Hi Chris, please introduce yourself and the new library:
Hi, my name is Chris Sweetman and I’m a Sound Designer and Audio Director primarily working in video games. I started my career in Film & TV many moons ago but moved across to games maybe 15 or so years ago.
I’ve worked in-house at companies like Gremlin, Acclaim, Criterion, Splash Damage & Microsoft and I now run “Sweet Justice”, an audio outsourcing company with my business partner Samuel Justice.
My new library is called Interesting Interiors and is collection of source material for use in ambience design work.
With decades of material at hand, there must be a ton of sounds to choose from. How did you decide what ambiences to include, and what to leave out?
Yes, there’s lots to choose from! The collection formed from source material that I found myself keep going back to over the last 20 years or so, I think I’ve used some part of the collection in everything I’ve done.
The most important aspect of the collection was that all the material had to have something interesting about it. I didn’t want to just release 30 basic buzz tracks.
We have lots of interesting sounds like rain on aluminum ladders and drilling thru walls that work really nicely as source for making the ambiences stand out.
Your library features 3 rare recordings of the derelict Star Wars stage at Elstree – what’s the story behind those?
During the early to mid 90’s the film industry was in a bit of a slump in the U.K and some of the big studios (Elstree, Pinewood, Twickenham) started to suffer.
There was a famous Stage 6 where large portions of Empire Strikes Back were filmed (including a lot of the Hoth interiors). This particular stage was so big it remained unused and was missing portions of its roof due to storm damage and was never repaired.
It was finally sold off to a consortium who built a supermarket on the land sadly. These recordings were made before its demolition in 1995.
You’ve also got what’s described as an extremely detailed sewer recording (!) in there – what exactly is that, and how did you capture it?
A large portion of the library was recorded by my father Brian Sweetman, a 40 year veteran of the film industry, and he gained access to some of the Victorian sewers under London for a film shoot back in the early 90’s. This was one of the recordings made, and I’ve got some other material of gushing sewer pipes!
• Interior Wooden Shed Plastic Tarpaulin Fluttering Around Subtle Wooden Creak 3:04
• Interior Original Star Wars soundstage Elstree Studio torn down 6:33
• Interior Original Star Wars soundstage Elstree Studio torn down 002 1:25
• Interior Original Star Wars soundstage Elstree Studio torn down 003 6:28
• Warehouse Large Space soundstage Elstree Deserted lovely movement Wind Drips 2:28
• Warehouse Large Space soundstage Elstree Deserted lovely movement Wind Drips plastic movement 002 2:44
• Warehouse Interior Drill Distant Horn Alarm Like Large Space 0:53
• Interior Large Space Distant Building Construction Work Reflective Verb Roomy 2:01
• Interior Large Space Hammering Hammer On Wood 0:32
• Interior Large Space Horse Swimming Pool Equine Exhaling Roomy 1:54
• Interior Roomtone Old Manor House Mansion Distant Movement Wooden Creaks 16:35
• Interior Parking Garage Surreal Tone Distant Echoey Birds 1:33
• Interior Public School Hallway Light Walla Movement 1:27
• Interior Public School Hallway Light Walla Movement Take 2 2:05
• Interior Public Toilet Bathroom Water Dripping Flowing Flush Splat 3:37
• Car Interior Small Heavy Rain on Windshield 2:10
• Interior Plastic Conservatory Roof Ceiling Heavy Rain Hit Splat 3:40
• Interior Lift Elevator Shaft Rain Drip Splat Tone Interior 2:04
• Roomtone Server Room Hum 2:03
• Sewer Underground Tunnel Water Lapping 2:02
• Interior Industrial Space Steam Sustained Blast 0:58
• Interior Steam Pops from Old Boiler 0:43
• Interior Steam Pops from Old Boiler 1:27
• Interior Faster Steam Pops from Old Boiler 0:41
• Interior Toilet Cistern Running Water Trickling Dripping 0:57
• Interior Underground Car Park Dead 1:05
• Wind Interior Through Gaps Tonal Subtle Creaks 2:04
Are you planning on doing more sound libraries – and if so, any clues as to what’s coming next?
Yes we are planning on continuing the “Interesting” series, I’m undecided on what’s next but it will be Interesting :)
Please share this:
from a myriad of independent sound creators, all covered by one license agreement
- a few highlights:
