• Home
  • About
  • Site Policies
  • Contact

Designing Sound

Art and technique of sound design

  • All Posts
  • Featured
  • News
  • Interviews
  • Reviews
  • Tutorials
  • Resources
    • VR Audio Resources
    • Independent SFX Libraries
    • Events Calendar
  • Series Archives
    • Featured Topics
    • Featured Sound Designers
    • Audio Implementation Greats
    • Exclusive Interviews
    • Behind the Art
    • Webinar/Discussion Group Recordings
    • Sunday Sound Thought
    • The Sound Design Challenge

Andrew Lackey Special: Top 5 Audio Tools for Christmas (but don't yet exist)

December 22, 2009 by Miguel Isaza

Christmas_Synth

For the most part, Sound Designers use borrowed tools.  Most audio software has its basis in music, and through the years features have been added for linear post production and surround sound.  Particularly in the areas of interactive sound design and surround sound there are big time needs for audio software development.  Here’s my Christmas list:

1. Sample Bank Audio Designer

Protools, Nuendo, Logic are great for linear, but the vast majority of the material game sound designers do is samples.  I imagine a cross between an audio editor (like DSP Quattro, Peak or Sound Forge) and a sampler (like Battery for visual purposes).  The key feature of this tool is that the samples of a bank can be edited/processed accross the entire bank or one at a time.

So say you have a bank of 10 punch sounds.  The waveforms of all 10 samples should be visable (with zooming options).  You can edit or process destructivly on any sample or the entire group.  In a pane at the top you can also edit the bank parameters like random pitch and random volume.  Lastly, auditioning the sounds is based on the bank parameters.  So the samples would randomize as they’re being played.

Future Features:

  • Auditionable from runtime events in the game.
  • A Source audio file feature would allow the import of a source sound that could be sliced into bank samples
  • Each sample could have mulitiple tracks availible for layering…then you can automatically exporet a mix down.

2. True Surround Delay Plugin

I don’t want to gripe too much, but when it comes to plugins developers seem to completely overlook the post market.  I mean seriously how many stereo vintage compressors do we need?  So to start off with, I’d just like a simple 5 channel multi tap delay with feedback.  Mono in 5 channel out.

3. True Surround Whacky Effects Plugins

Ok now that we’ve got delay, how about an oscillator modulating the azimuth of the surround field and the pitch of a sample.  Or what about if you panned a sound directly into the center of the room and put an LFO on the radian and the frequency of a notch filter.  Come on people you know what I’m talking about….crazy stuff….this would frickin’ awesome!!!   True canyon echos, waves rippling on a pond, helicopter blades, supernova’s radiating out in all directions.   I basically want Pitch/Time Blender 5.1…come on Sound Toys.

4. Clip Based Audio Recording to picture.

The idea here is a simple tool that allows you to record sounds to a video in a clip based fashion.  You would script the app with in and out points, name of the audio file and other meta data and then step through the cue as you recorded them.  The idea is to combine an Excell style cue sheet with audio to picture recording.  The current method of using one long timeline for the video and audio is inefficient.  I have friends who have written they’re own versions of this…maybe they’re reading this and will be inspired to put it out there.

5. iPhone and Field Recorder timecode sync app.

This may be a little far fetched, but who cares I’m dreaming here!  I basically want to play a movie on a handheld device and record in sync to a field recorder.  Ideally both the recorder and handheld device should be able to do machine control of the other, and the recorder should be able to get positional data from the video for its time stamp.  I basically want a one man, in the field foley stage:)

Ok well that was fun.  Please comment, forward and advocate for post tools.  There are growing numbers of sound designers and we may be able get developers to listen by creating some noise.  What are you ideas?

Written by Andrew Lackey for Designing Sound.

Image via Synthtopia

Filed Under: featured Tagged With: andrew lackey special, audio, christmas, recording, sound, sound design, tools, wishes

Comments

  1. Sean says

    December 22, 2009 at 4:36 pm

    Hmm, for number 1, Native Instrument’s Maschine lets you process a whole bank, or just the individual sample. Of course, it’s set up for music samples and loops, but I’m sure you could repurpose it for use in your sound effects set up.

