sound design ideas Asbjoern Andersen


Figuring out what works for a given project can be a challenge – and to overcome that, sound designer Barney Oram has devised a system to make the process easier. Here’s his sound design system:


Written by Barney Oram



 

Rule of Thirds is a technique I’ve been developing to foster creative re-iteration in my sound design work. It’s hardly a new approach, per se, but I’ve formalised it as a process and implemented it into my own workflow with great results. The phrase ‘Rule of Thirds’ is taken directly from photography, a technique by which the photographer uses a grid when framing photos to create a cohesive and pleasing image. I’m really just stealing the name – my approach doesn’t particularly bear resemblance to the photographic technique. The division of thirds is also fairly arbitrary for my approach, as I’ll go on to explain, but I found it to be a number I was most comfortable with.

As a sound designer, possibly the most important thing to learn is taste – a taste for what ‘works’

As a sound designer, I think possibly the most important thing to learn is taste – a taste for what ‘works’. The ability to understand aesthetic (be it defined by visuals, by direction, or by yourself) and practically apply that understanding in a proficient way is, in my opinion, what produces cohesive and impressive sound design. Some sound designers are inherently good at this – many are still figuring it out. I personally feel like I am still grappling with this concept, and I developed the Rule of Thirds approach out of the need to practice aesthetic understanding and aesthetic exploration in an easy way.

When initially approaching a sound design task, it can often be difficult, if not impossible, to design the perfect sound on the first try. With practice, it can become easier to get closer to initial perfection. Personally, I will almost never use the first sound I make. I have previously fallen into the trap of being content with the first sound I design, but I have slowly realised that I can miss potential to make the sound even cooler, by settling on my initial attempt, and not exploring everything a sound has to ‘offer’. As such, I needed a technique by which I was able to factor quick re-iteration into my workflow on the first attempt at creating a sound.

So, the Rule of Thirds approach is simply this; three steps of iteration for each sound you design.
Let’s unpack that with a conceptual example – this technique will work with any sound you need to create; say a rockfall, a reload, a magic attack, an explosion – even an ambience – anything.
 

[tweet_box]Rule of Thirds: A Sound Design Approach[/tweet_box]  

Let’s use a magic attack, for a fantasy game or film, as our subject. Perhaps you may have an animation, or visuals, to design to – or maybe you are designing blind. Either way, you’ll jump into your DAW, and begin to craft a sound. Maybe you could pull in some organic elements, rocks, whooshes, synth textures, and squash them together to create your first attempt. It isn’t bad – it hits the timings you need it to, it communicates the ‘magic’ aesthetic, and performs as a functional sound. You know it can be better, but you don’t know how to make it better.

Choose a stimulus to work from and iterate with that in mind

This is where we can use the Rule of Thirds – you’ve already done a third of the technique – the first iteration. Now, you will re-design the sound, two more times, with a brand new approach each time. I recommend you choose a stimulus to work from – I usually use a word – and iterate with that in mind. Think of it as a trick to stimulate inspiration.

Take a concept like wide. You’re going to re-work or re-design your magic attack with wide in mind. Instantly, that provokes ideas – you could make more use of panning; you could use chorus effects to add to the width; you could add some subtle movement in the sound by automating an element to pan across the stereo field; you could avoid occupying the central channel for your core elements altogether; or you could duplicate your entire sound, pan hard left and right, and offset the timings by half a second to create a huge, wide sound.

It doesn’t have to be wide – it could be short, long, small, muffled, backward, thin, red, blue, obtuse, organic, quirky, comical, chunky, gritty, smooth, rocky, hot, cold, dense, wet, tonal, hollow, flexible, ornate… anything. Take a descriptive word, be it something related to your target aesthetic – or not – and re-work or re-design with it in mind.

Instantly, your sound has gone in a new direction, and you’ve explored a new aesthetic that you almost certainly wouldn’t have entertained had you approached the sound from a surface level analysis

That’s your second iteration, and second step of the Rule of Thirds technique, done. Let’s move onto the third. This time, let’s take a conceptual aesthetic to work with, rather than a descriptive term; steampunk, for example. Initially, there’s a lot of directions that this could be taken, especially considering steampunk and magic are generally not close neighbours, aesthetically. Perhaps you could use some more clicky, mechanical elements in your magic attack sound; you could use Foley elements like leather, or clinking gear, to punctuate your sound; or you could decorate your sound with subtle air or steam release sounds. You could even just use distortion to make the sound a bit more aggressive, a bit gritter.

Instantly, your sound has gone in a new direction, and you’ve explored a new aesthetic that you almost certainly wouldn’t have entertained had you approached the sound from a surface level analysis. If you do it subtly, and cohesively, it won’t seem unusual to the end user – they’ll just hear a cohesive sound and accept it as part of the product’s aesthetic direction. Only you will know that, in order to get to that final interesting sound, you had to follow a slightly unorthodox approach. And again, it doesn’t have to be steampunk. It could be any aesthetic, any genre, that you weave into your sound.
 


