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Home Environments & Ambiences City Life Sound Effects Page 2
City and urban sound effects & recordings – including crowds, walla, traffic and other city activity
A slight breeze, the city rumble, distant people chatters, a bird passing by, crickets chirping, a little rain or snow, the tranquility inside the city is a fragile and magical moment.
City streets are the channels of all the possibles, a heat place for sensorial stimulus connecting people lives and their urban activities throughout the day. Yet when it becomes quiet we still perceive its energy and are able to sense the mood of the moment with serenity.
These recordings were made at ground level with very little editing in order to keep them natural and as close as a human would experience the city on a daily basis. At times, distinct activities can be heard in the distance although the most noisiest events were taken out. Each file is loopable.
Also, every season and weather condition are represented. This library has been thought for the universal need of sonic bed in urban scenes, used as glue or ‘exterior roomtone‘.
This selection is the result of 15 months of recording throughout the multicultural city of Montreal (considered the most European City in North-America). The mix of culture in this city gives it a universal flavor that makes it belongs to the citizen of the 21st Century world.
The library contains 60 Stereo ambience and 27 Surround ambience recordings. Each sound files are between 1 to 5 minutes long. The surround recordings are embedded in an interleaved wav files of 4 channels (quad).
The City Distant library gets you a series of high quality, diffused city ambiences. Choose ‘flat’, unobtrusive background tracks, or versions with emerging elements: trains, cars, trams, bells, sirens, fireworks and other noises. Captured in Prague, Czech Republic.
• Native 192kHz /24bit
• excellent mics used – Sanken CO100K (wide range, ultrasonic mic, recording frequencies up to 100kHz) and Sennheiser MKH30 (industry standard) in MS stereo configuration.
• Use any of rendered LR tracks or reach for included raw MS data.
• Long takes (up to 7 minutes).
• 12 files (plus the raw data), at several locations.
• Flat and normal versions
Characteristic atmospheres, crowds and room tone recordings made at a variety of locations in and around New York City.
The collection includes 3 hours and 44 minutes of New York ambiences in 50 files – with an average duration of 5 minutes.
So if you want the atmosphere and ambience of New York in sound, this library gets you exactly that!
“Restaurant Ambiences” is the first package of a series of libraries that include ambiences from different places in restaurants. Most of this pack was stealth-recorded.
Here you will find atmospheres recorded during trips in Bulgaria and Germany, so you may find Bulgarian or German speech. This package includes a variety of ambiences, which are recorded at different times of the day and at various places in restaurants.
You will find noisy crowds in the restaurant’s garden during dinner, a typical atmosphere of a large German restaurant (beer house), a small café, a kitchen in a small restaurant (during lunch preparation), kitchen room tones, warehouses, etc.
Gear used: Neumann KM184 stereo set in ORTF and XY Configuration, Zoom H6, Zoom H4. All files are meta-tagged in Soundminer
This bundle includes 4 different libraries.
The Baltic Sea sound library is compilation of 56 WAV files recorded with Sound Devices 702, Rode NTG3, Sony PCM-M10, two Oktavas MK012 set in MS, XY and ORTF setup. All the sounds were recorded far away from the cities and roads. Since most of the sounds were recorded in late winter, there are no insects or birds in background. There are few files that includes the sound of birds, but I left them on purpose, because of the overall feel of the files. In this library you will find beautiful sound of waves crushing on the rocks and shore, recorded from different perspectives in different stereo configurations, during calm and windy days. In addition to those sounds, there’s foley like walking, running and swimming in the water.
