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Home Environments City Life Page 6
City and urban sound effects & recordings – including crowds, walla, traffic and other city activity
SSL14 Porto City Sounds is one of our recording travel projects, captured in Porto, Portugal during a 3-days visit to the country. The Surround Sound LAB team traveled to Porto just to record the main essence of this city.
This library contains the main character of the lovely city: Boats, trains, wine and history in one of the most beautiful cities in Portugal.
More than 2 hours of original and actual recordings, 27Â original field recordings in Surround 5.1 , ST and Double MS RAW format (for custom editions).
Each ambience recorded in this library is at least 1-2 minutes long, so there is no need for looping ambience in your project. This library was recorded in a Double MS mic configuration. providing great post production possibilities.
Protesting People is a small collection of 26 ambiences recorded in Sofia (Bulgaria) tracking in 3 different days a peaceful protest to protect nature and forests from construction. This library will take you to the middle of 7,000-10000 crowds of people protecting nature. You can hear a lot of people and unrecognizable speech, the noise of a variety of instruments such as whistles, drums and others used in similar events. Moving streak in streets, whistling people and chanting OSTAVKA (Resignation) and MAFIA. This library can be used for any kind of projects in need of a protesting crowd from Eastern Europe
Gear used:Edirol R4-pro and Neumann KM184 stereo set . All files are meta-tagged in Soundminer
Whooosh! What was that? A pass by from a train? A bus? A tram from the 60s? The longest escalator in all of Sweden!?
Essential sounds from different types of transports for your production. A great starting point for new sound designers or to complement your existing library.
We have recorded buses, trains, trams, subways, ferries, escalators and freight trains in this library spanning over 100 files. Arrivals, Despartures, Pass Bys, Internal Rides, Doors and a toilet flushing on a train. It’s all there, for your essential transport needs.
All files have meta data and are easily searched for in any database search engine. Everything is recorded with Sound Devices 633 and MixPre-10T with Sennheiser MKH50, Neumann KM184 and DPA 4060 in 96 kHz 24 Bits with a total size of 6,7 Gb.
Quad City Berlin is a comprehensive collection of quadrophonic recordings from the busy and multifaceted german capital, the second largest city in the European Union.
It was created to work as an internationally usable library of urban ambiences while still capturing the unique sounds of Berlin. It’s a set of extensive and versatile recordings focused on large open spaces and the nice fat low-end hum of major city traffic.
Quad City Berlin comes in two flavors:
– Quad + MS: four channels with omni-directional mics + two channels mid-side (6 channels total, please check out diagram below. 102 files)
– Stereo only: the two front channels of the quad setup only (A-B stereo, 34 files)
The locations covered in Quad City Berlin include: rooftops, main roads & squares, residential areas, parks, freeways, room ambiences
The recording session took place in the fall of 2015 where birdsong is usually very sparse and the weather can still be sunny and dry. Thanks to these conditions, most of the recordings contain no bird chirping at all. All recordings where made using the same microphone setup: four omni-directional mics with equal distances to each other and one MS rig at the front side.
Depending on the location, the omnis where placed up to 3 meters apart to deliver a truly wide sound that works well on a cinema mixing stage. The MS signal serves as both a center signal (if needed) and a stereo option that is also mono compatible.
The four omnis where the high-end DPA 4006 (Bruel&Kjaer) microphones with a remarkable quality in the low frequencies. They work exceptionally well for city background hum and low engine sounds producing a very full and warm, yet precise sound.
Quiet Hotels At Night is the first one of themed library series in which you’ll go through night hotels. The package includes 27 stereo tracks with evening and night atmospheres from hotel corridors and rooms. The library is recorded mostly in large hotels in Bulgaria, Sweden and Romania. You will hear a variety of quiet atmospheres from empty corridors and rooms, air conditioners, bathrooms, an empty lobby bar with working refrigerators, to low activity from neighbouring rooms and backgrounds, screaming from a distant room, etc. Room tones and ambiеnces are suitable background for any audiovisual projects.
