New Sound Effects: Morning Birds, Ancient Doors, Coins, Farms - And Northwestern Soundscapes

Posted May 28, 2017 by Asbjoern Andersen in New sound effects libraries

This week on A Sound Effect, we have new libraries that will take you to far and familiar places. You can hear the rural and urban environments of the Pacific Northwest, morning choruses from West Texas, eastern Australian farms, and sounds of long lost passages tucked away in jungles and deserts. You’ll also hear various coin drops and rattles, too. For sounds that will grab your imagination, we have plenty for you to hear.

High Desert Ambiences 2

Nature & Countryside Ambiences High Desert Ambiences 2: Active Nature Play Track 94+ sounds included, 287 mins total $85

Explore a large collection of beautiful, tranquil sounds from remote desert locations across the American southwest and enjoy listening to the morning sun awaken desert wildlife. This serene collection features sounds that will make you fall in love with the harmonious desert dawn. Sounds include doves cooing, woodpeckers hammering, White-throated Swifts in swirling flocks, and much more. Featured like never before are recordings of Swainson’s hawks so close you can hear the whoosh as their powerful wings cut through the air. For the second installment of my extensive nature sounds from the heart of the American Southwest, here is High Desert Ambiences 2: Active Nature.

2% for the Planet:
Two percent of the price of this library is donated to an environmental cause. I view it as an “artist royalty” for the planet!
KEY FEATURES:

• This library is filled with the “Active Nature” sounds of desert mornings.
• Swainson’s Hawks – a male and female recorded near their nest in a 200-foot cliff. Recordings are from below the nest and include close, distant, circling, diving, and soaring perspectives.
• White-throated Swifts – flocks of small barn swallow-like birds circling, darting, and whooshing in front of a desert cliff.
• Other Birds/Wildlife Included: Canyon Wrens, Bewick’s Wrens, Montezuma Quail, White-winged Doves, Western Screech-Owls, Aoudad Sheep, Rufous-crowned Sparrows, Eastern Meadowlarks, and many more labeled as “songbirds” if not identified by species.
• Tracks starting with the filename “Quiet Desert” have low wildlife activity and are perfect “natural roomtones” to use as the foundation of a designed environment. If you need more “Quiet Nature” tracks check out High Desert Ambiences 3: Quiet Nature or the miniature pack of desert sounds in High Desert Ambiences 1: miNiATURE.
• Most files are 3-6 minutes in length
• Named markers included in each file to help find interesting events in an otherwise uniform waveform. Starting in Soundminer 4.5Pro_v252 you can now read text markers from within Soundminer!

• Marker text included in the Soundminer Description and BWAV description fields.
• Recording Location – Davis Mountains, Texas
• *Note – Birds were self-identified using several iOS apps and bird identification websites, so I cannot guarantee 100% accuracy of species identification.

Sounds from this library were used in the upcoming movie Woman Walks Ahead starring Jessica Chastain!

GEAR USED:
• Sennheiser MKH 8040 Matched Pair
• Sound Devices 702
• Rycote ORTF Blimp

FILE LIST:
• View in Browser or Download CSV
• UPDATE – the name of this library was changed from High Desert Ambiences 2: Dawn Choruses to High Desert Ambiences 2: Active Nature on 11/28/2017.

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'High Desert Ambiences 2' has nearly five hours of beautiful morning choruses that echo across the ranges and forests. Featuring barn swallows, wrens, quail, doves, owls, and meadowlarks, these tracks capture the peaceful soundscapes of the American Southwest as nature praises the rising sun. You'll also hear boisterous Swainson's hawks as they fly and chatter close by, plus most files are 3-6 minutes in length giving you - as Thomas Rex Beverly calls them - 'natural roomtones' for easily dropping into your project. For a collection of beautiful souvenirs from Davis Mountain State Park, look no further.

