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Michael Giacchino's THE BATMAN (2022)


Jay

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4 hours ago, TheUlyssesian said:

 

It just doesn't seem practical. A trailer for a movie is the primary marketing tool. No kidding, studios these days spend literally 10s of millions of dollars to get the trailers right. Trailers would have the budget to impanel an orchestra, write special music for it and record it.

 

A camera test is not that. 99% are never released because they are just that - camera tests. They are cheap, done quickly, essentially a proof of concept shown to suits. Few ever get released. Why would a studio spend money to pay a star composer to write music for a camera test and give him money to record it?

 

The logistics don't make sense.

 

The simplest explanation - that it is from the demo that Gia has already recorded - seems plausible.

 

I think the disconnect here is that you're assuming it's "recorded". Personally, I've not heard of "demos" being "recorded" with an orchestra or whatever else is going on here. If Giacchino has written something and given it to the director, then it's probably a synth mock-up. "Why would a studio spend money to pay a star composer to write music for a camera test and give him money to record it?" is also an applicable question to...Why would the studio pay for a demo be recorded when you can make perfectly acceptable demos in the computer?

 

On the camera test note. How often are camera tests released to the public as they occur in this manner? How often are camera tests even set to music? This is clearly meant to generate hype and it almost acts as a teaser of sorts.

 

4 hours ago, Jay said:

Is this piece recorded by an orchestra or a synth mockup? 

 

Like the others above me. It also sounds like a mock-up to my ears.

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sounds like it was recorded with an orchestra, particularly when the trumpets come in that doesn't sound anything too dissimilar from what I'd hear in terms of mixing on something like his Rogue One soundtrack.

pretty clear this isn't the full theme but either way I like the dark noir vibes and it feels particularly fitting for Batman so I'm keen to hear and see more.

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Logically, in my opinion, based on what I know... If it's recorded with an orchestra then it was probably written specifically for this and would indeed reference or hint / build up to a theme. Wouldn't be a stretch that the studio would pay for it if they think the small clip will generate a good buzz (which it has).

 

If it's from the demo though...probably a synth mock-up and only a small portion of it.

 

I could be wrong, and please correct me if I am, but does anyone know of demos being recorded with an orchestra?

13 minutes ago, DarthDementous said:

pretty clear this isn't the full theme but either way I like the dark noir vibes and it feels particularly fitting for Batman so I'm keen to hear and see more.

 

Agreed. 

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13 hours ago, TSMefford said:

I could be wrong, and please correct me if I am, but does anyone know of demos being recorded with an orchestra?

 

Generally “demo” refers to mock-ups of cues, but if you mean musical ideas that come before the spotting, then Marco Beltrami did a few jazz ideas for “Logan” with four or five players. Some were adapted into cues and others didn’t make the cut.

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2 hours ago, Skelly said:

 

Generally “demo” refers to mock-ups of cues, but if you mean musical ideas that come before the spotting, then Marco Beltrami did a few jazz ideas for “Logan” with four or five players. Some were adapted into cues and others didn’t make the cut.

 

Good to know. I've never heard such a thing, but you learn something every day. 

 

2 hours ago, Kasey Kockroach said:

This many posts discussing 20 seconds of music.

 

NERRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRDDDDS. 

 

I mean- yes, but you're here too so...

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Yeah, it doesn't look great for Giacchino, but it almost seems fair when you have all these opinions flying left, right and center, over nothing more than a 30 second teaser clip. What are you going to do when everything is hype, hype, hype these days - even innocuous teaser music is scrutinized to absurd degrees.

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I think he was being silly. Social media is known for people trolling each other, fighting and bitching, not for their thoughtful consideration and coherent ideas. I think Gia, an adult man that is well over 50, was very childish by descending to the same league of the trolls and answering them like this.

 

If these idiots didn't like the piece, whatever, move along. 

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  • 1 month later...

Is this confirmation that he recorded it?

 

Slightly para-phrased for clarity - 

 

Last year after reading the script I remember going 'Oh! I have an idea!' And I wrote the piece that is in the teaser trailer. And Matt has had that. It was just a demo version of it, a mock-up, it wasn't even done with an orchestra or anything. He had been using that in every single one of his presentations at Warner Brothers. He would put it behind everything - here's the costumes, you hear that music, here's another thing, you hear that music.

