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[RoanSong]

Well, any suggestions?

I basically just trawl these forums and the idmforums waiting for a "composer needed" ad, but by the time I've managed to email the poster, someone has already snapped up the position.

Does anyone know any good forums or 'net hangouts where I can look for work?

[louisdeb]

It may be an idea to post offering your service in the right section (paid/unpaid) so that anyone whose thinking of posting may chose you while just checking the forums.

[ROCKYIII]

Maybe offer your services to a game you find interesting in development, before they have found a composer.

Where do you look on idmforums?

[RoanSong]

It may be an idea to post offering your service in the right section (paid/unpaid) so that anyone whose thinking of posting may chose you while just checking the forums.

I've considered that, but that's what the Portfolios section is for - I think the admins are trying to stress that.

Maybe offer your services to a game you find interesting in development, before they have found a composer.

Where do you look on idmforums?

I usually look under the Ambient & Soundscape subforum - there's the occasional film student looking for free music, but I mostly just browse the forums out of interest.

[louisdeb]

I've considered that, but that's what the Portfolios section is for - I think the admins are trying to stress that.

Well then post there!

[RoanSong]

Yes, sure (been there, done that, and shall do again in the near future), but I'm thinking beyond TIGSource here.

I've been checking out gamedev.net, and there's not much there, either. I'm looking for sites/forums where film-makers and game developers express their need for composition (paid or unpaid) more than once a week.

[MoritzPGKatz]

Hello,

Just a few thoughts on this:

Chances aren't very high people will come to you to look for music, especially if you don't have people who can vouch for the quality of your work. (This is far more important than having a good showreel.)
It can be worthwhile to show a genuine interest in projects who aren't actively looking for music yet but who might be soon. Be prepared to write a lot of mails, especially in the beginning.

What you need if you want to get a steady flow of jobs in any freelancing business is a good network - it takes quite some time to establish and maintain it, and networking is a skill that has to be honed like any other and it really is much more important than beginner composers tend to think.

With some patience combined with hard work (both networking and developing a great sound), people will begin to contact you and you'll find yourself in the position that you'll have to decline jobs for one reason or the other.

One last quick piece of advise: If you're dreaming of making a living doing music production, never work for free. Just don't.

Upon popular request, I'll write a detailed article on this topic soon - I'll make sure to post a link on these forums.

Cheers,
Moritz

[Chris Polus]

Oh I just see you double posted the same question in the Business section, too. Which is kind of annoying... Anyway, here's my answer to your post and I put a link from there to here.

I think much lies in the nature of the profession.

A game project takes several months, a year or even multiple years depending on the scale and time the devs put into it. If you're efficient, you can make music for a game in one month. Even if it's 3 months, and the game takes 1 year to make, music still needs only 1/4 of the time of the final game. So you move on to the next project while the game's still in development. Also, you mostly only need one composer per game. But sometimes several 2D / 3D artists.

This means that just statistically it would take 4 times less composers than game projects. And several times less game composers than team members on a game. I feel your pain, I'm in the same position.

I think finding work is knowing people. If I develop a game and have a name in the back of my head, I'm going to look for that guy and ask. So it's about building your reputation with smaller projects and leveling up to bigger ones or more high profile ones. Or you are lucky enough joining a project really early where the dev just starts out and is happy having you on board but the game then gets the next Minecraft or Super Meat Boy or Fez... That doesn't happen too often.

Also, I don't like huge indexes of musicians or people. There are platforms that allow you to sell your music. Or license it for a game. Like AudioJungle The thing is: this platform is only great for the owner of that platform. You give away about 50% of your revenue to the platform, so the platform ALWAYS makes money. But there are thousands of people there. The chance that somebody picks and pays for YOUR music is super small. You end up spending a lot of time uploading music to all those platforms, but the chances are small. The client picks SOMETHING from that catalogue, the platform makes money, you probably don't. I think it's not worth the effort. Platforms play with your hope to sell music but I think in the end it's unlikely you make more than a few bucks total.

In my experience it's really about networking. Being part of a bigger community. Listen to other composer's music, comment, comment on game ideas in the dev forums, get in touch with developers, make them some free tracks as demos that fit their game, go to conventions, PAX, IGF, GDC, meet people, build your reputation.

In the end I think in the indie sector there's not much pay around. Everybody is starting out, nobody has a business and can pay you, the only thing you can do is take a risk and hope the game gets a success and you get some royalty share. Which kind of is the opposite of what Moritz said above. Never work for free if you want to make a living...

I know people who live from making music but they usually also work for bigger clients, for businesses, creating jingles, or music for TV, commercials etc. They spent years building their reputation, doing a job here, meeting other people who saw their work, shook a hand there and met somebody who does the next commercial and is willing to pay It's all hard work and it all takes time.

Everything else is lottery. You might be lucky and work on the game that gets the next big hit. But it's not likely

[bschmidt]

I'm looking for sites/forums where film-makers and game developers express their need for composition (paid or unpaid) more than once a week.

Unfortunately, There are no magic places where you can post your music and people will suddenly find you.