The Harbours Of Norway sound library features 25 files with ambients recorded in Myre, Sto and Nyksund, very small towns with direct access to the sea. Most of the sound effects were recorded at night, but since it’s a polar day time of the year, it was very pleasurable to walk and look for convenient places to set up my gear. Everything was recoded with ORTF setup built from two Sennheisers MKH 8040. Inside this library, you’ll find a lot of seagulls, waves crushing on the rocks and plants, windy ambients from the cliff, industrial sound from port in Myre with ship unloading the cargo, walla with steam engine boat and additional sounds from boat engine market and air cooling aggregates from food containers. Every file was recorded in 96kHz, edited (i removed any unintentional bumps, pops and unwanted sounds). I limited EQing to removing harsh frequencies, or enhancing a little bit the good sounding ones. At the end of the chain there is a small compression, for louder sounds.
The Summer Ambients sound library contains 33 beautiful WAV files recorded with Sound Devices 702, Rode NTG3, two Oktavas MK012 in MS and stereo XY pattern. All sounds were gathered in different and beautiful places like forests, lakes, meadows or swamps. You can expect amazing ambients, textures, different birds, insects, forest during rain, calm and windy days. It’s a perfect library for designing background sounds. Everything was recorded in amazing Masuria in Poland.
Summer ambients Update – library got 2x bigger and heavier than the original library. 59 additional files, 123 minutes of high quality audio recorded with Sennheiser MKH 8040 ORTF setup, Rode NTG3, Oktava MK012 XY setup plugged into SD702 and Sony PCM-10. It features ambients from the forests, ponds, swamps, meadows, lakes and suburbs recorded is very quiet locations, mostly just before the sunrise, during the day and before sunset far away from the cities.
Water Flow sound library took me about six months to record, consumed about 15 thermoses of tea and 42 litres of gasoline to get to all locations. It offers 90 BWAV files recorded in different locations. Huge part of this library is based on the recording sessions on the rivers. Two completely different locations, recorded regularly for the last 5 months allowed me to create this unique sound library. Most of the recording sessions took place during winter just before the sun was rising to reduce the amount of unwanted sounds. Almost all recordings are completely clear and only few have birds in background, since it was my intention to record some location ambients with natural backgrounds.
You can see the metadata and sound list below.
Coffee Shop features the acoustical surroundings of a cosy bar in the Old Town of a central European city. The full version of the library encompasses a complete day at the bar and is suitable for all kinds of appropriate sceneries as well as source material for elevated sound design (coffee machine, grinder, pouring liquids etc.).
The material contains various activities of waitress and cleaning persons that arrive in the early morning to prepare the bar for opening. Furthermore several long takes of the typical coffee shop athmosphere of chatting and laughing guests at different times of the day are included.
All relevant waitress activities are recorded from at least two different spots so that the desired sound is available as close-up or with the characteristic ambience of a coffee shop. The library is rounded off with steady room tones of fridges and ventilation taken at night. For detailed description of included material please check the metadata sheets.
A massive collection of crowd and ambience recordings – captured both indoors and outdoors.
Locations include an amusement park, mall, restaurant, beach, courtyard, fair, ski area, arcade hall, casino, coffe shop, convention, park, construction site, library, museum, cafe, zoo, store, theater lobby, tour boat train station – and more. From veteran Hollywood Sound Designer Lenny Jones.
There are 85 recordings included, most ambiences are 2-3 minutes in length – and there are more than 220 minutes of crowd recordings in total.
Vintage automobiles passing singly and in groups, from the earliest part of the 20th century. Perfect for those traffic backgrounds in your period production. Hundreds of vehicles, none dated later than 1910, passing at various speeds, and in various configurations and at various lengths. Captured in First Order Ambisonic and available n both FuMa and ambiX order and weighting.
In this sound pack I’ve included an in-depth selection of active ambiences. This library is focused more on the natural ambience of both busy main streets and calmer side streets.
Most sounds were captured below 110 St. and prominently in the Lower East and West Village. There are a multitude of police and firetruck sirens at varying distances as well as some not so common areas like the Intrepid Pier and the Hudson River Heliport ambience.
I’ve also included some extensive subway rides. All boring bits were edited out for a strong final product. There are multiple train rides with various levels of walla and PA announcements.