  2. hans says

    December 23, 2009 at 12:22 pm

    2) GRM Tools

    3) GMR Tools Shuffler and other plugs

    4) Try to find a used AudioVision

    5) thins might help:

    http://www.rdklein.com/AClapBoard/aclapboard.html

    or enter “timecode” in the itunes store

     

  3. hans says

    December 23, 2009 at 12:23 pm

    sorry, forgot this:

    http://www.rdklein.com/LTCReader/ltcreader.html

  4. Smuff says

    December 28, 2009 at 7:08 pm

    http://www.redmatica.com/Redmatica/Redmatica.html

     

    http://www.uhbik.com/index.php?item=surround

  5. foakleys says

    January 9, 2013 at 11:27 pm

    The Clubmaster has a distinctive brow-only frame, pinned hinges, and slightly cat’s-eye shape. While basic black is certainly acceptable, especially if you want to work the Reservoir Dogs vibe, the Clubmaster has been re-issued in a rainbow array of colors, just like the Wayfarer was last year. Clubmaster sunglasses with pink, gold, deep blue, violet, and green frames have been spotted on the street. Savvy fashionistas can also kill two trends with one stone and buy a pair of tortoiseshell Clubmasters, capitalizing on the current vogue for all things tortoiseshell while also snapping up the late 1950’s glamour of these shades.
    Articles from foakleys online store.and they also about including: fake oakleys holbrook
    foakleys
    fake oakleys dispatch ii
    , all the fake oakleys are top qualtiy and free shipping.

Social Media

  • Twitter
  • YouTube

Posts By Month

#sounddesign on Twitter

#sounddesign

tunepocketTunePocket Music@tunepocket·
26 May 2020

Download royalty free gunshot sound effects, incl. one shot gun sounds, gun cocking sounds, gunshot with silencer, machine guns, and more #gunshot #sfx #sounddesign #videoediting #gamedev #royaltyfree https://t.co/bTTDQkveKF

Reply on Twitter 1265206307927162880Retweet on Twitter 1265206307927162880Like on Twitter 1265206307927162880Twitter 1265206307927162880
Reel2MReel2Media@Reel2M·
26 May 2020

At Reel2Media we are harnessing the power of smart speaker technology, to deliver cutting edge skills that solve problems and add value. To find out more, click here https://t.co/VAAw7vTW1V #sounddesign #smartspeaker #alexaskill #amazonalexa

Reply on Twitter 1265206269255847936Retweet on Twitter 1265206269255847936Like on Twitter 1265206269255847936Twitter 1265206269255847936
SoniKSoundLibSoniK Sound Library@SoniKSoundLib·
26 May 2020

Listen to #soundcloud preview of our next release! #np https://t.co/S3bxxrnqrh #audiopost #soundlibrary #soundediting #sounddesign #ambisonics #spatial #surround #ambience #roomtones

Reply on Twitter 1265204382779559936Retweet on Twitter 12652043827795599361Like on Twitter 12652043827795599361Twitter 1265204382779559936
asoundeffectA Sound Effect@asoundeffect·
26 May 2020

Want to know what the independent sound effects community has been up to? Hear the very latest SFX libraries here: https://t.co/OUBM2SqMoP #sounddesign #soundeffects #soundlibraries #indieSFX #gameaudio #filmsound #filmmaking #gamedev #indiedev #indiefilm

Reply on Twitter 1265199255838511105Retweet on Twitter 1265199255838511105Like on Twitter 1265199255838511105Twitter 1265199255838511105
OblikLinesOblik Lines@OblikLines·
26 May 2020

Working on new tracks with many instances of Misty Valley ! ⁠
Misty Valley is free for all NI Reaktor users⁠
You can get it here: https://t.co/bb53Gtkw5e

#reaktor6 #reaktor #nativeinstruments #synths #vst #sounddesign #virtualinstrument #musicproducer #obliklines #mistyvalley

Reply on Twitter 1265198647307907073Retweet on Twitter 1265198647307907073Like on Twitter 1265198647307907073Twitter 1265198647307907073
Load More...

Copyright Info

All content on Designing Sound is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.

Copyright © 2023 · Magazine Pro Theme on Genesis Framework · WordPress · Log in