Natalie Burney - Futureworks

When creating a game, a Game Engine will be used. Some of the most popular are Unity, Unreal Engine 4, and CryEngine. Unfortunately, developing games isn't a quick and easy process. Creating a game requires tonnes of specialised skills, lots of time, and it certainly isn't cheap. Many talented individuals are required, including Concept Artists, 2D Artists, 3D Artists, Game Designers, Level Designers, Composers, Game Audio Designers, and more. However, Publishers often demand short development times, for financial gain and to reach consumer expectations in line with release dates. Unfortunately, this can result in consumers feeling their much loved games are released unfinished, as we often find that Game Developers are constantly churning out patches to fix basic bugs and extra content - content that consumers feel should be included in the games purchased on release dates. A rapidly changing market also makes game development difficult. Due to this, anything that can speed up the workflow is crucial.

Overtime, Game Engines along with games themselves, have become increasingly complex. Many Game Engines incorporate many different disciplines (Game Designers, Sound Designers, art/animation, etc), and they've become highly interactive. Game development requires a vast amount of knowledge and expertise - programming, animation, game audio, game art, and more. This brings us to the topic of Middleware. Middleware is a piece of software specifically designed for audio professionals, adding more functionalities that aren't available in the original Game Engine, making the process of creating specific and interactive audio more understandable for Game Audio Designers. The vast majority of Middleware products include an API (application programming Interface), runtime components, tools, documentation, and examples to help get you started. Wwise is a Middleware product created by AudioKinetic Inc. It gives Sound Designers the ability to import audio files, apply plug-in effects, mix in Real-time, define game states, simulate environments, and manage integration. Another Middleware product is FMOD Studio, created by Firelight Technologies. This Middleware is aimed at Game Audio Designers, incorporating many features of a DAW, which Game Audio Designers are more familiar with. It has moved towards being a graphical user interface, and the software can be used with a control surface.

Sound is an incredibly important aspect of a modern game. Despite the sound implementation vastly adding to a player’s experience, it is often underrated and somewhat ignored, even by the game developers themselves. Therefore, I desired to get the Game Designers directly involved in the creation of the sound content for their games. This will give them insight into the processes undertaken when creating suitable sound content, and learn the basic concepts of recording audio in a studio setting.  The beginning of ‘Spoopy’ is a comic-style drawing, giving the player an understand of the games storyline and the subsequent objective. In order to truly immerse the player, it was decided that both visuals and audio in the form of dialogue would be required. A Voice Actor was contacted to record the storyline dialogue, whilst the Game Designers themselves would perform the audio required for the in-game characters (AI civilians). 

The first studio session was completed in the Custom Pre, which is a personal favourite for voice recordings. The room can add warmth to the voice, which is great for the particular style desired. The voice actor was provided with a Script, and performed the voices of two characters using different accents and pitches to differentiate the two. The recordings were completed in two 4 hour sessions. 

‘Teim’ is a multiplayer dungeon trawler game designed for 3+ players. Each player will have individual objectives to complete within the dungeon, which may differ from the objectives of the other players. These objectives often require teamwork to be completed and after each objective, the difficulty will increase. Each objective that is completed results in points that could eventually lead to the ‘Ultimate objective’ containing the boss. However, there is only one sole winner and players have the ability to betray one another – refused to help another player complete their objective.

Within the dungeon, the players will face randomly generated traps, secret staircases, curses, mysterious doors, treasure, and mini-games. The player has the ability to play mini-games in order to gain prizes. Other players can join, but the original player may decide to keep the reward, denying the other player than contributed any share. The items collected have individual effects and specific stats – speed, health, damage, range, and gold gain. Below is an image detailing the inventory.

Game Design Team 

Emil - Game Design 

Ryan - Game Programming and Mechanics. 

Corey - 3D Design and Level Design

Gavin - 3D Design 

First Sound Ideas

Ambience samples to set the location - each room the players enter. 

 Weaponry sounds are a must. The players fire arrows, therefore will require arrow fire, hit, and projectile samples. 

Simplistic music score to avoid other samples being drowned out. Music may not be triggered continuously to avoid the issue of sounds being inaudible when played in conjunction with others. 

Will need alternative concept for the ‘footsteps’ of the characters, as they’re cubes, therefore they may not have actual footsteps. 