One thing that is very common in NYC during the summer months are the rain and thunderstorms. I’ve included a number of wet traffic, distant thunderstorms and heavy rains.
All in all this is a good representation of New York’s streets and subway systems.
Wind Textures features blowy and breezy ambiences, both in urban and rural areas as well as outdoor and indoor perspectives.
Key features:
A 1960’s styled bicycle riding around at a leisurely pace, wobbling to stay straight, walking along the sidewalk or being handled and chucked to the curb. Squeaky brakes, loud gears, and clumsy metal give this bike nostalgic character.
We’ve spent many hours exploring London’s far corners, seeking out the darkest, dirtiest, dimly lit areas of the capital’s streets in search of evocative and truly authentic sounds.
On visiting a large range of locations across the city we embraced our surroundings to capture the city’s natural reverberation and unique sonic qualities.
London Edge is the result of our methodical and passionate search for moods, atmospheres and textures, inspired by our favourite London dramas.
All sounds have been recorded in high-quality 24bit, 96kHz using Sound Devices recorders and Sennheiser MKH8040, MKH416, MKH30 and DPA4060 microphones. Each file has been tagged with detailed Soundminer metadata to speed up workflow and increase organisation.
The majority of recordings contain both a stereo MS decoded and ORTF version. The midside has a narrower more focused stereo image whilst the ORTF provides a wider version.
This library is a bespoke collection of crowd recordings from all over foggy London Town. We hand picked the finest pubs based on the locals and acoustics, with each recording offering a unique sense of space and character. From the sweet and quaint to the darn right scary, we shot them all!
Enjoy cutting crowds of all flavours; The pissed and disorderly, jovial folk waxing lyrical, raucous football fans, relaxed pub garden chatter, through-the-wall conversations, Quiz Night whispers, and a f*ckload more! This library is diverse, rich, and comprehensive. Whether your scene is contemporary or period, we’ve got you covered.
Obviously not a musical note in sight and where you need it most, we’re offering up two perspectives with our binaural quad recordings. With a little panning you will be immersed in your choice of London local… Drink up!
Available in three versions:
London Pubs Vol 1: Primary interior perspectives
London Pubs Vol 2: Secondary perspectives for quad use, exterior pubs, football crowds, pub sound effects
London Pubs Complete: Features everything from vol 1 & vol 2
Urban Winds is 49 minutes / 1.33 GB of medium and high-wind sounds in 38 separate files – recorded in 24bit/96kHz M/S stereo (decoded to X/Y stereo and mono), using Sennheiser MKH micophones. All files are UCS-compliant.
You get empty streets and construction sites, office exteriors and the port of Aarhus. You get plastic that flutters or thrashes, metal fences that clatter and vibrate, pipes and cavities resonating in the gusts. You get ambiances and specifics. I have tried to strike the balance between variety and nuance, to give you sound pros something to build a scene around. In that sense, this really is a construction kit of sorts.
You will hear very little human activity – other than distant traffic. I recorded mostly at night, and in large, undisturbed areas – and on one occasion in the aftermath of a violent storm (the kind that rips the tiles off the roofs). Had a good time standing in the relative safety of my doorway, recording stuff getting blasted down the street! All sounds were captured in Aarhus, Denmark.
• Howling, moaning, whistling wind sounds
• Wind-battered city ambiances
• X/Y Stereo and Mono sounds (decoded from M/S)
• Metadata included in CSV and ODS (OpenOffice) formats
Character Cars is a library of traffic for accenting backgrounds.
This library is the best-isolated elements out of a 170 consecutive hour recording session pulling single elements like car horns, sirens, trucks, and interesting sounding car bys.
Each isolated element is grouped into strings of grab bags of different topics like car horns, sirens, helicopters, and of course cars so you can easily accent lulls in dialog with a characteristic sound.