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    About Pottery Workshop

     

    84 sounds that are clean, subtle and capture pretty much every object and action of the magic of fire and earth.

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    Keywords

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Need specific sound effects? Try a search below:


 

Here’s a practical example, with some sounds I’ve designed. I decided to make the sound of a big metal machine – perhaps some kind of hydraulic press in a factory, or maybe even a huge robot’s footsteps. It’s perhaps not the best sound I’ve ever designed, but it communicates the idea – and also could represent an attempted first-pass at a sound design task. I began by making a big, chunky sound – lots of metal elements, some punchy transients, some nice mechanical movements and some servos – arranged them into a rhythmic pattern, and created a couple of extra variations by subtly shifting clip timings. I tried to keep the elements relatively raw, minimal processing was used and I mainly capitalised on some great source. You can hear the resulting sound below.
 

Next, I copied my first sound, and chose a stimulus to re-design it with. I decided to make it tight. So I worked with the original layers, stripping back the overlapping aspects, tightening up my fades, layering in some new elements for more of a rhythmic flow to the sound. I also accentuated the transients a lot more, making them shorter and adding some elements to the initial transient to make it more sharp and harsh. I also shortened the servo sounds, and used pitch to make them feel quicker, smaller and more accurate. I think the resulting design is much tighter than the original – and whilst maintaining some elements, has taken on a new life of its own. You can hear the resulting sound below.
 

Lastly, I decided to pick a conceptual aesthetic to work with. I chose an aesthetic close to my heart – Sci-Fi. Again, I copied my original sound, and took it in a completely different direction. My approach to Sci-Fi sound design currently rests upon modulation, and I used a few of my favourite plugins to warp and bend the elements. I decided to flatten my transients and make it more of a flowing, washy sound, whilst maintaining the rhythm of the original. The result is a spluttering, rubbery Sci-Fi style sound, which would be great to describe an alien or future energy. You can hear the sound below.
 

For me, approaching my sound design in this way has proven to be very helpful. I usually find that creating a sound three times, twice from different mindsets and aesthetic approaches, can yield great results. I think it’s about forcing my brain to consider a sound in a different context, and typically that context can stimulate enough ideas for me to make a sound much more interesting. As I said, three is arbitrary – you could, and should, re-iterate on a sound as many times as you need (or as you have time to) til it’s as close to perfect as it can be.

I hope this is an interesting look at my approach, and I hope it is useful. I’d love to hear how you’ve used it in your own work.
 

Big thanks to Barney Oram for sharing his insights on creative sound design!


 

ABOUT BARNEY ORAM

Barney Oram is a video game sound designer, currently working for Cloud Imperium Games on Star Citizen. He’s passionate about designing sounds, and creating audio experiences that are visceral and exciting. Barney is an active member of the game audio scene in the UK and online, and is a co-host of the Soundbytes Podcast, a monthly podcast focused on games and audio. He can be found on Twitter, and on his personal website.

 

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A Sound Effect gives you easy access to an absolutely huge sound effects catalog from a myriad of independent sound creators, all covered by one license agreement - a few highlights:

  • Door Sound Effects Noisy Doors Play Track 44 sounds included $10

    This library contains recordings of eleven different types of doors specifically chosen for their interesting sound. I performed all actions with a lot of detail covering “open/close”, “knocks”, “bangs and thuds”, “handle grab and rattle” and when possible also “crackles and squeaks” (all recorded at various intensities)

    50 %
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  • Metal Sound Effects MetalMotion Play Track 2000+ sounds included, 239 mins total $110

    MetalMotion is a sound design construction kit that contains four hours of moving metal mayhem: clicks and clanks, rolls and drags, wronks and squeals, scrapes and rattles, ranging from from tiny to monstrous. Nathan Moody’s unique performances with unusual combinations of props produce everything from Foley-like movements to intense groans and howls.

    Whether you’re covering a robot’s movements, sweetening weapon Foley, making crafting or pick-up sounds in a game, placing unusual layers beneath a kaiju’s roar, or crushing a submarine with undersea pressure, this collection covers the full range of subtle to raucous. Each file has many performance variations for creative choice and game audio asset creation.

    While there are some tasty impacts within, this library’s true focus is on characterful movements: handling, rummaging, opens, closes, ratchets, swirls, rolls, drags, drops, spins, rubs, zuzzes, and bows. Metal containers, filing cabinets, modern appliances, vintage (and very rusty) tools, cymbals, bells, grills, plates, bars, rods, and tubes, and many other props lent their voices to this collection.

    This UCS-compliant library was recorded with a combination of standard, contact, and ultrasonic-capable microphones through Millennia preamps. Sample rates vary based on the amount of ultrasonic content in each file. The audio files are mastered for realism, ready for extreme processing and pitch shifting of your own, but still useful in more grounded contexts.

  • Electricity Sound Effects Polarity Play Track 975 sounds included $72

    Polarity delivers more than 950 sounds of electricity, science and technology – captured in several locations around the world, from electricity museums to science labs. About 50% of the library is all about electricity, with various types of Jacob’s Ladders, Tesla Coils, Ruhmkorff lamp and all sorts of impactful bursts of energy.

