How to Make Ambient Music for Sync Licensing (Make Money Producing Music)

okay my brain's weird today okay why does it not it's like a puttering European moped all right so my publisher reached out to me and this popular TV network is looking for tracks that are ambient and dark and these type of tracks they usually sit underneath dialogue in TV shows so that I like to have a collection of these tracks that they can grab and Chuck it into a documentary or a show where there's tension in the scene I love making this type of music so I thought I'd show a bit into my creative process if you're looking to make music like this for television placements it's important to remember they're going to be people talking over this so we don't want to make something too intrusive we want it to sit nice and like in the background right by the way all the plugins I'm using are either free or they're included in Lander studio so check that out put the link in the description I've created the markers here it's really simple it's like every eight bar as the section changes right off the bat I found this pad sound on analog lab light and I've already chucked a Reverb on at this rev plate so I'm just going to record that in [Music] really simple and then I'm going to copy this over another thing that really makes this type of music impactful is hits just like a nice sub boom hit and I have this really nice sample library that I always use just like something like a sub boom and just go like this cool so now when the song starts it's going to have this nice impact make sure it's not too loud and I want to have that just happening every two bars duplicate this look and then duplicate duplicate I'm starting to build up this pulse so that pulse is going to be the energy behind this that's going to add that tension to this track if you're wondering what type of tracks this is going to be similar to think of like the soundtrack for the movie X machina ex machina think of uh really ambient kind of ominous that's what I'm going for adding a base thank you nice and then duplicate that foreign we have this nice intro so far we have two sounds and we have the hits to make it grow a little bit what you can do is start to play with the frequencies being introduced you take away the high end it sounds a bit darker you start to introduce that it's going to grow over time so I can grab this Auto filter put it on this you can hear that's kind of like a lot of high-end energy off the top to make that grow in just grab this show the Automation and I'm just gonna have it built and I can have it build even more if I put some more high-end information in the sound so I'll turn up the brightness here [Music] and then by here it should be pretty bright and it's going to really transition nice into the next section so that's great now I just want to start stacking stuff to make maybe like a bit more texture so I have Cube mini by lunacy audio up here that's kind of cool let's see what that sounds like I'm just going to play with the second half of the intro here [Music] come on so easy all right I'm going to record it [Music] what happened that's weird did you hear that oh I see it's like a half step up and then it comes back down okay so easy ooh freaky okay that's pretty cool though let's just try it [Music] maybe I'll pan it just a tad [Music] okay perfect now we need some sort of rhythmic pulse or rhythmic energy that's kind of going to introduce a motif that'll build into the next section as well I found a really nice pluck sound in zebra too so I'm just gonna be like yeah we'll see if that works [Music] quantize it to 16th notes and then duplicate that and then maybe I'll have the uh the volume just kind of fading in there so it's not coming in out of nowhere it's kind of just growing growing growing perfect I think that's good for my intro for now nice and simple only four tracks plus those little boom things something I need to glue the sections together is a rise and an impact so it kind of Rises for a couple bars and then we hit the build section it builds even more right what I'm going to do is go into that pack again that I have and there's some nice whooshes there something kind of like yeah something like that now why do I like that because it's not too intrusive like I've been saying these past couple times so I'm just gonna line it with the beat [Music] turn it down quite a bit [Music] that's good the next thing I like to do is make my own whooshes so what I can do is I'll grab a synth a low note of it let's see what's in analog lab here again maybe like a lead I need like a really strong kind of I'm gonna go with that foreign doesn't sound good now so what I'm going to do is freeze that and flatten it and now I can just chop it here delete this part and then just fade it in see if that works and then that hit's gonna come in again to make it even more extreme to climb up I can grab this Auto filter like I did to that other thing on the intro I'll just kind of like automate this opening up so I don't get hit with those high frequencies when it's fading in so I want it to be all the way open see if that does anything [Music] nice and then maybe I'll have some tail on that I'll grab the row plate so when that thing dies off there's going to be a tail of it instead of just falling off a cliff I'll increase the Decay time oh yeah that's sick then I'll just kind of blend it in with everything else [Music] cool so that is my intro okay so now I'm at the build sections I'm gonna do exactly what it's called and build what I already have and continue to build it until the breakdown so to do that I can take stuff that I've already recorded like this get rid of this automation here bring it up even further so I had the full frequency spectrum and then what I'm going to do is just grab that note put in an octave up get a thicker sound [Music] now I'm going to start introducing some melodic elements to this so I'm going to take this patch that I had here actually I want to keep that base note so I'm going to bring in more frequencies just like the top track I need like another sustained note I'll look through this biotech plugin for something that'll work [Music] I like that there's too much high end I'm gonna have to take some of that out let's just try it and see what it sounds like two hands foreign even use a metronome so I have to go in and fix everything let's see I wasn't too far off though there we go okay I was pretty far off that's pretty far off just gonna do that same thing I've been doing grab that auto filter take out the high end maybe I can introduce it even more down the line wonder what those notes sound like up an octave I always like to do this record something maybe it's not sticking out the way I want take the notes Chuck them up an octave foreign yeah that sounds way better and then I want to reintroduce that Paul sing thing that I had earlier I'm going to turn that into something that's going to complement that thing that I just made so I'm going