All files are meta-tagged in Soundminer
Gear used: Sound Devices 633. Neumann KM184 stereo set, Sennheiser MKH8020 stereo set
Enjoy your stay at the Night Hotel.
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).
RAIN features various kind of RAIN AMBIENCES and EFFECTS from different parts of CITIES and FORESTS.
In the forests, you’ll find sounds of RAIN FALLING ON DIRT, LEAVES and more.
In addition to the sounds of CARS PASSING BY and RAINY TRAFFIC in cities, you’ll also find RAIN COMING OUT FROM PIPES, HITTING THE ASPHALT and various kinds of RAIN POURING ON ROOFS such as PORCHES and LARGE PARKING LOTS and more.
And THUNDER!!
Recorded @ 24bit 96kHz with ortf, spaced omni, XY and carefully edited.
Rain City is a HQ sound effects library featuring 84 recordings captured on various indoor and outdoor locations, in peaceful urban environments.
You will find various types and intensities of rainfall, from subtle drizzle on tile rooftops and construction sites, to after-hours heavy rain on the city streets and downpours against car windows, Plexiglas rooftop panels, umbrellas and more.
'Rain in the City' has 70 files and more than 3 hours of recordings of light rain and storms in the city. This collection includes both indoor and outdoor ambience recordings from the 9th floor of a city building, within a vehicle, and on the street. There are also recordings of rain drops from the roof and drip cap, as well as rare recordings of a hail shower, flowing rain water through drain pipes and storm drains, and rain onto umbrellas, a car, and metal surfaces.
Gear Used:
• Neumann 185 MT stereo matched microphone pair with Sound Devices 702 recorder
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.
RESIDENTIAL SEAGULLS features 18 stereo tracks of seagulls in a residential area. All recordings have been taken from backyards where the city noise is very close to zero.
Key Points:
As usual, all files come in 24 bit and 96 kHz, with Soundminer embedded metadata.
Following Residential Ambiences approach, RESIDENTIAL WINTER – Ambisonics brings you 15 ambisonic residential atmospheres recorded during different times of a day in winter: early morning, morning, afternoon, evening and night.
In these recordings you will hear birds chirping, traffic, sirens wailing in distance, dogs barking, cats meowing and rooster calls. Recording done at night and in the early morning are very quite due to the absence of traffic.
Recordings have been done with a Sennheiser Ambeo + Zoom F8. All files are in 96 kHz/24 bit and meta-tagged.
This Ambisonics sound effects library contains the original recordings in A-Format (no processing whatsoever) and in B-format (AmbiX). By using Harpex, 5.1 (LRCLfeLsRs) and stereo (ORTF) mixdowns have been also added. Note that the Lfe channel is mute. It hasn’t been removed to follow the SMPTE path order.
The Ambisonics version contains all the formats. Stereo version only includes the stereo files.
Soundcloud demo plays the stereo version.
“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
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.
Lacking clean constant room tones for post production work? This library delivers more than 4 hours of professionally recorded room tones from empty office rooms, basements, staircases, corridors to more exotic locations such as a sauna.
Recordings are 5 minutes long, clean and do not include any environmental details and can be used in wide range of productions.
A perfect addition for post production company or freelance sound designer sound effect library.
Attic • Bathroom • Boiler Room • Bomb Shelter • Central Heating Room • Changing Room • Cocktail Bar • Cold Room • Conference room • Drying Room • Electrical Room • Factory • Hydraulic Elevator • Kitchen • Lobby • Monitoring Room • Network Room • Office Corridor • Office Room • Office Stairway • Parking Garage • Power Supply Center • Server Room • Small Kitchen • Small Shower • Small Winter Storage Room • Staircase • Stairwell • Storage Room • Toilet
Introducing the ultimate roller coaster sound library: Roller Coaster Sound Builder includes high-quality recordings from 5 different roller coasters, from classic steel coasters to aggressive impulse coaster. This huge collection includes clean roller coaster passbys, onboard recordings, and classic roller coaster screams.
Roller coaster pass by sounds were recorded without background noise in an amusement park that was closed to the public. A great amount of natural screams with different intensities is also included, recorded during a regular summer day in the amusement park.
