Issue link: https://digital.copcomm.com/i/1524863
M OT I O N P I CTU R E S O U N D E D I TO R S 43 working with the music team on those and can you tell us about the unique process of cutting music for nonlinear media? I am incredibly grateful to have gotten the opportunity to work with some fantastic industry veterans at PlayStation Studios Music. Their guidance and introduction to not- shoestring-budget-corporate game development prepared me for the more difficult tasks to come. I think it's easy to say that any position in game audio will come with an incredible diversification of tasks, but I think my time in music editing definitely had me changing hats very often. I have a particularly fond memory from my internship with the music team. I joined the MediEvil project during a critical period, focusing exclusively on editing and conforming tracks. One day, my manager approached me and asked, "You know how to use Unreal, right?" Although I was familiar with the Unreal interface, I may have bitten off more than I could chew when I went ahead and said, "Yes!" At the time, the technical audio side of development had one person working full time and they were stretched pretty thin with other tasks! Someone needed to script the music system logic for the remaining two-thirds of the game. That weekend, I got to work and enrolled in as many online programming classes as I could find, developing technical skills I never thought I'd need. That being said, on the more audio side of music design, music editing for gameplay is like propagating a plant to grow a forest. In traditional media, you'd take a piece of music and adapt it to fit the project. The same applies to games; however, since the medium is interactive, you can't control when or how long it takes for a player to move from one cue to another. Therefore, you must plan for multiple scenarios. You manage dynamic layering using in-game parameters, consider factors like enemy presence, inventory items, game progression, and more. These variables influence how the music is edited and implemented, creating a dynamic soundscape. All in all, I don't think the cutting process is too different; it's the variety of edits and how it's implemented that sets it apart from linear media. How did you transition over to the sound design team? During the pandemic, music work slowed down but the need for experienced technical sound designers increased. It was a great opportunity for me to switch from music to sound design. The skills I had developed on my own projects and my experience at "It was kind of surreal to be on the stage accepting an award I had only seen in photos and I am still incredibly glad that my first Golden Reel Award was for God of War Ragnarök of all games."