The intent of this library wasn’t to get the most pristine elements, but to create easy to use grab bags of background specific moments at a street level that can pop
Each SFX library in the “Collected Ambiences” series features 33 Stereo Ambiences from many different locations.
The series includes ambiences such as Public Spaces, Roomtones, Drones, Forests, City, Train, Bus ride, Rain and many (many!) more.
Vol 1: Airplane Landing/Take Off, Backyards, City, Car Wash, Residential Area, Construction Site, Birds, Fireworks, Crowd, Train, Roomtone and more. 33 files, 3.85 GB, 111 Minutes
Vol 2: Car Wash, Chop Shop, Backyard, City, Residential Area, Fireworks, Construction Site, Supermarket, Train, Roomtone and more. 33 files, 3.58 GB, 103 Minutes
Vol 3: City, Birds, Crows, Pedestrian Area, Residential Area, Bus, Roomtone, Village Fair, Weekly Market, Roomtone and more. 33 files, 3.45 GB, 100 Minutes
Vol 4: City, Traffic, Birds, Funfair, Pedestrian Area, Residential Area, Bus, Roomtone, Shopping Mall, Train, Roomtone, Drone and more. 33 files, 4,69 GB, 136 Minutes
Vol 5: City, Park, Train Station, Plaza, Birds, Crows, Pedestrian Area, Residential Area, Bus, Roomtone, Village Fair, Weekly Market, Roomtone and more. 33 files, 4.66 GB, 135 Minutes
Vol 6: Public Spaces, Roomtones, Forests, City, Small Towns, Country Side, Rain and more. 33 files, 4.65 GB, 134 Minutes
Vol 7: City, countryside, creek, forest, park, open-air bath, small town, water park and more. 33 files, 4.9 GB, 147 Minutes
Vol 8: Public Spaces, Roomtones, Public Bath, City, Busride, Farm and more. 33 files, 5.14 GB, 148 Minutes
Vol 9: Public Spaces, Industrial, Animal Shelter, Factory, Mall Food Courts, City, Park, Schoolyard and more. 33 files, 4.62 GB, 129 Minutes
Vol 10: Public Spaces, Gym, Train Interiors, Fireworks, Public Bath, , City, Train, Busride, Rain and Wind, Wind and many more. 50 files, 8.94 GB, 248 Minutes
Vol 11: Beach, Public Space, City, Rain, Wind, Weekly Market, Bistro and many more. 33 Files, 4.93 GB, 122 Minutes
Vol 12: Countryside, Heavy Duty Gardening, Riverside, Rain, Zeppelin, Garden, Trainstations, and more. 33 Files, 6.37 GB, 180 Minutes
Vol 13: Countryside, Heavy Duty Gardening, Riverside, Rain, Zeppelin, Garden, Trainstations, and more. 50 Files, 9.88 GB, 275 Minutes
Vol 14:Harvester Cabin, Home Improvement, Busy Exhibition Hallway, Kids Crowds, Farm, Coutryside, and more. 33 Files, 5.76 GB, 160 Minutes
All recorded with Sound Devices 744T, Sonosax SX-R4+, Sound Devices MixPre-6, Sennheiser MKH-8040 ORTF, Sennheiser MK-30 + MKH-8050 (MS), Beyerdynamic MC930 ORTF, RODE NT4 or Sony PCM-D100. All files were cleaned, edited and most of the files loop seamlessly.
Please check the Content Lists below for each library to see what the full list of ambiences in each library.
If you buy all 14 Libraries together in the “Collected Ambiences – Bundle”, you land some great savings compared to the individual collection prices.
Get the “Just Ambiences | Construction Sites” Library for free by purchasing the “Collected Ambiences – Bundle”
Sounds of Central America explores the sounds native to this Latin American region and beyond.
These high-quality sound recordings were meticulously recorded in Mexico, Guatemala. Honduras, El Salvador, Nicaragua, Costa Rica and Panama. Included is also a taste of the Caribbean and beyond with additional recordings from Belize and Cuba.