This collection provides unique, hard-to-access source material in high-quality, with a large amount of takes for creative sound design. We worked hard to capture as much useful material as we could when we had full access to the rides. All sounds were recorded in Särkänniemi amusement park, Tampere, Finland. Also available in the special Complete Amusement Park Sound Bundle.
Our second entry of our brand-new sound effect series 3D SURROUND is here: ROOM TONES EUROPE. This library offers an enormous variety of different room ambiences. From busy transportation areas, malls and warehouses over congress centers and green houses to swimming pools and public libraries. ROOM TONES EUROPE covers all different scenarios you could possibly need, delivered fully surround with unprecedented precision, spatial impression and clarity. Undoubtedly, this can be easily used in stereo productions as well. Either chose the angle yourself or use the stereo version (included in 3D SURROUND).
CLEAN AND PRODUCTION READY
ROOM TONES EUROPE is a highly versatile ambience library that smoothly adapts to virtually any application.
It offers a large selection of generic ambiences to blend into many different contexts as well as specifically recognizable locations delivered with maximum authenticity.
FRAME YOUR SCENE
Ambiences are an excellent tool to establish the mood of a scene, level, or location. With ROOM TONES EUROPE, this becomes a simple and rewarding task: Choose from the over 98GB large pool of well categorized ambiences available.
From ultra-silent to lively, confined to wide open, dry and close to reverberant – everything delivered in an immersive 3D audio format that’s also backward compatible.
To increase your mileage with the library even further, the average sound is 3-7 minutes long.
INCLUDING STEREO VERSION
In addition to the ORTF-3D files, the 3D SURROUND edition also contains all files in 2.0 stereo for your convenience to save time on unnecessary conversions. Instead, you can instantly use these great new sounds for all your projects that don’t require surround sound.
Specs:
Files: 119 • Size: 19+ GB • Format: WAV – 24bit – 96kHz
125 pristine roomtones from locations including offices, universities, schools, apartments, hotels, laboratories, bathrooms, stairwells & garages. Unwanted background sounds have been removed through the use of Izotope Spectral Repair, resulting in a wide variety of refined roomtones. All sounds were recorded using the Sound Devices Mix-Pre 6 and a stereo pair of Sennheiser 8020s.
This library comprises ambiences recorded from inside a sea shell/conch in various settings as city streets, nature, waves, traffic, walla.
Discover distorted realities from the sea shell, the sounds are filtered, occluded by the natural shell, an organic resonator.
In addition there are few sounds that are created by blowing inside the shell and making a note, which is a traditional Inca instrument (Pututo).
WHAT’S INSIDE:
25 stereo files (15 ambiences + 10 Shell Blowing note)
Shanghai is a fascinating and lively city, full of contrast – a mixture of old and new, with towering skyscrapers looming over winding residential lanes, with streets full of rattling old bicycles and electric scooters, with noisy trucks rolling alongside almost silent electric cars.
The elevated highways that cross the city give certain areas a dense, constant rumble, while the city’s many parks offer a range of sounds, full of people and activity during the day, and generally quite empty at night – offering a diffuse, distant sonic perspective of the environment.
This library contains many of the everyday sounds of the city, with a variety of on and off-street recordings, interior and exterior walla, park and bird atmospheres, restaurant interiors, traffic, and even a range of metro recordings. While some of this library’s sounds are quite specific to Shanghai, the majority could be used in other large city environments, particularly in but not limited to those cities where Mandarin is the most common language.
All recordings were made with a pair of Lewitt LCT 540s microphones in an ORTF configuration. These microphones have extremely low self noise and a wide, balanced frequency response, allowing for the detailed capture of a range of sounds, from distant and quiet to close, loud and chaotic, from the deep rumble of engines to the supersonic screeching of brakes. Recorded at a sampling rate of 96kHz, these recordings contain detailed information above 20kHz, expanding the possibilities for sound manipulation by slowing and pitching down the recordings.
Shenzhen is the first ever sound library of the Silicon Valley of China. Jzoo Sound invites you on the first ever audiological journey to the unique locations in Shenzhen that only locals know.