Prototype 

The Prototype is scheduled to be completed by 20/11/15. Below is what is expected to have been completed by this date. 

Mechanics - Shooting - damage - Health 

‘Multiverse Theory’ is family friendly multiplayer game. Four characters have had their universe invaded by evil pixel characters, and the only conceivable way to defeat these pixels characters is by working together - the player cannot go it alone, but they can certainly betray their fellow characters for the treasure obtained upon their journeys. 

Game Design Team

Sam - Game Mechanics 

Tom - Level Design and 2D Art

Caoimhe - Concept Art 

Callum - Environment and 3D Design 

Zack -  Environment and 3D Design

First Sound Ideas for Multiverse Theory

- The sound must be light hearted and implementing using Unity - Sonic The Hedgehog and Super Mario provided as examples. - Simplistic and engaging music played throughout gameplay - Dialogue not considered, but vocalisations for characters may be recording during Foley sessions. - Sound Effect of cartoon jumping, bell chime, and footsteps. 

Prototype 

The Prototype is scheduled to be completed by 29/11/15. Below is what is expected to have been completed by this date.

Muliplayer Mechanics

Character Designs - Four playable, and pixel enemies 

Movement - assigned to Xbox controllers and keyboards

‘Spoopy’ is a family friendly game based around ghosts and ghost-busters. As a ghost character, the objective is to scare every civilian out of the town in order to graduate from ‘Spoopy School.’ However, there are Ghostbusters prowling, attempting to locate the ghosts to exterminate them, which must be avoided. If caught, the game ends. 

The Ghostbuster character has radar equipment to aid them in locating the ghosts, along with vacuum-like exterminating equipment. The ghost players have the ability to hide for limited amounts of times, so they can avoid the approaching Ghostbusters. In order to scare the civilians, the ghost players have the ability to possess furniture.

The game could potentially be a multiplayer in the prototype. This could dramatically alter the sound content that could be implemented for the game. Certain sound cues could be over-shadowed by other triggered sounds or result into too many samples being played simultaneously, which could become confusing for the player. 

The AI will have random movements, moving around the game locations. The AI will either in a state of wandering or fleeing. The AI will have a ‘Scare meter’ – the higher it is raised, the better. The Scare meter will be used to determine the high score.

Game Design Team 

Victoria - Concept Art, 2D Art, and Texturing.    Will - Concept Art, Environment Design, and Texturing.

Sam - Level and Environment Design

Kirsty - Game Design (Mechanics) 

Phil - Environment and 3D Design. 

First Sound Ideas for Spoopy

Ambience samples to set each location within the game - cathedral, School, etc. 

Simplistic linear music (potentially interactive) that could be utilised to alert players of an approaching enemy. This could be integrated into Unreal Engine 4 using FMOD. 

Sounds triggered when ghost characters possess furniture and objects.

Automated low-pass filters on exterminating equipment to signify the draining of the items power to the players. It cannot be used continuously. 

Potential studio recorded dialogue, but the dialogue will not be spoken word. Similar style to The Sims and Pokemon. 

Prototype 

The Prototype is scheduled to be completed by the 21/11/15. Below is what is expected to have been completed by this date.  Mechanics - Character - Movement, Possession of an object (float and transform), Power meter for possession/cooldown, travelling through walls (ghost character only). 

A.I - Movement - Point-to-point inside navigation mesh.  A.I - Reaction States - Wandering, scared, and fleeing.  A.I - Scared level metering.  Multiplayer - Working LAN - Single Player Movements (Ghost players). Ghost Buster Players - Movement (sprint) - Scanner - Radar which reveals position of ghost players and traps them within a room.  Ambience and atmospheric sound cues, basic character sound cues, and sound cues for possession of furniture and objects for ghost players. 

