Frank Bry has released another of his great “Ultimate” collections, this time including a huge amount of glass recordings.
Presenting Ultimate Glass Sound Effects Library. 736 glass sound effects recorded at 24-Bit 96kHz. Sounds included but not limited to: Windows, Mirrors, Bottles, Vases, Jars, Dishes, Wine Glasses, Drinking Glasses, Light Bulbs, Ornaments and Computer Screens.
Not only is there the usual smashing and breaking of glass, there are many sounds made by glass that are perfect for video game and film sound design. Pitch, bend, warp and process to your hearts delight.
Over a year in the making and dozens of location recording sessions, this is the Ultimate Glass Collection.
[vimeo]http://vimeo.com/21843732[/vimeo]
Gear used: Sound Devices 702 – Fostex FR-2 – Sanken CSS-5 – Sennheiser MKH-416 – Audio Technica AT-835ST – Sony PCM-D1
Ultimate Glass – $100 | 96kHz 24-Bit WAV | 736 files | metadata ready | PDF List
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Bonus: TV Screen Goes Bada Boom
And here’s a Q&A with Frank, talking about the making of this fantastic collection:
Designing Sound: What was the most challenging stuff to record for this library?
Frank Bry: The most challenging thing about making this library was dealing with recording levels. Glass is very dynamic and sometimes I had no idea how loud a certain glass object was going to be. The bottles and jars have a loud peak at the start and then quickly drop in volume as the debris spreads out. If the levels were set too low it seemed the body of the sound was missing and if it was to high the limiter would kick in hard. It took me a while to find the best average but I eventually did through trial and error.
Another issue that came up was glass debris hitting the microphone. When I record outside I try and use only the zeppelin and when there is substantial wind I will add the dead kitty. My outside “recording area” is a concrete floor from an old barn that burned down and has some protection from the wind with dirt walls around 3 sides. This kept the wind to a minimum for the most part but I made an effort to record with no wind. Sometimes the glass debris will fly everywhere, very unpredictable! When it does it can hit the microphone zeppelin and make a small plastic tick sound. When the dead kitty is on you don’t here it so at times I would have that on if I felt the glass was going to spray everywhere. A few times after I got back up to the studio I found pieces of glass in my hair.
And finally, one of my favorite sessions was at a house up the road that was getting demolished. I heard the sounds of destruction one morning and quickly grabbed my gear and ran up to see what was going on. The guy who was destroying the house told me he would hold off for a couple hours while I set up my gear inside and smashed my way through the house. I had to record quickly so I only used one mic set up, the CSS-5 and SD 702. I got some great material from throwing objects throughout the windows from the outside and hitting window frames with a crow bar inside. It doesn’t get any more fun than that!
DS: How were the sessions conducted? Did you have a kind of guideline to record the different perspectives and performances?
FB: I started recording this library a little over a year ago after I stored up a few dozen wine bottles in the garage. I also had stored many other types of glass like jars, old vases and lightbulbs. The only guideline I used was the “get it right the first time, you only have one shot” idea. Unless you want to spend lots of money on glass source you have a limited amount of takes you can do. I did purchase over 100 windows for this library but I still only had one shot at most of the smashes because a lot of the windows were one of a kind. I picked them up from a local glass shop that had accumulated tons of glass window “mistakes”
I only drew blood once and it was a tiny poke to my left index finger when I was picking up some glass shards to drop. I forgot to bring my thicker gloves one day and paid the price, well, it really was nothing. I will say to all who want to record glass: be very careful, this stuff is sharp and can be very unpredictable. When you get tired, stop and wait for another day to finish.
[vimeo]http://vimeo.com/21554945[/vimeo]
DS: What gear was used and how?
FB: I mainly used the SD 702 and a Sanken CSS-5 along with a Sennheiser MKH-416 and my trusty Sony PCM-D1 as a back up. I did use the AT-835 ST and Fostex FR-2 rig on a few sessions also. I would either have a mic set-up on each side of the glass smashing area or one close and one far depending on what I though would yield the best results.
DS: Apart of the “destruction” elements, there’s also a lot of special found sounds that can be used for a lot of sound design tasks. Could you talk us about those unique recordings and ways to use them?
FB: While recording I found that glass makes some cool noises by accident. Whether it’s cracking, scraping or hitting all sorts of noises can pop out. One time when I was setting up a large shard of heavy, thick glass it slipped out of my hand as I was holding it vertically and it tapped the concrete floor. Luckily I was rolling and recorded some very cool and bright “glass ping” sounds. The shard also cracked slightly as it hit so I just kept on rolling.
I also recorded lots of debris falling and “raining”. I found that certain pieces of glass have a musical quality to them and with a little processing can be made into some great “fantasy spell” type sounds.
When I was recording the large windows smashing I tried to make the Impact and debris falling have a longer gap so if you wanted just the debris part it can be easily separated. At the same time I cleared the ground under the window smash after almost every take so you would not hear too much glass falling on glass sounds. There are some in the library but for the most part the glass falling after the impact is landing on a clean surface.
DS: Was there anything special in the editing/metadata tagging processes?
FB: I tried to use as many descriptive words as I could to make searching more accurate. I use key words like Large, Small, Medium, Interior, Exterior, Debris, etc so when you search you can narrow down what you are looking for. Other than that it was pretty straight forward.
DS: Anything else to add? Perhaps a hint for the next release?
FB: I still have about 50 windows left to break and decided to wait and record them with some new gear optimized for 24-Bit 192kHz resolution. There will be Ultimate Glass II sometime this year. I have a few other large collections in the works right now and I let you know as soon as I get closer to release date. It’s cools stuff and most of it has not been heard before. I’m excited to get these finished.
Oh, man! I was waiting for that mini-dozer of yours to dump a bunch of those shards. Sounds great!