Huge Hidden Passages

Materials & Texture Sound Effects Huge Hidden Passages Play Track Up to 1727+ sounds included From: $70

Huge Hidden Passages takes you from the depths of the jungle, to the entrance of a temple, and behind the thick walls of a castle to discover a buried pyramid – and beyond. Some of passages will be hidden to your eyes, but we offer you the sonic keys of those closed passages. The library is the final installment in the World Of Secrets series.

Available in two versions, and a bundle:

Huge Hidden Passages – Designed
A ready-made collection of elements designed for your mysterious access. All designed elements have separated layers (sorted by textures) to give you the possibility to construct your own.

Specs: 187 .WAV files, 1.07 GB
Recorded with: 744T + EAA Micromix • Schoeps MS Couple • KM 82i Neuman • 2 KM 184 Neuman • DPA 4060 • Barcus berry contact mic

Huge Hidden Passages – Toolbox

An incredible toolbox, issued from a year of recording and sound design. Versatile, dense, pitchable.

Specs: 1540 .WAV files, 10.43 GB
Recorded with: 744T + EAA Micromix • Schoeps MS Couple • KM 82i Neuman • 2 KM 184 Neuman • Sennheiser MD 441 • DPA 4060 • Barcus berry contact mic

Huge Hidden Passages – Complete Bundle
Get both the Toolbox and Designed packs, at a special price.

Specs: 1727 .WAV files, 11.05 GB
Recorded with: 744T + EAA Micromix • Schoeps MS Couple • KM 82i Neuman • 2 KM 184 Neuman • DPA 4060 • Sennheiser MD 441 • Barcus berry contact mic

All packs contain stereo & mono, 192 / 96 kHz, 24 bit files.

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The sound designers at The Red Libraries are masters of creating worlds out of a single foley idea - as shown by their other collections 'World of Secrets' and 'Water Rush' - and 'Huge Hidden Passages' turns up their imaginative design to eleven! You'll hear sounds of hidden temple entrances deep in the jungle, creaking metal portcullises guarding the kingdom, stone pyramid doors and pillars, and much more. The library is even divvied up into a ready-made selection and a flexible toolbox of elements for all the moving parts in your complex portals. If your project was inspired by Indiana Jones, Uncharted, or The Mummy, you will not find a better collection!

Coins

Foley Sound Effects Coins Play Track 105 sounds included $15

‘Coins’ by Badlands Sound includes 100+ clean and high-quality coin sounds. Everything from one coin, a few, too many coins dropping on various surfaces like wood, water, metal, and other coins. Also, includes Foley sounds of grabbing coins perfect for film and video games.

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'Coins' by Badlands Sound is a straightforward pack featuring a sonically recognizable type of object: coins. You'll hear over 100 sounds as coins are dropped on surfaces like wood, water, metal, and a pile of other coins, or they are picked up, grabbed, and shook. Each interaction has several takes, making this library useful for interactive use, too. Whether you need sounds of money being interacting with for counting and simply because your character likes the sound, this library will bring out their inner Scrooge.

NXNW – Cascadia 2017

Nature & Countryside Ambiences NXNW – Cascadia 2017 Play Track 69+ sounds included, 209 mins total $30

This library of environmental recordings is the culmination of three recording expeditions to the stunningly gorgeous Pacific Northwest. We visited a variety of locations ranging from urban Vancouver, Portland, and Seattle to the wild and untamed Olympic Peninsula. We captured dynamically disparate sounds such as a noisy Seattle shipyard and the quietest location in the continental US – deep within the primordial Hoh Rainforest. There are excellent crowd wallas, and contemplative mountain streams. From beaches to mountain tops to luxury high rises no environment was left un-recorded! This is what the Northwest sounds like!

In all, this library features 69 individual files totaling over three hours of runtime. Total un-zipped file size is over six gigabytes. All sounds have been edited to remove discernable dialog and unwanted noises. What’s left is pure, loop-able ambience suitable for no-fuss editing.

