There’s a gap between the creation of a sound and its playback. From creation to reproduction, from microphone to speaker, there are countless steps that must be taken in order to realize our craft as sound designers.
Whether you’re doing the field recording, pulling from sound libraries and layering in a DAW, or working to play back sounds as part of a game, there is always a process that must be followed to get between the start and final execution of an idea.
As a technical sound designer, my interest lies primarily in the final aspect of bringing a sound recorded in the field or designed in a DAW and getting it to play back in a game appropriately.
And as games have grown in complexity, so has the potential to represent actions and events within the game with increased dynamism and variation, allowing for repetition and believability.
Here are a few things I try to keep in mind when working to bridge the gap:
Systems Serve Gameplay
Whatever you’re working on, however you go about achieving the results, always find the core of gameplay and aspire to support it in the best way possible. Understanding the principals of what gameplay is trying to communicate should be your guiding light when designing audio playback systems.
Imagine stealth without obstruction/ occlusion, physics with limp, laggy, or inappropriate impact sounds, ambient without dynamism and randomization;
Get to understand the fundamental aspects and make sure they get the appropriate attention from an audio system-design perspective.
The majority of the time, this will end up being the biggest win and most satisfying!
Know What You Want
Understanding the needs of a game is a good first step, how you get there is another question.
While some people choose to feel their way around to a solution through countless hours of experimentation and (possible) head-banging, there is a divine beauty in thinking your way to a solution and executing on it immediately.
You may have heard tales of people solving problems: in their sleep, while jogging, or scrolling a tumblr of cat pics. Once the destination you’re trying to reach is clear, the path often opens itself in front of you like a bob-sled run.
That said, there is a beauty in fumbling around in the dark looking for the light switch. Knowing when to take a step back and shift focus to allow for side-ways inspiration is a skill that can be developed over time.
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This is a unique bicycle library that captures road surfaces from the perspective of super quiet bicycle. These are clean, quiet, nicely performed true exterior rides. Including multiple perspectives, speeds and actions. From fast passbys on asphalt to slow onboard recordings and smooth stops.
The Extra Surfaces library provides 162 sounds captured on the following road types Large Bricks, Gravel, Grit, Icy Asphalt.
The four additional ‘onboard road’ surfaces are the perfect extension for your other ‘City Bicycle’ library of taste. Just add it as a layer, mix it and voila your bicycle can move from gravel to bricks to grit or from large bricks to slippery icy asphalt roads.
Speeds and actions:
Three speeds. Departures from slow, medium to fast getaways. Arrivals from slow stops with gently brakes to smooth departures.
Five perspectives:
1. Onboard Front: captures the whirring tire and surface sound.
2. Onboard Pedal: nice overall combination of pedaling, crank creaks, chain rattle, tire and surface sounds.
3. Onboard Rear: close up sound of the rear axle, with chain, sprocket and switching of gear.
4. Tracking shot: mono recording of the passby, keeping the bike in focus while passing by.
5. Static XY shot: stereo recording of the passby that emphasizes speed.
Overview of perspectives and mic placement:
Onboard recordings are 2-3 minutes long depending on speed. Higher speeds > shorter duration.
All 3 onboard mics are edited in sync with one another to make layering easy.
All Passbys, Arrivals and Departures move from Left to Right.Metadata & Markers:
Because we know how important metadata is for your sound libraries we have created a consistent and intuitive description method that adheres to the Universal Category System. This allows you to find the sound you need easily, whether you work in a database like Soundminer/Basehead/PT Workspace work, or a Exporer/Finder window. We made a video that helps you navigate the library ans find your best bicycle sounds faster and easier.
CategoryFull
A quick way to filter out sounds you don’t need: like handling sounds or vice versa bicycle onboards.UserCategory
Fastest way to find the type of action you need for all bicycles. Passby needed, just click and voila.
OpenTier
Once you’ve selected the bike you can open up OpenTier and audition and select the perspective you want to use.Scene &Â Performer
This field contains the type of bicycle or other sound. So you can find the bike you like fast.iXMLTrackLayout
This is a neat little identifier you will find in the Waveform displays and you can see in a glance what Listening position you are.
MicPerspective
We have another way to find perspectives but it is more limited to distance to the recorded subject.
So passbys are MED – EXT and handling are CU – EXT. Exterior? Of course: we recorded everything outside!UserComments
We used this field to create the UserData and give you the minimal set of information about the recording in the filename.Additionally, we added Markers to some wave files, so specific sound events are easy to spot in Soundminer and other apps.
If you have any questions about this, please contact us info@frickandtraa.com!
Need more?