    Then we go through welders, plasma spheres, 3D printers, starting to cover a more broad technology theme – like old phones, telegraphs, dynamo wheels, rotary dials, whirling watchers, alarm, lab centrifuges, something scientists call a roller and a rocker, servo sounds, neon lights, a wimshurst machine and sparklers.

    Many sounds in this section were captured from vintage equipment, from a 1928’s tram to old telephone switchboards, high voltage levers and control surfaces.

    All content was recorded at 192KHz with a Sanken CO100K, a couple of Sennheiser 8040 and a Neumann 81i, translating into final assets that have plenty of ultrasonic content, ready for the most extreme manipulation.

    Bonus: Two extra libraries included for free:
    This library also includes two additional releases from Mattia Cellotto - for free: Crunch Mode delivers 230 crunchy sounds made with a variety of vegetables, fresh bread, pizza crust and a selection of frozen goods. The Borax Experiment gets you 158 squishy, gory, slimy and gooey sounds.
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Explore the full, unique collection here

Latest sound effects libraries:
 
  • Trench Rammers is a one-of-a-kind sound library, created by sound designer Barney Oram. It features recordings of two 20th century Trench Rammers, some of the last operating machines of their kind in the world. The library features 48 files in total, capturing the Trench Rammers using a variety of microphones and perspectives, supplied in 192kHz 24bit WAV file format.

    This library contains multiple recordings of two antique Trench Rammers, the Pegson ER5 and the Warsop Benjo, and also features additional recordings of four antique stationary engines, the Amanco Hired Man (1920s), the JAP 1947, the Lister D (1940s) and the Norman T3000.

    Recorded in Leeds, UK, this library features multi-mic coverage and a range of distance positions captured on all included source content. Microphones used include; Sanken, Sennheiser, Neumann and DPA, captured with Sound Devices and Tascam recorders.

    This library includes detailed SoundMiner metadata and utilizes the UCS system for ease of integration into your library.

    Behind the Scenes Video:


    Trench Rammer


  • The cozy natural rhythms of hums, scrapes, splashes and thuds soundtrack the pottery workshop where the earth meets art. Find the true sound of it with Vadi Sound Library.

     

    About Pottery Workshop

     

    84 sounds that are clean, subtle and capture pretty much every object and action of the magic of fire and earth.

    From the rhythmic hum of the spinning potter’s wheel, to the splash of water, the scrape of clay with the tools shaping and smoothing surfaces, listen up for the symphony of creation.

    You will hear the tapping and thud of ceramic pottery, wooden ribs, wire cutters, loop tools, and sponges, all kinds of rummage, and mud actions on the potter’s wheel. The clicking and whirring of mechanisms during firing cycles add a mechanical counterpoint to the workshop’s natural rhythms.

    You will get variations of sounds in different proximity, size, and style of action. This collection is handy due to the clarity and diversity of the raw sounds. They have both Foley and practical usability and room for further sound design.

    You will get intuitive, detailed naming, UCS compatibility and the usual Vadi Sound craft and attention to detail in 84 pristine sounds. Recorded in 24bit-96kHz.WAV format on our favorite Sennheiser MKH 8040 stereo pair and Zoom F6.

     

    Keywords

    Pottery, workshop, electric potter’s wheel, wheel, oven, heat gun, mud, clay, ceramic, glass, wooden, metal, cup, handle, push, pull, move, remove, shape, tap, shake, clank, level, lid, tool, organizer, toolbox, rummage, fiberboard, button, bucket, sponge, plate, Dremel.

     

    What else you may need

    You may also want to check out Drag & Slide for 477 sound files of dragging, sliding, scraping and friction sounds of different objects made of wood, plastic, metal on various surfaces. Our bestseller Crafting & Survival is another good choice to get access to 1000+ survival, gathering, movement and crafting sounds.

  • All files are recorded 32bit, 192 kHz, with Shure KSM 137, Line Audio Omni1, FEL Clippy XLR EM272, Sonorous Objects SO.3 and JrF C-Series Pro+ microphones, Sound Devices MixPre-6 II & Zoom F3 recorders. Library contains wav files of driving, interior and exterior foley, mechanical and electrical sounds. It is also available in UCS.

  • Introducing Devils Bane Trailer, a chilling symphony of horror encapsulated in 533 meticulously crafted sound files, ready to unleash terror upon your audience. Dive into a nightmare realm where every creak, whisper, and shriek is meticulously designed to send shivers down your spine.

    • 533 files
    • 3.5 GB of game audio assets
    • All in 96k 24bit .wav
    • Dark Horror Movie Trailer Sound Effects Library
    17 %
    OFF
  • Birdsong from the countryside of the Swedish rural region of Värmland.


   

2 thoughts on “Rule of Thirds: A Sound Design Approach by Barney Oram

  1. This is a very useful article. Thanks for sharing your knowledge. Its useful to have an approach and methodology. I’m going to try this.

  2. This is a really cool way to think about things differently and come up with something super unique. I will definitely be trying this out – thanks, Barney!

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