Is everyone now a film or game score composer?

[Ex Machina]

Maybe it's just me, but I see SO many preset packs for various software and hardware synthesizers that are described as "cinematic." Some of these packs are better than others. But they are all clearly aimed at composers writing modern electronic scores or at least people who aspire to be doing so.

I get that professional or even semi-professional composers probably have more money to spend on presets and also have less time to program their own patches given the tight deadlines on most of these scores and shrinking music production budgets. Unless you're a Hans Zimmer level super successful composer who can hire a team of sound designers to create custom sounds for your scores you are probably buying "cinematic" presets.

But there can't be that many film and game score composers or even musicians writing ambient music to support a sound design business catering primarily to this group of customers.

FYI, I never used to use presets as a matter of principle. But I realized over time that no one listening to my music cares one way or the other. Actually, they would probably prefer that I use expertly crafted presets if these sounds make my music sound better.

But I'm just wondering what happened to the market for more conventional Electronic Pop sounds. Maybe it's still there but has been augmented by more cinematic presets that weren't previously available.

[imrae]

I am a bit worried that the "composers" are becoming more homogeneous in their sound pallette than the chart-botherers.

As you say its unclear what fraction of people buying this stuff are actually having any success with it; but then the same can be said for EDM Serum presets. Perhaps they are doing it for fun?

[Ex Machina]

As you say its unclear what fraction of people buying this stuff are actually having any success with it; but then the same can be said for EDM Serum presets. Perhaps they are doing it for fun?

Maybe you're right. I'm sure there are a lot of people who don't earn any money from writing "scores" but who just enjoy creating that style of modern atmospheric electronic music. I know for certain that I don't earn a dime from my 80s inspired Electronic Pop songs. But writing music and even playing the piano are incredibly fun, creative hobbies for me.

I fortunately have a job that provides me with enough discretionary income that I can afford to buy (within reason) presets for my various synth plugins. However, I almost always program my own patches for my hardware synths because their control surfaces and hardware programmers make creating my own custom sounds a much more enjoyable process than clicking away on a computer screen.

Incidentally, back in the day when I owned racks of hardware samplers, I used to have an additional small, portable DAT machine that I used almost exclusively to record all manner of crazy "found sounds." I would then layer these samples with recordings of my various analog synths to create some really cool hybrid sounds. But I stopped doing that a long time ago even though I still use a lot of those sounds from 30 years ago in my music today. I think maybe things are just too easy these days. I've gotten lazy and use Kontakt libraries from Heavyocity et al instead of creating my own custom sounds.

[Xenos]

Just my opinion, but "cinematic" describes a flavor rather than being limited to a specific use. Soundscapes, special effects, dramatic hits/stabs, etc used in games/film can work really well as part of a song's intro, or easily changed into a riser effect with something like CableGuys ShaperBox. In pretty much any genre, I hear "cinematic" sounds used often in song intros before the music hits, and that's been going on for decades.

[omahlay1800]

Maybe it's just me, but I see SO many preset packs for various software and hardware synthesizers that are described as "cinematic." Some of these packs are better than others. But they are all clearly aimed at composers writing modern electronic scores or at least people who aspire to be doing so.

I get that professional or even semi-professional composers probably have more money to spend on presets and also have less time to program their own patches given the tight deadlines on most of these scores and shrinking music production budgets. Unless you're a Hans Zimmer level super successful composer who can hire a team of sound designers to create custom sounds for your scores you are probably buying "cinematic" presets.

But there can't be that many film and game score composers or even musicians writing ambient music to support a sound design business catering primarily to this group of customers.

FYI, I never used to use presets as a matter of principle. But I realized over time that no one listening to my music cares one way or the other. Actually, they would probably prefer that I use expertly crafted presets if these sounds make my music sound better.

But I'm just wondering what happened to the market for more conventional Electronic Pop sounds. Maybe it's still there but has been augmented by more cinematic presets that weren't previously available.

you can describe a game as a controlled film. their music can be similar - depends.
but me personally more on the film composing spectrom