 

So when it came time to release the teaser trailer, he said, 'We have to put it with the music. We can't put it out there without it.' And usually you don't get that chance. Usually the music isn't written till way late in the game. 

 

So I did go over. And I recorded that for that. We recorded a bunch of other music as well - lots of themes and things that nobody has heard yet. But they'll all be popping up as the film gets underway again. 

 

 

 

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Of course not. Only a few composers like to record the score before the movie comes out: Morricone, Zimmer on The Thin Red Line and (I guess) Inception... 

 

Gia is more traditional. Aside from the four Jupiter Ascending movements, he scores everything to picture.

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It seems common practice for Giacchino to write a suite or a handful of themes, demo them or record them (if lucky) and then expand that into the full score later on. 

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Yeah obviously he hasn’t written the score. He even says that.

 

 But he’s definitely recorded the music what is the most important point.

 

I think this puts to bed the assumption that a major studio tentpole with a marketing budget running into the hundreds of millions of dollars would release a teaser online with a midi music track. So the music in the teaser was obviously recorded with an orchestra.

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12 hours ago, TheUlyssesian said:

So I did go over. And I recorded that for that. We recorded a bunch of other music as well - lots of themes and things that nobody has heard yet. But they'll all be popping up as the film gets underway again. 

 

I'll certainty concede I was incorrect that he recorded with an orchestra. However, I still say that this isn't the full main theme and people should stop taking it as such.

 

However.

 

20 minutes ago, TheUlyssesian said:

I think this puts to bed the assumption that a major studio tentpole with a marketing budget running into the hundreds of millions of dollars would release a teaser online with a midi music track. So the music in the teaser was obviously recorded with an orchestra.

 

This is certainly not true. Studio put things out with "midi" / sampled tracks all the time. Midi does not always sound god awful. Many high-end projects have midi / synth full scores with some solo instruments added. It happens. 

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Live or not, Gia’s demo would be a piece of cake for any decent sample library these days. 
 

This track is an extreme example of what the technology is capable of, and this was done over six years ago. It’s like John Powell on speed. 

 

 

 

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12 hours ago, TheUlyssesian said:

Maybe I haven't heard such high quality midis. The ones I have come across all sound very thin and you can make them out easily. But perhaps technology has progressed.

 

Technology certainly has. That’s not to say that some don’t come out sounding a bit soulless even with the greatest quality libraries.

 

However, with GREAT care taken to adding the realism to it, you can get very good results. But there’s more to it than just putting down midi and calling it a day. I personally go through and add little bits of “realism” in the performance, by either playing things live on a midi keyboard, off setting some notes, etc. You can even take it a step further by adding some performer noise. All that on top of the top of the line and very well recorded libraries can create quite realistic sounds vs what was available 10 or so years ago. 

 

Problem is. If you hear good midi, you may not realize it. If you hear decent or bad midi then you’ll definitely know it.

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Some demos do get recorded, Danny Elfman recorded some demos with an orchestra for Justice League (or was it Ultron?) and Austin Wintory recorded his demo pitches for Discovery with an Orchestra.

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1 hour ago, TSMefford said:

 

Technology certainly has. That’s not to say that some don’t come out sounding a bit soulless even with the greatest quality libraries.

 

However, with GREAT care taken to adding the realism to it, you can get very good results. But there’s more to it than just putting down midi and calling it a day. I personally go through and add little bits of “realism” in the performance, by either playing things live on a midi keyboard, off setting some notes, etc. You can even take it a step further by adding some performer noise. All that on top of the top of the line and very well recorded libraries can create quite realistic sounds vs what was available 10 or so years ago. 

 

Problem is. If you hear good midi, you may not realize it. If you hear decent or bad midi then you’ll definitely know it.

 

Thanks for that. Not the thrust of this thread, but going down a rabbit hole...

 

As technology improves and realism reaches its peak, at what point do orchestras become obsolete?

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1 hour ago, Fal J. M. Skywalker said:

Some demos do get recorded, Danny Elfman recorded some demos with an orchestra for Justice League (or was it Ultron?) and Austin Wintory recorded his demo pitches for Discovery with an Orchestra.

 

Yes, some do, but if it's full orchestra it is rare. Especially for a full length score. More likely a couple themes or suites.

 

54 minutes ago, TheUlyssesian said:

 

Thanks for that. Not the thrust of this thread, but going down a rabbit hole...

