The F**k Up Feature: Some Mistakes I’ve Made and What I’d Do Differently

Credit: stevepb

Nobody’s perfect. I think for composers, or really any career path, a lot of mistakes will have to be made in the process of learning. I have certainly made mistakes in my career, and I will certainly continue to make mistakes throughout my life.

That said, I think it’s helpful to look at some mistakes that I have made and focus not only on how I rectified the mistake, but also how the mistake happened, and how to prevent the mistake from happening again. With that said, here is your obligatory do as I say, not as I do warning.

Credit: Tumisu

Mistake #1: Not Asking Pre-Viewing Questions

The Mistake: I was brought on to write music for a film after the previous composer had to drop out for personal reasons, and I was viewing it with the director. I was so eager to watch the movie for the first time that I didn’t even think to ask the director any questions. After watching the movie, I wasn’t entirely sure whether the movie took a serious tone or was a comedy of dry sarcasm. After the first watch through, the director asked me what I thought, and I had to stumble through an answer. I liked it, but I couldn’t get an immediate grasp on tone.

The Catalyst: Because I didn’t ask any questions before watching the film, I was lost when I was trying to understand the film on the first watch through (not that I needed to understand every single beat, but a general understanding is a must).

The Fix: In the moment, I kind of fumbled through an answer about liking the film and vaguely speaking about tone. It was a little embarrassing, as I am normally pretty good at figuring out what I’m trying to say. However, I made sure to ask the director afterwards the reason they had wanted to make the film, and its message. That gave me a clearer idea of tone and direction.

The Prevention: From that point, I mentally treat every first viewing kind of like a film I’d find on Netflix: instead of reading the description of the movie to get an understanding of the movie before I watch it, I’m asking questions to the director to get an understanding of the movie before I watch it. This helps me get a better idea of what I need to do musically. Bonus points as well if you’re able to get a cut of the film to watch a couple times beforehand.

Credit: DCG_MAK

Mistake #2: Not Double Checking Your Deliverables

The Mistake: There was a game I was working on that needed some music for an ending sequence, nothing out of the ordinary. I had sent one of the layers for the sequence and only realized after sending it in that the audio randomly clipped out at one specific moment. I (somehow) fixed the issue temporarily, but got some comments back and had to send another version in. I then had the same issue a second time, and again only caught it after sending it to the game dev (thankfully before they caught it).

The Catalyst: I was in such a rush to get deliverables through and move on to other work, that I didn’t double check the bounced audio files before sending it out. Because of that, I failed to catch a pretty egregious exporting glitch twice, which makes me look pretty amateurish.

The Fix: Thankfully, I was able to catch the mistake both times before the game dev ever saw, but if they would have seen it, I would’ve looked really bad, especially if I’d been caught doing it twice. However, I did ultimately decide to apologize for it both times, even though they hadn’t heard the error. In my mind, it’s better to be upfront with people versus try and hide things from them. Additionally, I figured out how to rectify that export error (took a lot of research, but ultimately switched bounce mode from offline to realtime, which seems to remove most MIDI playback errors).

The Prevention: Of course, finding the fix to the error will prevent it from happening in the future, but it’s also now in my system that I need to double check every deliverable I export for any glitches/audio errors. Additionally, I now try and give myself some time between exporting and double checking to make sure I am happy with the mix/composition (though this isn’t always feasible).

Credit: myrfa

Mistake #3: Poor Organization/Naming Conventions

The Mistake: No one specific project for this mistake, but there were a couple times throughout the early stages of my career where I was trying to look for something I worked on, whether it was an audio file or a Logic session, and just could not for the life of me find it. I had named it something random or put it somewhere it shouldn’t be (I do remember one time that I somehow managed to save a Logic session on my desktop. I don’t even know how I’d have done that).

The Catalyst: Because of my laissez-faire attitude towards organization, I was unable to find past projects that I either needed to revise, or wanted to do something with, such as post to YouTube.

The Fix: In the moment, there wasn’t so much a fix as a cost. I spent a long time trying to find the specific files I needed, which is inefficient and, at times, frustrating.

The Prevention: I realized I needed some kind of organization system. I now aggressively folder all my audio files split by project, piece, and so on. I also assign a 3-4 letter tag based on the name of the project, so I can look up those letters to find all files related to it. I needed a format for file names as well, and I settled on two standards, one for films and one for games. My film format is as follows: Tag_Cue#_Timecode_Version#_FullMix/MusicOnly (depending on whether or not the file contains dialogue/sfx from the film). For games, I use this format: Tag_GameplayUsage_Layer#_Version# (although I drop the layer number if it’s not applicable).

Credit: Kenneth Schulze

Mistake #4: Butting Heads Creatively

The Mistake: In my first year in college, I was brought on at the start to create music and sound effects for a JRPG. I was excited, because I had been itching to work on a JRPG (orchestral music is already my forte and I would love nothing more than to add a rock band to it). However, it so happened that the creative director and I tended to butt heads creatively. He was my friend, so it’s not like we hated each other, but our disagreements slowed production way down and eventually the project fizzled.

The Catalyst: I had let my own ego and thoughts get in the way of my ability to work with others, which led to me coming off as, quite frankly, fairly unprofessional. It also affected the team’s ability to move forward with the project. Games as is already take a long time to develop, and when it’s stop-start it makes it just that much more difficult.

The Fix: I did eventually realize I was in the wrong, even if I felt like my ideas were really good. I apologized to the director and we moved on. Sometimes it’s as simple as that. Apologizing is not only the thing you should do from a moral aspect, but, from a strictly business perspective, it’s better to fess up to mistakes when they happen rather than try and hide it, since you’ll be seen as more trustworthy.

The Prevention: I have learned that I need to separate my ego from my art (a really hard thing to do) as much as I can. At the end of the day, even if I really like my ideas, if the person you’re working for doesn’t like them, there’s kind of nothing you can do about it other than figure out how you can work with their idea in the best way. This is a client service business after all, and the customer is always right (in matters of taste).

Credit: succo

If there’s anything you should take away from this blog post, it’s this: you will err, you will make mistakes, and you will f**k up. Charles Swindoll said it best: life is 10% what happens to you and 90% how you react to it. It’s important to be able to look objectively at yourself and figure out what the mistake way, why it happens, and how to fix it both in the short term and in the long term.

If you like what I write, have any questions, or just want to say hi, feel free to reach out with the form below! Otherwise, I’ll see you on the last Friday of next month.

All photos are from Pixabay and linked/credited appropriately. No AI (Artificial Intelligence) was used in the writing of the blog nor are any of the images AI generated. However, this blog was created using copious amounts of AI (Andrew Intelligence).