This is a unique collection of sounds captured of various atmospheres at different times of the day. From energetic local farmer’s market, to howling subway tubes, to local middle school performance day, to old alleyways of a forgotten part of town.
The library also contains many rhythmic elements, such as meat chopping, construction hammering, and ominous beeps. Not to mention the echoing Chinese announcements between two schools, and the cacophony of crying and construction in a forgotten alley. I hope this library will even meet your sound design needs, and ultimately show you a local and unique side of China.
All recorded in 24 bit/96 kHz. Some recordings contain detail information above 20khz. The library is passionately described emotive words, and all the recordings are fully tagged with metadatas compatible with Soundminer, Basehead and Soundly.
Gear Used: Roland R26, four channel built-in microphones (OMNI and XY), four channels merged down to a stereo file.
Any questions? Shoot me an email here
This library delivers a wealth of siren sounds, from police cars, ambulances, fire trucks and more. Features a range of US siren wails and yelps, arrivals, constant wailing and pass-bys, from internal and external perspectives + siren recordings from countries such as Spain, Denmark, Mexico, France and Germany. These sounds are all hand-picked from Sound Ideas General HD and General HD 2 libraries.
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.
Skytrain Rapid Transit FX is a collection of unique passby’s, overhead POV and onboard sounds recorded at 24bit 96khz both in stereo and mono, giving you maximum flexibility and realism for your projects.
The Vancouver transit system is world renowned and carries millions of residents and visitors on board each year since its beginnings in the 1980’s. The older cars have a particular screech to them, perfect for creative design for monsters or machines, and can compliment any variety of air craft or land transport library.
“Slush and Wet Streets” is a library that contains 34 tracks (92 minutes total) that are recorded in winter urban environments. You will hear sounds of passing cars and people on slush, wet or snow-covered streets.
Atmospheres are recorded at different times of the day and night and at various locations. There are ambiences in the collection that track urban traffic at varying intensities, from an almost empty street with 1 or 2 pass by cars to busy traffic on a wet boulevard. Also, microphones are placed in different positions, from 2m to 30m from moving cars.
You will encounter sounds of people who walk in slush and snow, voices and other sounds typical of the winter urban environment. The library was recorded in Sofia, Bulgaria. All files are meta-tagged in Soundminer.
Gear used: Neumann KM184st, Rode NT4, Edirol R4pro.
Enjoy the winter streets.
‘Smooth City Traffic’ by Badlands Sound includes 21 high-quality city traffic ambiences great for your projects. Hear the smooth sounds of traffic rushing through the city. This library was recorded by Sound Devices 702t with a pair of Line Audio CM3’s and a matched pair of Sennheiser MKH 8040’s in 96k / 24bit.
Feel the weight and the whooshing of the various vehicle passbys rushing through the city. You will also notice the unique qualities in each file like a car passing by with a flat tire, semi trucks, sports cars speeding by, as well as aggressive diesel trucks.
This is a collection of snowy, icy, slushy, crunchy winter traffic. Single car passes, busy city roads, distant skylines, village roads, highways. All files are 96khz 24bit with metadata, and recorded with 2 x Sennheiser mkh 8040, mkh 416, Audio Technica BP4025 and Sony D100.
This library captures the sounds of the beautiful city of Amsterdam. With crowds, transport, water and general ambiences. From the busy street to the quiet park, from the red light district to the outdoor café, there is everything here for the theatre designer or film maker to get a true taste of the Dutch capital.
Get the sound of Las Vegas, the original Sin City: Ambient and crowd recordings of locations on the famous Las Vegas Strip and beyond. Also includes recordings from the Hoover Dam and the Grand Canyon, including a 30 minute internal helicopter flight through the canyon. Perfect for film makers, documentary makers and theatre sound designers to get those authentic Vegas sounds. Includes Soundminer embedded metadata.
Get the sounds and ambiences of London: Here are 101 authentic recordings from the English capital.
Featuring crowd sounds, traffic, general ambience, underground / tube, church bells, emergency and much more, this library is the perfect backdrop to any film / theatre project in need of that lively, living city sound. Detailed file names plus Soundminer, ID3 v2.3.0 and RIFF INFO metadata embedded.
