I’ve been working on a game project on and off over the past year and a part of the design is of relevance to this month’s theme — animals. The gameplay revolves around creatures of various kinds — some good, some evil, some tiny, some large. I had to conjure a vocalisation system that achieved the following technical and design criteria: Actions by the user would directly … [Read more...]
A Few Independent Animal Sound Libraries To Check Out
Animal Sound Design and Recording Month is coming to a close so we thought it would be neat to do a roundup of just a few of the indie SFX libraries out there that have great animal recordings. (Disclaimer: I sourced suggestions from the Twitter community and my own experience so this list is not intended be comprehensive, simply a few strong suggestions. If you feel there … [Read more...]
Viviana Caro: A Career Working With Animal Sounds
Guest Contribution by Leonard Paul You've worked a lot with animals as a sound engineer, could you give a brief history of how your initial interest in audio restoration of bird sounds has led to being the recordist for the Colombian Mountain Grackle in the mountains of Colombia? My interest on animal sounds started when I worked on my audio engineering undergrad thesis. I … [Read more...]
(Mis)adventures in Cat Recording
About three years ago, on a whim, I adopted a 6 month old kitten. I had dealt with cats before at friends’ and family’s houses, but had never owned one, and Luna (short for “Lunatic”) was full of surprises. After her initial "moving in” period, in which she hid under the bed for nearly a week, I discovered that Luna was an exceedingly outspoken individual that needed to make … [Read more...]
Capturing Personality in Animal Recordings
There’s something I’ve noticed about recording animals over the years. Even if the animal is being cooperative, it can be damned difficult to really catch an individual’s personality. If the animal is trained, that’s wonderful. You may be able to get a variety of sounds out of them with the handler’s help…BUT…vocalizations recorded from trained animals can often sound rote. … [Read more...]
As Bobby Darin said, “If I Could Talk to the Animals…”
Might want to be careful if you're going to try recording this critter! We use animal sounds all the time in sound design. Whether it be the twenty some-odd creatures that went into the sound of the Velociraptor in Jurassic Park, or the Elephant bray used in the destruction of the Titanic, they seem to find their way into every situation...sooner or later. This month, we've … [Read more...]