All sounds were captured on a Sound Devices 744T recorder. Microphones used include a Sanken CSS-5 stereo mic and a matched stereo pair of Sennheiser 8040s in ORTF configuration. All recordings are accompanied by a high quality photograph for reference and tagged with Pro Tools searchable metadata.

Bonus library included:

As a special incentive we will also include a bonus mini-library of ambiences from the Irish countryside that James recorded on a recent trip home! Highlights include some great mountain winds and a rare recording of a starling formation taking flight!

Credits:
Recordist, Producer, Editor – Jason Strawley
Photography, Video – Andrew Garraway
Asst Producer – James Nolan

Thanks, and enjoy!

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'NXNW – Cascadia 2017' by Blackguard SMG is a peaceful collection of soundscapes from the American Northwest. From Portland to Vancouver, this library has ambiences from camping in the wilderness like waterfalls, mountain streams, camp fires, and rain on Rattlesnake Lake, as well as urban sounds of traffic, rooftop ambiences, parks, shipyards, and ferries. It even has a few highlights from a trip to the Irish countryside for a bit more heavy wind. If your setting is reminiscent of Twin Peaks, Silent Hill, or Alan Wake, then this collection should have you covered.

Farmed Out

Nature & Countryside Ambiences Farmed Out Play Track 126+ sounds included $49

The Australian bush is something very close to my heart. Most of these recordings were taken on my family's property in Molong NSW.

This collection includes a large number of natural bush ambiences recorded at all times of day. There are plenty of birds, some sheep, turkeys, bees, cicadas, crickets, dogs and chickens. As well as motor vehicles on gravel, chainsaws, campfires, generators, footsteps, and even a wall construction. There is as always some random stuff fin there as well.

Recorded with a Sound Devices 633 and Sennheiser MKH8040s. The library is 2GB and includes 126 x 24bit 48kHz .wav files. Sound Miner metadata embedded.

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'Farmed Out' by Smackheads is a collection of over 120 sounds from an Australian farm in New South Wales. You'll hear ambiences of the usual farm chatter from animals like cows, sheep, turkeys, and chickens, as well as the rumble of machinery from chain saws, ATVs, and station wagons. It also has various other sounds like footsteps, construction, campfires, and generators. If you need a wide variety of sounds from the laid back but busy life on the ranch, give this one a listen.

Need more sound effects? See all the latest SFX releases here

Popular sound effects this week:

Cinematic & Trailer Sound Effects CIRCUS Horror Strings Play Track 180 sounds included $7.80

Strident and Demonic

Expand the timbre of your horror violins and cellos with CIRCUS, a sinister sample pack featuring 180 WAV sounds of screeching or high-pitched string noises, perfect for horror music and dark sound design.

Creative Tension

This collection offers a curated selection of screeches, high-tension tremolo, heavy jeté strokes, dark demonic textures, finger patterns, chaotic string elements, clock loops and bow accents.

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Bird Sound Effects Seagulls Play Track 28+ sounds included $35

The Seagulls sfx library includes 28 tracks of both single, isolated seagull screams, and bigger flocks of nesting seagulls, calling out to each other and their chicks. There are plenty of classic call sounds, but also some weird throaty and raspy screaming, and what could sound like seagull laughing sounds.

All tracks are recorded with the very useful zoom function of the Telinga microphone and dish.
Library includes both untreated tracks, and noise reduction processed tracks in two separate folders. Noise reduction processed tracks have carefully been cleaned up with a CEDAR NR system.

Though these birds are in an abundance around most harbours and industry around here, they are not always easy to record. You mostly hear them from a distance, or from places not easy to access. When you try to get close to them, they will usually fly away.

Many hours have been spent on rooftops, gardens, backyards, a junkyard, and different harbours to get this material.

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Animal Sound Effects Collections Animal Hyperrealism Vol IV Play Track 2096 sounds included, 78 mins total $153

⏰ For a very limited time:
Add this library to the cart and enter ah4launch in the cart coupon field – to sprinkle an extra launch discount, on top of the current discount!