The GoodBike library is a part of the ‘City Bicycles – Complete Bundle‘ available here in the A Sound Effect store. It consists of all 4 bicycles and includes additional surfaces and extras ranging from one-off bicycle passes captured in the city and bounces and rattles. If you buy the complete bundle you get 1 package for free!Here’s a handy comparison table:
Responses:344 AUDIO: ‘City Bicycles has a plethora of content, for a great price. The perfect balance between a great concept, great presentation and outstanding execution, lands them an almost perfect score of 4.9..‘
The Audio Spotlight: City Bicycles is worth getting if you are in need of great sounding and well edited bicycle sounds.
Watch a video created by Zdravko Djordjevic.
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This is a unique bicycle library that captures this characteristic bike in clean, quiet, nicely performed true exterior rides. Including multiple perspectives, speeds and actions. From fast passbys on asphalt to slow onboard recordings and smooth stops.
The GoodBike is a smooth sounding retro bike that doesn’t rattle or squeak, it has a really nice tire sound for a subtle presence in the mix.
Speeds and actions:
Three speeds. Departures from slow, medium to fast getaways. Arrivals from slow stops with gently squeaking handbrakes to heavy stuttering skids.Five perspectives:
1. Onboard Front: captures the whirring tire and surface sound.
2. Onboard Pedal: nice overall combination of pedaling, crank creaks, chain rattle, tire and surface sounds.
3. Onboard Rear: close up sound of the rear axle, with chain, sprocket and switching of gear.
4. Tracking shot: mono recording of the passby, keeping the bike in focus while passing by.
5. Static XY shot: stereo recording of the passby that emphasizes speed.
Overview of perspectives and mic placement:
Onboard recordings are 2-3 minutes long depending on speed. Higher speeds > shorter duration.
All 3 onboard mics are edited in sync with one another to make layering easy.
All Passbys, Arrivals and Departures move from Left to Right.Metadata & Markers:
Because we know how important metadata is for your sound libraries we have created a consistent and intuitive description method that adheres to the Universal Category System. This allows you to find the sound you need easily, whether you work in a database like Soundminer/Basehead/PT Workspace work, or a Exporer/Finder window. We made a video that helps you navigate the library ans find your best bicycle sounds faster and easier.
CategoryFull
A quick way to filter out sounds you don’t need: like handling sounds or vice versa bicycle onboards.UserCategory
Fastest way to find the type of action you need for all bicycles. Passby needed, just click and voila.
OpenTier
Once you’ve selected the bike you can open up OpenTier and audition and select the perspective you want to use.Scene &Â Performer
This field contains the type of bicycle or other sound. So you can find the bike you like fast.iXMLTrackLayout
This is a neat little identifier you will find in the Waveform displays and you can see in a glance what Listening position you are.
MicPerspective
We have another way to find perspectives but it is more limited to distance to the recorded subject.
So passbys are MED – EXT and handling are CU – EXT. Exterior? Of course: we recorded everything outside!UserComments
We used this field to create the UserData and give you the minimal set of information about the recording in the filename.Additionally, we added Markers to some wave files, so specific sound events are easy to spot in Soundminer and other apps.
If you have any questions about this, please contact us info@frickandtraa.com!
Need more?
The GoodBike library is a part of the ‘City Bicycles – Complete Bundle‘ available here in the A Sound Effect store. It consists of all 4 bicycles and includes additional surfaces and extras ranging from one-off bicycle passes captured in the city and bounces and rattles. If you buy the complete bundle you get 1 package for free!Here’s a handy comparison table:
Here’s a handy comparison table:
Responses:344 AUDIO: ‘City Bicycles has a plethora of content, for a great price. The perfect balance between a great concept, great presentation and outstanding execution, lands them an almost perfect score of 4.9..‘
The Audio Spotlight: City Bicycles is worth getting if you are in need of great sounding and well edited bicycle sounds.
Watch a video created by Zdravko Djordjevic.
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Collaborator Co-Conspirators
The old saying “you can get more done with a team than you can by yourself” is truer today than ever in game audio and the game industry at-large.
Whether it’s within the audio department, the game team, or the world-wide community there are people whose greatest gift in life is the ability to collaborate and share knowledge. |
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While there are great examples of lone-wolf artists working in isolation to create left-field masterpieces, game development in general always feels like it thrives on the creativity of collaboration.
This runs throughout the process where people are relied upon for the speciality and expertise, as well as their experience to help solve problems.
Finding ways to foster communication and creative solutions between people can only lead to a more refined and informed experience for everyone.
Knowledge Share
We’re all solving the same problems, often in very similar ways. One of the greatest developments of my (short) time in game audio is the amount, and accessibility, of information about the dark art of technical sound design.
I spent countless hours on my way into the industry manically scrubbing SDK documentation for OpenAL, Source Engine, and countless others that even mentioned audio in relation to interactivity to even begin formulating a semblance of the way audio was played-back by a game engine.
Fast-forward to today where audio middleware can be downloaded and connected to a game running in real-time and manipulated on-the-fly. Couple that with the wealth of individuals who have been humble enough to share their processes and experiences and you’ve got the potential to begin (or extend) your understanding exponentially.
I hope someday you do the same!
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