We were very pleased to have procedural audio veteran and PANow regular, Paul Weir, speaking at the May meetup.

Paul has been involved in some groundbreaking generative music projects for games and retail spaces over the past 20 years, and he began his talk with an overview of his work to date – discussing the pros and cons of PA, some of the challenges you might meet, and how the technology has progressed over time. Following on from that we had a listen to audio examples of the works and took a look at some of the custom software used.

His work for retail spaces is often driven by the client’s need to stimulate a specific mood in the customer. Paul spoke about how he approaches each brief: weaving together location recording, sound design, system design, and finally on-site installation of the standalone music systems, in places as diverse as banks, airports, outdoor public spaces, and high-end department stores.

Video of the presentation and Q&A is below. (The video framing is off-centre for the first couple of minutes).

Paul Weir is an Audio Director, Composer and Sound Designer, currently working as an Audio Director with Microsoft and for Hello Games’ procedural sci-fi game, No Man’s Sky.