Animal Hyperrealism Vol IV is a sound library containing animal vocalisations, from real to designed creatures totaling more than 2000 individual sounds in 294 files. The sounds were recorded in zoos, and wildlife centers.

The asset list includes but is not limited to: hippos, hyenas, vultures, dwarf mongooses, elephants, African cranes, parrots, tigers, pigmy hippos, rhea ostriches, brown bears, pheasants, wildebeests, African wild dogs and many more. The content has been recorded at 192KHz with a Sanken CO100K, an Avisoft CMPA and a Sennheiser 8050 for center plus two Sennheiser MKH8040 for stereo image.

The resulting ultrasonic spectrum is rich and allows for truly extreme manipulation of the content.

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Updated in real-time, so it always shows 3 of the most popular SFX libraries from the past week

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THE WORLD’S EASIEST WAY TO GET INDEPENDENT SOUND EFFECTS:

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:

Cinematic & Trailer Sound Effects CIRCUS Horror Strings Play Track 180 sounds included $7.80

Strident and Demonic

Expand the timbre of your horror violins and cellos with CIRCUS, a sinister sample pack featuring 180 WAV sounds of screeching or high-pitched string noises, perfect for horror music and dark sound design.

Creative Tension

This collection offers a curated selection of screeches, high-tension tremolo, heavy jeté strokes, dark demonic textures, finger patterns, chaotic string elements, clock loops and bow accents.

Haunting and Experimental

Create haunting atmospheres, perfect for horror, thriller or experimental soundtracks. Every element has been designed to unsettle and disturb, blurring the line between music and noise.

80 %

OFF

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Firearms Sound Effects Handguns & Pistols Play Track 75 sounds included $34.99
Stockpile your arsenal of HANDGUNS with this mini pack of cutting edge sounds of modern warfare, designed by our team of AAA-industry veterans and huge fans of games like Gears of War, Call of Duty, Medal of Honor, Battlefield, Killzone, Command & Conquer, Red Alert and many more.

From PISTOLS, HANDGUNS, and SILENCERS to GUNSHOTS, ZAPS, and BULLET RICOCHETS, quiet WEAPONS HANDLING, this mini pack of sounds will give you everything you need for any HANDGUN-wielding SOLDIERS or AGENTS!

KEY FEATURES:
- Huge variety of big and small weapons, mechanical industrial and modern clean sounds, different types and intensity variants
- Ready to use – requires no editing, labeling or splicing
- Categorized, organized and individually labeled files for maximum use efficiency
- All files are included in Hi-Rez WAV, SD WAV and HQ MP3 formats
GET THE MODERN WARFARE WEAPONS SOUND PACK NOW!
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Creature Sound Effects STOMPS – Creature Footsteps Play Track 8500+ sounds included
Rated 5.00 out of 5
From: $299

We’re incredibly excited to introduce the ‘STOMPS – Creature Footsteps’ sound effects library – these are footsteps like you’ve never heard them before!

STOMPS is a massive collection of more than 8,500 files to boost your creativity and help you add special footstep sounds to your new project.

The library is organized into 3 categories –
Source, Textures, Design:

In the Source category you’ll find the “best of” several hours worth of our recordings sessions, with more than 7,500 files (with lots of variations) organized into 83 folders. Every single sound is the product of a new recording.

You’ll find the sequences that include: 2 Legs WALKING, 2 Legs RUNNING, 4 Legs GALLOPING, 4 Legs TROTTING, and 4 Legs WALKING.

We used all kinds of weird props to record original, versatile sounds with lot of character, different textures, and in very different frequency ranges.

These sounds form the DNA of your future footsteps. You’ll have lots of different sound colours to play with, ranging from very small and harsh sounds to very low and bold ones, and all the ranges in between.

In the Texture category, you’ll find more than 600 sounds with different textures to help you customize your footsteps. These textures are also a very valuable sonic material that will help you construct lots of varying sound design work.

