What do I need to compose music and polish it for a video game portfolio?

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Alex

Becoming a video game composer is my big dream and I really want to make it happen. For now I'm using Sibelius 7 (notation software) to create my music, but I don't know if that's enough though. I need to know what kind of gear I'm going to need if I want to make this into a career. Do I need a midi keyboard? What's a sequencer? Oh, do I need a keyboard of some sort? How do you create sound samples and with what? What do I need to edit, mix, and produce music for the best quality.

When answering this question you must assume that I know nothing about recording, mixing, and producing. By the way, I'm looking to compose in a variety of genres; orchestral, swing, new world, rock/metal, electronic and some other unique inventions of my own that I know sibelius alone can't fulfill.

I've also though about investing in one of the following; an education in digital arts (recording, mixing, and producing) or an education in music composition. I feel the latter will give me every thing I'm looking for, but I'm just not sure and I wanna make the right move.

I need an answer as soon as possible because I've been putting this goal off for to long and it's time to make my dream career work for me.

I'm looking for answers from those who are in a closely related field and have had success, but for those in video game music specifically, even better.

Answer
It would be helpful to know how much music training you've had and how old you are. I would definitely recommend becoming proficient in playing the piano since that's the foundation for knowing how to compose. You would really benefit from having a quality midi keyboard with multi-track recording capabilities and numerous instruments and drum sounds. Don't get the cheapest one because you need to build up your portfolio with quality recordings. If you look into getting an education in music composition make sure the college specializes in contemporary music. I made the mistake of going to a college that only taught classical music which really wasn't what I was looking for.

Once you've recorded something you'll need to be able to turn it into a MP3 or WAV file so you can email out samples of your work. Below is a link to an article on how to do that.

Where can i download video editors just like iMovie?

Hannah Kle

Well macs are too expensive and i can buy one so i have windows 7, i use Windows Live Movie Maker its Pretty good but i want one like iMovie because i LOVE video editing. So if anyone could get me a link or something that is just alike to iMovie and if i like it you will get 100 POINTS!!! So help please!

Answer
Because of patent laws, one program can't be "just like" another one. They can do similar basic things but they're all set up just a little differently. There's a reason that Macs are more expensive and iMovie is one of those reasons. The closest you're going to get to iMovie on a PC is one of the commercial (not free) programs and it's not going to work "exactly" like iMovie. Adobe's Premiere Elements is probably as close as you're going to get to iMovie. It's on sale this week at Staples, Best Buy and others. If you're a student you can buy for less through Adobe's Education Store.
http://www.adobe.com/products/premiere-elements.html

Here's a review of some of the common video editors.
http://video-editing-software-review.toptenreviews.com/

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