I really enjoy this format now. It allows you to do more, try different ideas and decide which area you want to focus on. Since you only have one minute, you have to choose whether to focus on searching for melodies or trying out harmonies. Or you could write a short phrase and make it versatile and interesting purely by mixing and sound design.
Since it's a small sketch, you aren't afraid to make mistakes and you won't regret it if, for example, you don't want to spend much time developing your mixing and mastering skills right now. With a larger format, you kind of have to do all these things to a similar standard to avoid spoiling a potentially good track with poor mastering, for example.
By the way, in this last sketch, I actually spent some time adding an automated dynamic delay with Timeless 3 so that the sax wouldn't just fade away but would "take off" somewhere "upstairs". However, MTS just doesn't render this effect, and I didn't notice that yesterday.
Here's a comparison of what I heard in the DAW and what it sounds like in the final master. I think it's a bug because I can't get MTS to render this effect correctly even now.