Ramps vs. Steps

One of the main roles of film music is to affect the intensity of the action or drama on screen. Usually this is an increase in intensity, although there are plenty of times where you want things to wind down as well. There are many ways to build intensity, the most common being a rise in pitch, rise in dynamics, addition of instruments and voices, etc.Something that caught my attention recently that I had never given much thought was the idea of climbing by ramps or by steps. What I mean by this is having the intensity build gradually, like a ramp, or in chunks, like steps. I first thought of this idea while listening to the track "Dream Is Collapsing" from Hans Zimmer's score to Inception. From beginning to end the cue builds in intensity, getting more and more massive the action heightens. What I found interesting was that the cue kept building in chunks of 4. Rather than constant rising of elements, every 4 bars added only a few layers.There are a few advantages to increasing intensity in steps rather than a gradual and constant ramp. The first is predictability: once your ear gets used to the pattern of the ramp you stop paying attention to it. The steps on the other hand give you a little kick each time the next step is introduced. The next advantage is time. If there are only 5 steps from A to B, you can extend the length of each step along the way. In a climbing ramp there is no distinction between the layers and step 2 becomes very similar to step 3.Ramps have their advantages too, but I think they are mostly suitable for shorter lengths of time. Off the top of my hear I'd imagine 20 seconds or less would be an appropriate length of time or a ramp, otherwise the advantages of the steps should be taken into consideration.