Finally, we have the Design category. Here you’ll find more than 500 processed sounds created by veteran sound designer Michel Marchant, covering a wide range of characters like Robots, Snow Creatures, Distant Dinosaurs, Rock Golems, Armies, Colossus and many, many more!

Update: Glued version also included

STOMPS now also features a special GLUED version, with the exact same content but with variation files edited together to reduce the number of single files in the collection, and making search through all sounds easier.

With “STOMPS, Creature Footsteps,” you’ll have anything you’ll need to create everything from small creature footsteps to big, out-of-this-world ones.

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Explore the full, unique collection here

Latest sound effects libraries:

Destruction & Impact Sounds Woodpile Chaos Play Track 82 sounds included $10

Woodpile Chaos is a gritty collection of 82 wooden hits, creaks, and scrapes — a wild mix of organic textures born from raw timber and controlled destruction.

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Animal Sound Effects Collections Dark Environment Sounds and Loops Play Track 120 sounds included, 63 mins total $29.99

This is big set of scary sound effects, that will make your game, or any other project performance much more impressive!

Dark, evil ambient loops, ambient noises, scary sounds, heavy rumbles, moans, metal squeaks, scratches, cracks, debris sounds, sub bass sound FX, background white noises, thunder strikes, electric sounds, engine loops, electric sparks and many, many more!…

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Car Sound Effects Ford Puma 1997 sports car Play Track 206 sounds included, 48 mins total $65

All files are recorded 32bit, 192 kHz, with RØDE NTG1, Line Audio Omni1 and FEL Clippy XLR EM272 microphones, Sound Devices MixPre-6 II recorder. Library contains wav files of driving, interior and exterior foley, mechanical and electrical sounds. It is only available in UCS.

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Ambisonic Sound Effects Red Deer Play Track 13+ sounds included $80

A small collection of High quality, close up red deer recordings.

Red Deer Roars and Moans and other vocalisations from different habitats. (mountainous areas and forest)

Recorded over the years during the rutting season, varying distances but mostly up close and face to face with this loud and scary mammal.

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Game Audio Packs - Game Sound Effects Libraries Ultimate UI Click & Select SFX Bundle Play Track 1054 sounds included, 9 mins total $60
Take full control of your interface sound design with the Ultimate UI Click & Select SFX Bundle — a massive collection of 1,054 professional-grade UI sound effects across seven expertly crafted libraries by RawAmbience.

From crisp button clicks and smooth menu transitions to RPG-style selects, denies, and toggles, this all-in-one bundle gives you everything needed to design intuitive and immersive UI audio for games, apps, web, or interactive media.

Packs included:
Click and Select UI RPG SFX
Click And Select UI RPG SFX 2
Click Menu Sound Effects
Click Menu Sound Effects 2
Click Sound Effects
Essential Menu Click Sounds
Essential Menu Select Sounds

Your complete UI sound design toolkit.

The Ultimate UI Click & Select SFX Bundle delivers a polished collection of responsive interface sounds, including:
- Click & Select UI RPG SFX 1 & 2 – Over 456 sounds tailored for RPG and interactive UI: selects, hovers, alerts, cancels, access-denied, and more.
- Click Menu Sound Effects 1 & 2 – 281 high-quality menu interaction sounds for toggles, clicks, opens, closes, and confirmations.
- Click Sound Effects – 110 versatile UI clicks designed for modern app and game interfaces.
- Essential Menu Click Sounds – 107 precise and minimal click sounds, ideal for clean, modern UIs.
- Essential Menu Select Sounds – 100 select-focused sound effects, delivering clean, modern UI feedback for toggles, confirms, menu navigation, and precise user selections.
Perfect For:
- Game menus and HUDs (RPGs, mobile, indie, AAA)
- Web and app UI feedback
- Interactive experiences (VR, AR, touchscreen)
- UI prototyping and UX testing
- Accessibility-focused sound design
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