David at Tracktimeaudio has published an interview with Watson Wu on recording cars.
I have the privilege of getting my first interview with the awesome, excellent, Watson Wu.
TTA: First off, some of your work with NFS ProStreet — this game emphasized more on the fun of the game than on the realism of driving, did this slightly different emphasis have any effect on the recording technique for the vehicles? Were there any cars that proved difficult to record well? Lastly, did you use predominately dyno-based recordings?
For ProStreet I was hired to field record passbys and help the EA team apply microphones on GT race cars in Sebring, Florida. We were capturing Corvette CR06, Cadillac, and Viper cars during their practice runs around the track, speeding at 170-190mph. The Corvette CR06s are The Loudest race cars I have ever encountered! They were like constant sustains of gun shots, painful to our ears. While many of the microphones were able to withstand the constant pounding of the high decibels, I was given from the team mic pads to cut off the extreme sounds going into my field recorder. While EA as well as a few of their external contractors sometimes use dyno-packs, I most of the time capture vehicles while in motion. Many of us believe that this recording on the go produces the more natural sound. As we have learned from years of recordings, we constantly strive to achieve better or nastier recordings with newer microphones and push the limiters to the extreme for that more aggressive sound. after all, video games and films are fiction based.
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