 

As technology improves and realism reaches its peak, at what point do orchestras become obsolete?

 

I think we're a ways off from orchestras becoming obsolete. Sample libraries are quite good at your standard articulations and performances and ranges of expression, but when it comes to anything beyond that it does start to lessen in quality. That's why I mention that some productions that do have full score created with sampled orchestras still have live recorded soloists.

 

I find it incredibly difficult to get a very realistic sound when it comes to soloists. When it's an orchestra and you consistently have other groups of instruments covering up one another or supporting one another this isn't much of an issue, but when you want a solo performance it gets significantly harder to get it to sound real. So there's certainly a need to keep solo musicians around.

 

And, as I said, libraries are quite good at your standard articulations, but when you step outside those I find I also have issues to get realism or to get the orchestra to move or change in quite the way that I want. Just as an example off the top of my head, I'd imagine if you were wanting to create a track like this and make it sound very real then you'd have lots of issues, particularly around 0:16 or 0:17:

 

I find brass and even woodwinds have a ways to go in the virtual instrument realm to catch up to what's going on here.

 

To keep it a bit on topic, in the case of Giacchino's "Camera Test" track, you've got mainly a dark piano, percussive kits, brass, strings, etc. and they aren't doing anything particularly complex in this specific instance. In that context I wouldn't be surprised if it was sampled. This is why I was so baffled by everyone insisting that it HAS to be recorded. It doesn't. It's perfectly conceivable these days that something like this could be produced convincingly with "MIDI" or with a Midi and Recorded Mix. 

 

EDIT: To add onto this, here's a mock-up from Powell.

 

I've heard far better than this, but this isn't awful sounding. Though composers like Powell can generally expect a full score to be recorded so they don't necessarily have to go for the realism techniques I mentioned earlier, just enough to convey his ideas. I know Desplat's demos are quite MIDI sounding. Again though, he doesn't need to make real sounding demos, just enough to convey ideas.

 

I've actually heard of a case where a Director opted to go with a Synth Mock-Up for the final film scene. They did use the recorded version in the credits though.

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17 hours ago, TSMefford said:

I've actually heard of a case where a Director opted to go with a Synth Mock-Up for the final film scene. They did use the recorded version in the credits though.

 

Didn't that happen with a few cues in Avatar? Cameron opted for the synth mockups over the final orchestral recording.

 

I think. Could be wrong, might be thinking of a different score.

 

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37 minutes ago, crumbs said:

 

Didn't that happen with a few cues in Avatar? Cameron opted for the synth mockups over the final orchestral recording.

 

I think. Could be wrong, might be thinking of a different score.

 

 

Could be. Not the example I was thinking of, but clearly it’s happened more than once! XD

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45 minutes ago, crumbs said:

Didn't that happen with a few cues in Avatar? Cameron opted for the synth mockups over the final orchestral recording.

 

I think. Could be wrong, might be thinking of a different score.

 

 

I'm not sure about Avatar, but this clearly happened in Titanic. One example is for the scene on which Jack draws Rose wearing the Heart of the Ocean. On that scene, Cameron listened to the demo of the love theme on piano, and decided to use it on the final cut.

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38 minutes ago, Edmilson said:

 

I'm not sure about Avatar, but this clearly happened in Titanic. One example is for the scene on which Jack draws Rose wearing the Heart of the Ocean. On that scene, Cameron listened to the demo of the love theme on piano, and decided to use it on the final cut.

 

Is that the same thing though? A piano is a real instrument. We are talking about music produced in a computer without any live recording.

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Still, an early demo that got used instead of the actual score. As said on the booklet of the LLL:

 

Quote

In the film Score: A Film Music Documentary, Cameron recollected Horner delivering a cue labeled "Sketch" for him - Cameron thought it was written for the scene of Jack creating the nude drawing of Rose but it was actually Horner's piano demo for the love theme ("Rose"). Cameron thought it fitted perfectly over the drawing scene and decided to place the cue there, insisting that Horner not orchestrate it, and leave it as a piano solo piece.

 

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  • 5 months later...

That Batman trailer has to be library music. I hope it is.

 

On 3/23/2020 at 2:47 PM, Edmilson said:

Still, an early demo that got used instead of the actual score. As said on the booklet of the LLL:

 

 

 

That's a cue that caused a bit of debate in the Titanic box thread - whether a demo cue should be included in the main program, if it was the recording used in the final film.

