7: One door closes, more doors open
Happy holidays, friends!! I hope you all have been having a wonderful, cozy past couple of weeks in your various corners of the world.
This is the most chill holiday season I've ever had. No preparations for visiting family or family friends, no preparations/volunteering for church festivities, no schedule coordinating for meeting up with friends. I miss everything, though...it's just not quite the same. Hopefully next year, we'll all be able to gather with our loved ones again.
This month has been exciting, to say the least! I think I can finally, officially say I work in game audio. (Still doesn't feel real to say that!)
One door closes...
But first, let me start with what was happening at the beginning of the month.
At the beginning of October, I actually applied to work at Proletariat, the studio that just released Spellbreak, and I was really excited about the prospect of working there. After all, it's a project with elemental magic and a fantasy setting - everything I love and aspire to work on! I eventually passed the initial application stage and interviewed via phone screening at the end of October. Then I moved on to the audio test stage, which I worked on at the beginning of November. (That was what the Genshin Impact, Castlevania, and Legends of Runeterra redesigns in the last newsletter were from!)
Finally, at the beginning of December, after about a month of waiting, I received an email from Proletariat letting me know that I would not be moving on to the interview stage. Not going to lie, I was definitely pretty sad about it for a couple days - I tried really hard to stay calm, but I cried quite a bit over it. But, well...I did move on and made peace with it. I came to realize that it doesn't mean I wasn't good enough; it just means the role and I are not the right fit for each other at this time, and something even better will come along. I also reminded myself of what Juan and Isabella (and quite a few others) always say: If you keep working at it, the opportunities will come. You'll face rejections, but you have to take them in stride and keep moving forward.
In addition to that, I received some very kind feedback from Dave Shumway, Proletariat's Principal Audio Designer, that further put things into perspective. Not only did I learn how I could keep improving myself as a sound designer (main takeaway: more organic layers in magical sound design in order to keep sounds grounded in the world!), but I also learned that I actually made it to the top of the applicant pile. Among 200+ candidates, I was one among 9 of whom were chosen to test - the farthest I've ever gotten on any audio designer application!
On the one hand, it was a little saddening that I had gotten so close and didn't get to go further, but on the other hand, it made me really proud to realize that I'm so, so, so close. I'm right there. I just need to keep pushing a bit further, and then maybe, just maybe... I'll be a full-time audio designer in games. (Maybe I'll even get to work on Genshin Impact?!) I've gotten this far, and I'm going to work even harder to get where I want to be.
...and more doors open...
While the beginning of the month brought the rather disappointing news from Proletariat, the rest of the month brought some really wonderful opportunities, the first of which is - that I landed my first game audio contract!!
For the coming weeks, I'll be working with Ubiquity6 on their project Backyard, which is a social platform currently in alpha that allows you to video chat with friends while playing games. Many of the games are still in development or in need of polish, but they're all missing audio - which is where I come in! I feel super blessed and lucky to have been recommended for this contract, and I'm really excited to be working on their games as it's the bubbly, playful sound design I love doing.
Aside from this game audio contract, I've also lined up a couple of animation projects within the small audio outsourcing studio that I've been working on with my former classmates! The first project is a more comedic piece originally started for the Open Animation Film Fest that we'll be continuing to work on and hope to eventually release in 2021; the second project is a more thought-provoking thesis film from a group of very talented animation students at San José State University. We're starting to cultivate a social media presence for the first, and we're still working on negotiating contract terms for the second, but in general I'm very much looking forward to getting to work more on these projects in the new year.
It may just be a few projects for now, but I'm so damn stoked to finally be starting. I feel like I've been holding my breath for so long, continuing to work on my craft, preparing myself so that when luck favors me I'm ready, and now it's happening. I'm still looking for contracts and that full-time role in game audio, but I've come quite a long way from not knowing a thing about designing sound effects, and I'm freakin' proud.
...which is huge progress.
Speaking of coming a long way - I've definitely had quite a personal journey this year. For one thing, do y'all remember how I mentioned in an earlier letter that I had goals this year of getting my first contract in game audio and working at an audio outsourcing agency? I wasn't sure that I would be able to actually achieve those goals, but - I did it!! (Technically, I helped create the audio outsourcing studio, but that still counts hahaha.)
But not only did I make great strides in my career goals, I hella improved my sound design abilities in a considerably short amount of time.
