This is a song I had to remix for a Full Sail class. I added bits of instrumentation here and there, nothing drastic. I also manipulated the vocal to create a new part that did not exist in the original. Finally, I rearranged everything as a radio edit. The original was 5 minutes something.
I recently redid all the sound for the 'Oz, the Great and Powerful' trailer as a Full Sail project. I've added it to my portfolio. Dialogue, Sound Effects, Score, Foley and Backgrounds were all replaced. The original was mixed in surround, this is a stereo fold-down for web playback.
Find it here.
Headphones or high-quality sound system recommended.
For this Sound Design project, I was tasked with recreating the ambience for this Red Square Map. These sounds included background loops and stingers. I also had to recreate the sounds for the Portal, Jump Pad, Small Health Pickup and Hidden Door. The sounds for my Shock Rifle (which you can read about here) were also implemented into this map.
For the sounds of the Hidden Door, Jump Pad, Portal and Health Pickups, I wanted to stay true to the Unreal Tournament aesthetic. The Jump Pad and the Portal however I wanted to be slightly quieter in my map than the original sounds. There are a total of 7 different Cues for these sounds.
The Door Open Cue is one sound, about two seconds long. It is difficult to see because it is so dark, but the Door Open Cue matches the length of the animation. The sound is a combination of a metal door sliding open and and a hiss of air. This cue is attached to the same Trigger Volume that causes the door to open. When the Volume is touched, the Cue is played. It has an Attenuation Node and is targeted to the door so that the sound is spatialized.
The Door Close Cue is similar to the Open Cue, but with a slam at the end. This is just a sample of a metal door slamming shut. The Cue is attached to the same Trigger Volume as the Door Open Cue, except it is played when the player stops touching the Volume.
The Portal sound was a combination of electrical hums set up in a loop. Similar to my Shock Rifle Alternate Travel sound, I put on a low-pass filter, so that the lows stick out, giving it a sense of restrained power. The loop has a definite beat to it, so in looping it I had to be careful that the loop maintained that beat. The Cue has the sound attached to Loop and Attenuation Nodes.
The Portal Use Cue is a one shot that uses the same loop sound from the Hum Cue, with a Vari-Speed plugin applied, so that it sounds like the portal is slowing to a stop. It is fired off when the player uses the portal.
The Jump Pad Hum Cue was designed in much the same way as the Portal Hum Cue, so I won't go through it.
The Jump Pad Use Cue is a one shot, that is a combination of the Hum Cue sound sent through a Vari-Speed plugin, and a Jump Pad sound I found in a Sample Library.
I wanted the Health Pickup to sound like a small canister being discharged. It is a sample from a library of that exact thing, implemented as a one shot Cue.
There are three ambient zones in this map, all with a slightly different feel. I wanted the overall feel to be dark and eerie. The ambience is implemented using three Cues (External Ambience, Musical Ambience, and Internal Ambience), a Trigger Volume, and a Reverb Volume.
The Outside zone is a combination of unfiltered External Ambience and Musical Ambience.
The External Ambience Cue is a combination of two looping ambient sounds, and 4 stingers that fire of with a 20-30 second delay. The ambient sounds are distant traffic, and light wind and snow. The stingers are 3 different bird calls and a woman screaming. On it's own, this Cue is not particularly dark. While the stingers do add some eeriness, it's really the other cue that makes it dark.
The Musical Ambience is a combination of a single looping ambience, and 4 stingers that fire off with a 20-30 second delay. The ambient sound is a series of minor and discordant chords, played on a synth pad. The stingers are violins being scraped with their bows, which creates an extremely dissonant and discordant sound. The Cue sits low enough in the mix to not be too distracting, but you can hear it. It is meant to indicate danger; that the outside zone is a dangerous place.
The Trigger Volume triggers a Sound Mode that puts a low-pass filter on the External Ambience Cue only. It is applied around the Tunnels in the map. The Musical ambience is unaffected. It has the effect of slightly muting the external ambience - traffic and wind - a realistic effect meant to mimic being sheltered in the tunnel, but it has another more sinister effect. With the External Ambience Cue slightly muted, the Musical Ambience Cue sticks out more. This has the desired effect; while being in the Tunnels seems like a good idea initially, it is in fact a far more dangerous place to be.
The Reverb Volume is around the hidden room with the Portal. It filters out the External Ambience and Musical Ambience. The Internal Ambience Cue that exists within the Colume can then be heard.
