YouTube / TJ Maxx holiday promo!
Caroling in the Key of Glee
Our arrangements of three Christmas carols were featured at a TJ Maxx/Marshall's kickoff event in NYC that had the cast of Glee (the hit show on Fox) singing along! Created by our friends at Reality Digital, and produced in conjunction with You Tube, the "Carol-oke" contest invites users to add their own vocals to our instrumental versions of Deck the Halls, Jingle Bells and We Wish You a Merry Christmas. For us, arranging and recording the music tracks was the easy part. Start with our extensive orchestral instrument collection. Then add chimes, harps, and of course, sleighbells. The challenge - and fun! - was working out the mechanics of the online digital mash-up. How to cue the contestants? Record singers to lead them in. How can we solve variations in timing latency? Add bumpers at the end, just in case. With over $5,000 in prizes for the best singing performance, the site has attracted more than 500,000 viewers.
Mobile audio session at GDC 2010
Jeff is leading a panel discussion on mobile gaming audio at the upcoming Game Developers Conference in San Francisco, titled "After the iPhone....What?" Drawing from his network in the interactive audio industry, he's bringing together the audio gurus from Google (Android), RIM (Blackberry), Windows Mobile and Palm. With the iPhone dominating the mobile gaming market, the iTunes App Store recently passed the 100,000 mark. It's becoming increasingly challenging for developers to sell games, and this has a direct impact on interactive audio providers in mobile. Is it time to look for greener pastures and "blue ocean"? The session will cover the basic audio implementations on the leading iPhone competitors, as well as their gaming and online store strategies. Stay tuned for a full report in late March.
"Drawn To Life - The Next Chapter" ships for Wii
The second installment in the Drawn To Life saga is now available on the Wii, featuring our UI sounds. Far and away, the most innovative, charming and central feature of the game is its paint window. Players draw their own game objects and character attributes that are immediately integrated into gameplay. Think "Harold and the Purple Crayon" and you've got the idea. As you might imagine, this makes the paint window one of the most heavily used parts of the game, so the sound design was a crucial component. With our strong background in UI audio, we were brought in Bay Area Sound Department to help set the tone: whimsical, organic and tactile. See a You Tube video demo here.