For context, here's my first game audio redesign from about a year ago. Looking back at it, it's not terrible, but I had made it too harsh and filtered, lacked any organic feel, and didn't use the entire frequency range:
And now, here's the Genshin Impact redesign I did last month that is probably the most representative of my capabilities, aesthetic sensibilities, and what I'd like to work on in the future. More creative layering, a sweet balance of organic and synthetic/magical feel, and aesthetically cohesive:
Most importantly though... I put more effort into my social life and became a part of the game audio community. I've started meeting fellow game dev and audio peeps, making friends, and becoming more open with sharing my life and my work. It may not seem like a huge thing, but making friends isn't always easy for me (and has only been made more difficult by the fact that none of us could meet face-to-face this year), so I'm really grateful for such a warm community and for all the friends who've entered my life this year.
So - watch me in 2021!
While I'm really proud of how far I've gotten in 2020, I'm definitely looking forward to what 2021 will bring. I've got my sights set on a few opportunities on the horizon, but I'm also dreaming big. I'd still love to contract for Team Audio, but I'd also love to land a full-time studio role. I want to continue what I've started and spend the next year reaching that goal and getting to work on projects that are close to my heart - and to do that, I'll work hard to continuously improve myself, work on contracts, gain experience, and apply apply apply.
I'm going to make sure that 2021 is a wonderful year.
Other little updates
- Redesigned another *Genshin Impact* ability - Mona's Ripple of Fate: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IEhwbE_kDCY
- Updated my website again! I moved to Squarespace 7.1, which allows for more customizing without a lot of coding. This time around, I updated the layout a bit, toned down on color and selected a different color palette: 
- My current day job is asking me if I'd like to become a regular full-time employee! To be honest, it's tempting, but I think I'd like to stay on-call or become regular part-time instead to be able to leave enough flexibility during the weekdays for contract work, sound design studying, and job applications. I can manage with a workweek of 30-35 hours, but I've done the 40-hour workweek while trying to do projects on the side and it's an extremely quick path to burnout. I'm fortunate enough that my mother keeps me under her insurance and is willing to have me pay her back for that extra cost, so at least that wouldn't be an issue. The discussion has been tabled till January though, so we'll see how it goes!
- I finally received the *Hollow Knight Piano Collections* vinyl record and CD that I ordered in February! It's SO GOOD.
- I also bought and downloaded the *Genshin Impact* soundtracks, and discovered that miHoYo already has them on Spotify. Suffice to say, I've been listening to them nonstop and have been happy as a clam!
- Bought my second and third sets of keycaps: DSA Magic Girl and Dark Magic Girl. I can't wait for them to ship in May ahhhhh!!
- I've been practicing my typing on MonkeyType just for fun; I already touch-type and my wpm is pretty decent, but I'm curious to see if I can get even faster! It's also just fun to do when I need to take a quick break from work. My current personal best on the 30-second test: 
- Alex and I celebrated our three-year anniversary on the 28th! What we love to do is go treat ourselves to meals at our favorite but more expensive restaurants, and this year we did the quarantine version and picked up take-out. We also binged anime and played some *Genshin Impact*! Overall, a perfect day <3
- Recently, I started getting back into watching anime, and a couple of my favorites have been *Maid Sama* and *Violet Evergarden*. So good - if you haven't seen them, I highly recommend. I'm currently in the I-feel-a-void phase though, so if you have any recommendations, please send them my way!
- Media consumption: *Genshin Impact*, *Hades*, *Animal Crossing*, *Nice to Meet You*, *Great British Baking Show*, *Maid Sama*, *Violet Evergarden*, *Sailor Moon*, *The Great Pretenders*, *Hilda* Season 2, *Never Have I Ever*, Christmas movies!!
Thank you, from the bottom of my heart.
Finally, before this year ends, I'd just like to thank you all for your friendship and support! I don't know if I'll ever be able to adequately express how grateful and appreciative I am for all of you. I'm still quite terrible at responding sooner rather than later - I haven't forgotten that I have messages I still need to get to!! I'm so sorry, and thank you again for your patience!! - but please know that I'm so happy that you're all in my life. <3
& That's all for now! Thank you so much for reading, and be well.
Happy holidays, and happy new year!!
Stay cozy,
Amerlyn