The internal ambience is a combination of various electrical hums, looping. While being a relatively neutral sound, it is a respite from the eerie outdoor ambiences, meant to indicate a place of relative safety.
For this sound design project, I wanted to create all the sounds for the Shock Rifle using naturally occurring sounds with as few effects as possible. Considering the Shock Rifle is an inherently futuristic weapon, this meant finding individual elements that on their own were natural (e.g., air release, door slam), and combining them in a way that made them sound more futuristic.
In my mind, all sound effects are just collections of other sounds happening at the same time. I thought about the mechanics of the weapon, how it should work if such technology existed, and added the sounds together in a way that seemed logical to me.
I have approached sound design this way before out of necessity. For a previous class, I had to create a soundscape in which I had to tell a story using only sound. Part of my story involved a man getting hit by a car, from that man's perspective. That sound was a collection of three sounds; the car screeching to a halt, the body hitting the bonnet and bouncing off, and the glass of the windshield shattering. Since I couldn't actually perform a hit and run, I had to record the sounds individually and combine them. With the help of a friend, I recorded my car screeching to a halt. I jumped on the bonnet and rolled off and recorded that. And lastly I smashed up a bit of glass. The combination of all the elements was perfect, so I've pretty much gone with that approach for all my sound design ever since.
In the case of the Shock Rifle, there are seven Sound Cues, with ten total sounds files, and many individual sounds. I will go through each Cue, describe the individual sound files that make up each Cue, describe the sounds I used to create each file, and lastly describe how the files are implemented in the Cue.
The Primary Fire of the Shock Rifle is a laser blast. It is made up of three combined files.
1. Primary Fire 1 & 2
2. Primary Fire Layer
I bounced two versions of the Primary Fire by just slightly changing the phasing and chorusing effects I used. This with the Primary Fire Layer sound makes three. I implemented these three sounds by setting up a randomization node on Primary Fire 1 & 2 with some modulation, and then mixing it with the Layer sound, which also went through a modulation node.
The Alternative Fire of the Shock Rifle sends out an electrical orb that travels along. The alternative fire cue is a one shot Cue of just that orb being fired out, and is made up of three files.
1. Alternative Fire 1 & 2
2. Alternative Fire Layer
Only one Alternative Fire file was required for the project, but I bounced two in the same way I did the Primary Fire for more variation. The implementation for the Alternative Fire is the same as the Primary Fire, but with the Alternative Fire files.
Now we get to the sound of the electrical orb itself. This is simply one looping Cue. I used the sound of a continuous electrical arc, but EQ'd it, cutting out most of the high frequencies, so that it had more of a sense of 'contained power' than something overly aggressive.
I noticed that the original sound of the arc had a natural pulse. In looping, I had to be careful to match that tempo, and loop it in such a fashion that it didn't interrupt the pulse or else the loop would be noticeable.
The Travel file is implemented using a looping node, followed by some modulation, so that it is slightly different each time.
If the electrical orb hits something (a player or wall for example), it bursts into a small electrical spark. I wanted this cue to sound impotent so as to inform the player that this was not the best way to use this weapon. How to use it best, I will describe later.
It is a one shot sound file of a bottle rocket shooting into water, with some slight chorusing. In the implementation, it is attached to a modulation node to make it slightly different each time.
Now for the fun bit; the way you're supposed to use the Shock Rifle. If you shoot the Alternative Fire, and then shoot the travelling orb with the Primary Fire, you get a massive explosion of electricity, which does a lot of damage to opponents. It is one sound file made up out of 6 individual sounds
Once these were all combined into one file, the file is simply attached to a modulation node within the Cue to give it some variation each time it fires.
In retrospect, I needed a bigger bang. This sound didn't have the power I had envisioned for it. Some more low-end perhaps, or something almost subsonic could have worked. The lows also need to reverberate a bit more.
The sound of the weapon getting picked up is two sounds, combined into one file.
Implementation was again just the one file through a modulation node.
For the Ammo Pickup I wanted to represent the sound of power dissipating into the system. I took the loop from the Alternative File Travel and affected it with a Vari-Speed plugin so that it started normally and slowed to a stop. Then adding a simple click sound of a button I had, I had my Ammo Pickup.
This has the same implementation as the Weapon Pickup; one file through a modulation node.