 

That THW demo from Powell isn't bad, per-se, but it wouldn't cut it in the film. I'm actually surprised that it sounds as flat as it does, as I assume the director is going to be signing off cues from those demos, and really the recording sessions are going to be the first time they properly hear what it sounds like.

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6 hours ago, Richard Penna said:

That Batman trailer has to be library music. I hope it is.

 

It's just a Nirvana song with some overdubs. No Giacchino it looks like to me:

 

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40 minutes ago, TSMefford said:

 

It's just a Nirvana song with some overdubs. No Giacchino it looks like to me:

 

 

The overdubs are definitely Gia-related material. It's clearly derived from the music that was confirmed from the first teaser.

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13 minutes ago, KK said:

 

The overdubs is definitely Gia-related material. It's clearly derived from the music that was confirmed from the first teaser.

 

Oh yeah it's definitely related. Just not sure if he did it himself or not. Trailer houses typically do these song remixes and are more than capable of emulating a reference track. I suppose it could be Giacchino, but I can't say for sure.

 

I guess my point is, it's just some overdubs. Giacchino or not, it's not much to talk about.

 

EDIT: Read a few articles on the track. Most of them say Giacchino did the overdubs, but don't have any real source on that. I suppose for now we'll just say he did it unless a trailer house claims the work.

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Just now, KK said:

Yea, that's fair. Not much to go off of. But I never liked the teaser music much anyway.

 

Apologies for the skepticism, it's just still pretty rare that composers have anything to do with trailers most of the time. People also incorrectly assume trailer music is from the film's score all the time. So my default state for trailers is that it's not music by the composer or from the film.

 

As far as the music itself. I still say that we're probably just hearing the opening of the theme, if it is the theme at all. That's my hope at least. If the Screen-Test Track is straight up the whole theme I will be severely disappointed. 

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  • 2 months later...
Quote

BTL: You mentioned the delays in some of the movies you were scoring, and obviously, two of the bigger movies you were scoring, Jurassic World: Dominion and The Batman, had to stop production, but then they restarted and had a few issues. In fact, Jurassic World restarted production after being postponed a few weeks back.

Giacchino: It’s hard to keep track anymore, because it’s on, it’s off, it’s on, it’s off, and I know Batman as well has had its woes. Look, it’s hard to make a movie in the best of circumstances, but to do it like this, it’s like a madhouse, to quote Planet of the Apes. It’s a little nuts. I don’t know how they’re doing it. I really feel for the crew and the people involved. I talk to Matt [Reeves, The Batman director], and they’re long hours, and you’re all in masks and shields and completely covered. It’s tough, it’s tough.

 

Quote

BTL: You might not be able to answer my last question because you haven’t started working on it yet, but while Jurassic World is something you’ve been doing already, The Batman must be tough because there’s so much iconic music associated with the character. People know or think they know what a Batman movie might sound like from Danny Elfman and Hans Zimmer and even the ‘60s show. How do you go into something like that without worrying about repeating what’s been done before or drifting too far from what’s expected.

Giacchino: You know, it’s interesting, because there’s two camps in this thing. There are the people that are like, “Oh, there’s a Batman movie. You better use the Danny Elfman theme or the Hans Zimmer theme,” or who knows what theme. It could be anything, and they refuse to let go of what was. What I love about comic books growing up is that you would see all different versions of Batman. There would be this series, and then there would be a totally different series where he’s almost a different person in a way. You would get everyone’s interpretation of what they thought Batman was, we do it with Shakespeare all the time. Everyone puts on their own version of Shakespeare. In terms of taking an existing character and reinventing it in some way, that’s the great gift of all of this is we get to see different versions of it. For me, it’s more about what is right for our Batman? What are we doing for our Batman? This is our Batman. I’m not concerned about anything that came before. I’m not thinking about that at all. I loved all of it. I was certainly there in the theaters watching it, and I loved Batman since I was a kid, but I’m excited to do our version of it, and what we think it should be. That’s how I approach every time I do one of these movies that is tied to something from the past. It’s about the excitement of “Alright, this is our version, so now we get a chance to do what we think would be cool to do with this character.” So that’s always the approach I take.

http://www.btlnews.com/composers/michael-giacchino-travelogue-vol-1/

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