to start to bring some of the notes up an octave in this ARP that I have so [Music] [Laughter] right you get where I'm going a bit more development remember I'm building and I'll just duplicate that again duplicate all of this again don't overthink it just duplicate everything I had learned that over many years don't overthink it okay so I'm going to start building this with the auto filter I have on this track so the more we get to that breakdown [Music] and then we need some hats and stuff obviously what I wanted to do was introduce some new sounding hits we've had this kind of sub Boom the whole time I did find a really cool hit here in the Quick Picks of the Lander samples it's got an amazing sound effect section it's really easy to find samples really fast I just noticed this hit has like a pulse to it and I kind of want it to be in time with my tracks so I'm holding shift and I'm just stretching it here that's perfect and I'm going to start to duplicate that every two bars to see if it's working we can make up a story like about Tim going down the dark alley and see if it works there he was the alley was in front of him but he didn't know where to go or not knew the pizza was on the other side but as a risk that is what I'm going to take see like I'm feeling that that's really great I can feel the tension and it doesn't matter what I'm talking about that's a ridiculous story okay so I'm duplicating those hits again and then I'm going to have these same things happening again as well over here and then that's gonna be also duplicated sometimes I like to duplicate the same track grab a different sound and I'm going to pan it to the other side let's try it nice so this sounds they're kind of complimenting each other they're different enough that when I spread them left and right you're adding this nice stereo width to the track so I'm gonna group those and send them through the same Reverb and it's going to really bring them together but also give them a spot to live in I don't want it that crazy [Music] nice I think that is good for the build section I can always come back to it for the breakdown I ended up writing it while Tim was taking a nap on the couch that I'm gonna summarize what I did it's not very much different than the build section but you'll hear it's a lot more intense so this bass sound I want it to change a bit so I ended up adding shaper box too I'm gonna automate it so for the breakdown it's gonna be on so going from just a sustained note now it's going to pulse a bit for the breakdown part I reintroduced the idea of the cube here from the intro but I only have it lasting for a shorter amount of time so it's kind of just coming in and out and that's it I took the Pulses from the zebra at the beginning and put them back in for the breakdown just a single note pulses and then I found this amazing clap from mandala 2 and I freeze and flattened it just kind of giving that Eerie feeling and finally my favorite part I found this really like meaty synth sound and synthmaster player and I automated the pitch automation to kind of fall off so it gives that kind of brown like I didn't have to do that I could just play the thing [Music] and then finally I found another different hit from that sound effects section on Lander samples the Quick Pick section so here's the breakdown section [Music] I love that I'm just reusing the hits that I made and that I have for the first sections [Music] now I'm at the climax for the climax section I'm just going to copy everything I have for the build and just drag it over and I'm just going to be adding to this but at first I have to connect the two sections so the breakdown to the climax so what I'm going to do is still use this and since this building I'm going to use these hits I'll even have this clapping sound and just keep that going I'll bring in that full cube idea and even that synth drop off I can have that in there I think and I'll have that hitting every two bars instead of every four here like in the breakdown perfect foreign [Music] maybe I'll keep that uh shaper box two on So the base keeps pulse up so there's something missing I think it needs to be like a higher note on top of everything to give it that final energy and drive it home so I'm gonna look for like a string sound I have the Spitfire audio BBC orchestra that I can grab so let's try that just put it out long I'll just grab those notes pull them up here yeah it's great what if I like doubled those though maybe I can double them for the second half I'll just grab all the notes drag them up an octave [Music] nice and what I like doing this is what I've been doing lately is grabbing that tape plugin by baby audio it gives it that warmth and like for the uneasiness I can turn up the wear which is going to add like a wearable to it [Music] [Applause] so it's not quite in tune it's kind of putting the listener on edge I need like a longer rise or maybe like a two bar Riser I'm gonna go back to the sound effects category and the Quick Picks on the plug-in here go to risers yeah that's fine [Music] it might be a bit too high so you can just always like go in turn the pitch down and see what it sounds like it's just like another layer that adds to the ending of the track can I stretch it out a bit it might get messy I'm going to change the algorithm here to complex and see if I can [Applause] nice perfect [Music] one more thing I want to add to this a low percussion just in the background a little bit it's just going to add more pulse to this percussion let's hear some of these [Music] let's try that [Music] okay quantize this to eighth notes and then I'm going to have a hit at the beginning how low does this go it's kind of losing some of its smack down there but let's try maybe if I compress it a bunch foreign [Music] over again so outro intro same thing different thing I'm just gonna grab everything like I did earlier copy paste then I'm going to have obviously instead of the auto filter going up it's going to start to fade out and then these will come in it's kind of like the opposite like a mirror image almost I'm gonna have them Fade Out slightly and then even these hits can kind of start to come down and that can come over here and then these can be deleted I think that's it let's take a listen I could add more you can always keep going it does need a mix I think I did mix on the go but there's probably some EQ stuff I could do but I just wanted to get the idea out and have a full track to kind of send over to my publisher see what he thinks and hopefully get a placement thank you [Music] thank you foreign [Music] foreign [Music] and that's it I hope this video helped you understand dark ambient underscore music let me know in the comments if it helps you think about this kind of conversational process and we'll be back with another video soon see ya

Channel: LANDR

Views: 7,971

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Id: E4eghKjWH1o

Length: 19min 33sec (1173 seconds)

Published: Tue Jun 13 2023