Sounds of Central America was recorded with the intention to be particularly useful for post-production environments with a range of genuine and rare sounds you could expect to hear in these countries.
From wild Mexican rodeos, to howler monkeys screaming in the Guatemalan jungle, local fish markets in El Salvador, various means of local transportation, exotic nature, all kinds of crowds with all kinds of local accents, angry mobs, incredibly close-mic’d hummingbird wings and so much more.
We hope you enjoy this high-quality sound pack.
All tracks recorded by Evan Buist, sound engineer and field recordist (National Geographic, DreamWorks, Paramount Pictures).
A collection of real and gritty skateboard sounds. We recorded these sounds on the streets and not in the studio. Featuring various skateboard riding movement and trick sounds. These sounds are so real, you can hear the bearings squeak.
The sounds of Hong Kong, recorded in 2007. It includes the sounds of a ferry from Lantau Island to Hong Kong, the legendary Star Ferry, trams, street scenes including the iconic pedestrian crossing beeps and MTR (Metro) trains, interior and exterior.
Some tracks could be used for any modern or futuristic city, where you need to add an exotic or futuristic dimension, that Blade Runner-esque feel if you will, not just for Asia!
In total, 30 recordings are included for more than 40 minutes of authentic Hong Kong sounds.
A comprehensive sound library from the enchanting world of the Middle Ages featuring meticulously recorded elements that come together harmoniously to create a realm of realism that transports your audience back in time, including isolated elements, acoustic impulse responses, noiseprints, and ambience loops.
This audio library brings 29 crowd ambiences from several interesting places in Israel:Â the Jerusalem Western Wall and Holy Sepulcher, Tel Aviv’s traditional Carmel market, streets and parks, beaches and villages, and more. Recorded in May.
Library highlights:
• 29 diverse Hebrew and international speaking crowd ambiences
• recorded with a Sony PCM-D100
• 96 kHz / 24 bit high resolution
• each track lasts for 3-6 minutes
• exclusively on A Sound Effect
In Residential Ambiences you will get the sounds of 15 different recordings of residential atmospheres with a duration of 10 minutes each so there’s no need to loop.
Recordings have been done during five different periods of a day. Each one includes three versions:
Recordings feature sounds such as dozens of birds singing in the early morning, dove calls in the morning as the same time traffic gets noisier, human activities in the background in the afternoon distant traffic and voices in the evening, and sirens wailing in distance at night.
Some of the birds included are: doves, sparrows, crows, a cock, woodpeckers, blackcaps, magpies, and pigeons.
Since some of the files are extremely quiet (mainly in the evening and at night), descriptive markers have been included to highlight interesting events in an otherwise featureless waveform. These markers can be read in programs such as Izotope RX, Reaper, and Soundminer. The markers are also included as .txt files in separate folder.
All files have been recorded in 96 kHz/24 bit with Soundminer and BWAV embedded metadata.
UCS Compatible Metadata embedded. Fields included CatID, Category, Subcategory, FX Name, Filename, Description, BWDescription, Library, RecType, RecMedium, Microphone, Designer, Manufacturer, Keywords.
This collection presents a wide range of crowd sounds. There is applause, shouting, cheers, rhythmic clapping, disappointment, whistling and more. Audiences also differ in the number of people and, accordingly, the saturation of the atmosphere.
This library will help you a lot in working with films, TV shows and concerts. Add the genuine emotions of the crowd to your project, they will undoubtedly complement the composition.
One hundred ambiences. From English pubs and cafes to Charles Bridge in Prague to a rooftop on Madison Avenue and the pastoral city ambience of Central Park. Great background ambiences for film, TV, games and many other uses.
With A Sound Effect, Asbjoern has created a web site where our international community can browse, learn, and share the vast fruits of our labors. Together we are accelerating the very real potential power of sound design as a recognized art form.
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