Chris' answer is spot on.
Networking is probably the most important thing you can do; and establishing a network takes time (years often!).


Presuming your music is up to snuff, there is no substitute for making in-person, human contact with people.  Go to www.gdconf,com, PAX, www.GameSoundCon.com, etc.  Meet with other composers. More importantly, meet and talk with game developers and producers.

Also, networking is NOT talking to someone for 60 seconds and handing them a business card or CD.  Networking is establishing a relationship with someone and seeing what you can do for them, without anything being in it for you.  it's establishing a rapport over something you share in common.

I know of one composer who got their first game gig (a DS game) because at GDC they struck up a random conversation with someone playing in the indy game forum.  They talked for two hours about games, the control mechanisms, music, game design.  Never did he say "hey, do you have any work for me?"  A couple months later, he got an email from the guy and next thing he knew, he was doing a DS game.

Look at where you live and see if the local college has any videogame clubs.   Go hang out with them and impress them with your knowledge of games and gaming (and gaming prowess ) .  Next time they're doing their own indy game, they might well think of you.

On forums, scour the programming and game design areas.  Chime in and answer the rare question about sound/music when they come up.  (Do NOT post there saying "i'm a composer--hire me').. as you do that, over a period of time those programmers/designers will get to know your virtually and start to trust you.  It's not as ideal as in person, but can still be very valuable.

Good luck!
Brian Schmidt
President, Game Audio Network Guild
www.audiogang.org

[PythonBlue]

RoanSong, just keep networking. Your best bet for a first job is to comment on other people's WIP's and pray they'll contact you asking for your music. Which just happened for me, so it is definitely possible.

[Maverick Denizen]

Chris, you pretty much nailed it. It was really nice and reassuring to read you post, as I'm having the same problem as Roan right now. This far I've figured that - as in most other fields in life - the two most important factors are connections and luck. I got into some minor projects in the last few years: I've been asked to create music for some radio ads, a few audio books, a commercial video, etc. and all these requests came pretty much out of the blue. Usually it turned out that someone knew someone who knew someone who knew me, and my name turned up, and I was asked if I wanted to do the job or not. Obviously it helps if you have a portfolio online, but don't depend solely on it, I think the chances of someone finding your tracks and inviting you to a team are rather low - might happen, but you shouldn't base everything on that. Question is however if you want to take this whole thing seriously (by which I mean making-a-living-out-of-it seriously) or just as a hobby or side-job. I personally don't really stress too much on it since I'm doing it mostly for self-development, and as such I can afford not having to push myself too hard, but as far as I can tell this far, most of the more professional musicians have a healthy resumé, loads of tracks to show off, and preferably a sleek website to contain all that. Things like these are not something that can be done in a manner of days or weeks, I believe all that requires a succession of small steps - first just hope that you can get working on a project or another. Once you get it done, you will 1: have something you can show to other developers, 2: have your name up there so that people might notice it and maybe, if they need a musician, might remember it. The more projects you take part in, the bigger your portfolio will become, the easier it will be to convince people that you are doing quality job (assuming you are doing quality job in the first place), and the bigger chance you will have to have someone find you. All this however requires tremendous amounts of perseverance and luck. What I can advise you is that as of now concentrate on trying to make as good music as you possibly can (try to make something that's unique and high-quality, something that if gets heard, will attract people's attention and preferably get stuck in their heads), hope for the best, and don't feel bad about being turned down or refused. Just create tracks that come naturally, experiment with different styles, look for projects that don't have musicians yet (the devlogs board is particularly good for that), but don't force either your music or yourself either on others or on yourself (what a weird little sentence this ended up as), take it easy, and remember that even though you should do the best you can, this is something that doesn't depend on you only. Try to have a positive outlook, and hope for the best.

Let me invalidate all I said right here, at the end though. I say all these things without ever actually taking part in any sort of indie gaming project. I'm a newcomer to this whole thing; in fact, I posted my rag-tag portfolio here just a mere few days ago, so all I say and think about the topic is very subjective and shallow - don't take my word on everything, I just wrote down my own personal feelings and experiences, so I might be corrected by someone who actually knows better, but, at any rate, I think that what cannot be refuted is that - just as Chris said - there's no recipe for instant success, just hope to get lucky, and up until that moment just create, create and create.

[Chris Polus]

Well Maverick, you already made your own experience and therefore all the things you say are valid from what you experienced. And most of it pretty much reflects my own experience as well.

To summarize my experience: You are the one who needs to be active and contact people. Having a portfolio on this and other forums doesn't automatically get you a gig. Devs are busy and they don't know you exist if they didn't happen to come across one of your posts anywhere. They might look for composers, but why should they stumble upon your profile of all profiles out there. So it's you who needs to get out, write emails, search for projects you think are fun and you could contribute to and contact these people.

What doesn't work is putting up your portfolio and website and wait until somebody discovers you to be the next rockstar. Even the Angry Birds people, successful as they are now, worked in their company for years, having one mediocre game after the next until they finally had THE idea.