Sound and music for games is already a growing frontier for professional music careers; mobile, then, triply so. But with the expanded opportunities come unique challenges. Learning about them requires real-world experience, and short of word of mouth, that kind of knowledge is often scarce – even in the Web age.

Composer, sound designer, and audio director Ben Long has put his sonic thumbprints on games and TV networks alike, and has recently turned his attention to sharing some of the industry secrets of the mobile realm, with work in game design textbooks and GDC China. Now, he has a new book entitled “Game Audio 101: Mobile” that assembles all that experience into a single reference. Launched at South by Southwest Interactive, it could prove invaluable to people aspiring in this area.

What’s especially unique about this title is not only its focus, but its insights into real-world case studies – fairly legendary ones, at that. Long gets tips and background on the making of sound for hit titles Angry Birds (iOS, Android), music app Drumkit (iOS), and RPG hit The Harvest (Windows Phone).

Nor is this generalist advice, painted in vague, broad strokes. There are specifics of platforms (not only iOS, but Windows Phone and Android), sound design technique, technical information, and career advice. Covered in the book:

• Basics of the mobile market, MIDI and mobile design
• Anatomy of specific titles and the techniques they used to make effective music and sound direction
• Particulars of everything from looping to sound cues, coupled with interviews with sound designers
• Tips on improving sound design, catering to specific platforms, and managing your career and negotiations

I should caution that this is more of a white paper of assembled research and tips than a front-to-back textbook. My one complaint is, therefore, it does feel a bit abridged, under fifty pages. There’s sometimes a copy-and-paste sense to the content, as well, in case you’re expecting something with the level of polish of, say, an O’Reilly e-book. The tips you can glean from it, though, could be worth the price of admission if this is a field about which you’re serious – and a lot more than you’d get out of a similarly-priced workshop or the massive cost of attending conferences. You’ll have to do a little digging – the title really picks up somewhere about halfway through – but you could easily get some nuggets that could transform a career.

To make things easier, we have a CDM-only discount code for readers, bringing the price down 50% off its current sale price to just $19.95. Enter the following code at checkout:
AT101ebooksxsw45

More information:

http://www.gameaudio101.com/about_book.php

Ben Long has also written a terrific reference exclusively for CDM, from January – much shorter than the book, but good if you want a taste of his writing:
Creating in 2011: A Composers’ View of Mobile Game Audio, From Trends to Slot Machine Sound Design

Let us know what you think – and definitely if you happen to get a good gig in the industry.

That’s the question I ask at the beginning of the Create Digital Music Winter 08 guide. We’ve filled it with good stuff we love, plus good stuff we hear that you love (via our survey of hundreds of readers for the holiday guide). Via Creative Commons-licensed images, you’ve shared your world of music, and so we share the whole guide as fully free work (it’s got a CC Attribution / ShareAlike license).

Here’s some of what’s inside – we wanted stories that you’d want to live with the whole winter season:

• Circuit bending 101 with Michael Una
• Imagining synths: reflections on the design of electronic instruments with Dan McPharlin, creator of wonderful miniature synths handmade from cardboard
• Tutorial on slicing audio to MIDI in Ableton Live 7, with tips from Live guru Francis Preve plus a free accompanying CDM pack designed by Covert Operators at http://covops.org/cdm
• Holiday Guide, with your favorite gear and software of the year, listening and reading suggestions, and ideas on open hardware from monome creator Brian Crabtree
• Creative tips for surviving winter in Berlin, courtesy monolake (Robert Henke)
• Images from the CDM community and beyond

With the help of graphic editor Nathanael Jeanneret, the results are designed to be an object on paper or read on high-resolution displays. The PDF is available free, with an on-demand print version from Lulu available worldwide (US$19.99 before shipping). I just ordered my print copy rush, so I’ll let you know what it looks like as this is the first time we’ve tried this.

Print Edition + Free PDF Download @ Lulu.com

A big thanks to our sponsors for making this possible:

Ableton Live, our premiere sponsor; now with an unlimited 14-day trial

Audiofile Engineering, makers of Wave Editor for Mac

Highly Liquid DIY MIDI electronics maker

Covert Operators, creators of Live Packs and video tutorials for Ableton Live

I’m really eager to hear what you think.