In total, this library gets you more than 4 hours of atmospheric London sounds!
Sounds captured at famous (and some not-so-famous) London locations and landmarks such as:
Alexandra Palace • Borough Market • Bricklayers Arms • British National Gallery • Buckingham Palace • Cardington Street • Carnaby Street • Chelsea Wharf • China Town • Courtyard Gallery • Covent Garden • Euston Station • Festival Pier • Gough Square Warwick Court • Greenwich Foot Tunnel • Hyde Park • Islington Green • Joseph Grimaldi Park • King’s Cross underground station • London Eye • London Underground • Old Compton Street • Palladium Theatre • Piccadilly Circus • Pubs around London • River Thames • Royal Horticultural Halls • Seven Dials • Shaftesbury Avenue • Soho • Somerset House • Southbank • Southbank Skatepark • Southbank Tower • Southwark Street • St Paul’s Church gardens • The Strand • Theatre Royal • Trafalgar Square • Warwick Court • West End • Whitechapel
A special bundle opportunity:
Get this library on its own – or get the special bundle featuring both Sounds & Ambiences Of London Vol 1 and Vol 2 at an excellent price, for more than 590 minutes of signature London sounds
Following the success of WW Audio’s, ‘Sound & Ambiences Of London’ – here is Volume 2, with even more interesting and useable files for your theatre or film projects.
Consisting of 101 great, and sometime eclectic recordings from the English capital, and over 10GB in size, this is a library every sound designer needs in their arsenal. It comes with detailed file names plus Soundminer, ID3 v2.3.0 and RIFF INFO metadata embedded.
In total, this library gets you  5.5 hours of atmospheric London sounds!
Sounds captured at famous London locations and landmarks, including:Bow Bells – Two amazing, over 10 minute recordings from the belfry at St Mary Le Bow Church  • The famous crossing outside Abbey Road Studios, made famous by The Beatles • Stunning overhead plane recordings coming into land at Heathrow airport • Christmas Markets • Crowds outside Buckingham Palace before and after the changing of the guard • Various emergency vehicle sirens • Various markets both internal and external, quiet and busy • Tube train journeys • London Underground ambiences • Various Parks • Great sounding famous London pub ambiences • Train stations • Room tones, including the infamous possible Newgate Prison Cell in the cellar of the Viaduct Tavern Pub • Churches • Crowds in some of London’s most popular and obscure streets • General traffic sounds • North, South, East and West London locations • Hotels • London Aquatic Centre • The Royal Exchange • St Bartholomew’s Hospital Grounds • Scrooge’s Counting House Location • The Tower of London • The River Thames from Execution Dock • Pudding Lane – the location of the start of the Great Fire of London • Various Gardens • Underground car park • Tower Bridge • And much more – check out the complete file list below
A special bundle opportunity:
Get this library on its own – or get the special bundle featuring both Sounds & Ambiences Of London Vol 1 and Vol 2 at an excellent price, for more than 590 minutes of signature London sounds
Beautifully captured sounds from the stunning Czech Republic capital of Prague.
This library takes you on an whirlwind audio journey around the most popular areas of Prague. Listen to the sounds of people crossing the famous Charles Bridge, take a stroll into the Old Town, visit the Old Jewish Cemetery in Prague’s Jewish Quarter, venture into the atmospheric torture chamber at Daliborka Tower, walk around the palace, listen to the evening chorus while overlooking the city, enjoy the sound of the church bells ringing for mass, walk through the famous Naplavka Farmer’s Market, take some time out to enjoy a drink in one of Prague’s most famous beer halls. These and many more sounds are included in this library of ambiences, traffic and crowd sounds.
The library is  6.05GB in size and approx 3 hours of audio, all recorded at 96KHz / 24 Bit and is perfect for the film / documentary maker, theatre sound designer or anyone who needs that authentic sound of Prague for whichever project they are working on.
The whole library contains detailed Soundminer, ID3v2.3.0 and RIFF INFO metadata embedded. It also includes PDF, Numbers, CSV and XLSX info.
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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