Backgrounds are an important part of the Sound Design,as it can help set the location and the surroundings in a scene. The background audio can be highly complex, as it is possible to go beyond what can be seen within the picture, giving us the opportunity to create a whole new world outside the walls or the shot. Background audio fills a void, which left empty can leave the film feeling unnaturally quiet.  However, we decided that a simplistic and somewhat minimalistic background session would be the most suitable for the MU2402 assignment. Our background session would mostly be used to set the location, and add an extra texture to the audio. We chose this because we believed that a more complex background session could potentially draw attention away from the dialogue, which we definitely wanted to avoid. There definitely needed to be background audio, as would feel sparse without.  The film is located in Manchester, which is an extremely busy and lively city. We envisioned the location to be within the confines of the city itself, therefore it would require typical city ambiances, such as traffic, police sirens, road works, and general city noise. Luckily, I live rather close to the city center and almost directly next to an extremely busy road, therefore I began capturing the atmosphere using my Zoom H4n from the second floor skylights. Unfortunately, I began the recordings during the Easter Holidays when the days were lovely, making it difficult to avoid recording children playing and birds singing. Although rather pleasant, these sounds certainly didn't match the mood of the film. Due to this, I began recording during the late hours, but it certainly had an entirely different feel than the day. However, on reviewing the recordings, the traffic actually sounded slightly similar to wind, which I believe was down to my zoom.  After reviewing the traffic recordings, we decided to record other traffic takes as we definitely agreed that the traffic recordings could be mistaken as wind. Having booked out a production Suite at Futureworks, we set up a shotgun microphone aimed at the traffic below. We recording roughly 18 minutes of traffic noise, giving us the ability to remove aspects within needing to record more. The microphone managed to capturing talking, which we removed. Other samples we added to the background session were sirens, using high-pass filters to create the feeling of distance. In the end, we used both takes of traffic, as we found the first take (recorded at my home) added an interesting texture. 

Why is Foley important, and why isn't the production sound enough? Foley is the reproduction of everyday day sound effects which are then added into the post production to enhance the quality of audio for films, television, games, and radio.

The Boom Operators biggest concern is capturing the dialogue. The dialogue recordings must be clear, and captured without interference from other sounds. As a result, the vast majority of Boom Operators use directional microphones, aiming them towards the actors. However, this results poor quality production sound, which lacks depth and intensity. Unfortunately, the absence of clothing movements, footsteps, and so forth is abnormal and potentially distracting. This issue is resolved with the use of Foley. Furthermore, the vast majority of the production set and props aren't the real deal. That wouldn't go down too well with health & safety. The beautiful plastic sword won’t sound fantastic. It’ll sound like plastic, which definitely isn't the sound desired. ‘Foley helps to recreate a controlled background layer of realistic ambient sounds that enhance the auditory experience of the film.’

Before beginning to process of recording the Foley, we opened up the notes from the Spotting session and placed them all within an Excel sheet. Planning is an absolutely crucial aspect of post production, and we needed a general idea of what was required before beginning. Next, we shared ideas on the items and objects that could be used to create the sounds desired (knife being thrown, punches, kicks, clothing rustles). During the recording, we noticed that recreating the exact action using an identical object - throwing a pen-knife object onto concrete - didn't sound as we expected. In that instance, the pen-knife hitting the floor sounded similar to a pot or vase being smashed, therefore we had to become inventive. 

Punches - bashing an Easter egg

Knife throw - throwing Allen Key set onto tiles

Knife shutting - Keys and a metal box clasp 

Knife picking up - candle flame snuffer and jewellery 

In the end, we decided to use samples for the footsteps and focus our time on ensuring other aspects were sounding accurate. Some of the punches used were from online sound libraries. Interestingly, we also used samples to create a shell shock experience after a character is shot in the shoulder from close range. We combine three samples - Low frequency bass, tinnitus high frequency, and mid frequency sound effect. 

When approaching the dialogue editing for the MU2402 module assignment, I must admit that I mistakenly assumed that the task would be of little difficultly, therefore required less time than other aspects of post-production sound. However, it quickly became clear that dialogue editing is highly time consuming and meticulous. Ensuring everything is synchronized, whilst ensuring all the audio takes - whether production sound or ADR - blend together seamlessly isn't a quick and simple task. 

The first step in the dialogue editing process was arranging and synchronizing the production dialogue recordings. Unfortunately, the audio reports provided were rather difficult to understand and decipher, therefore we decided to use the file names to locate the corresponding audio by looking at the names of the OMF files, and locating the Fostek audio files with a similar file name through the Pro-Tools Work-space. This process alone took several four hour studio sessions to complete, but it certainly would've taken a lot longer if the audio files lacked a decent naming convention. It truly showed us the importance of ensuring the audio files are organised efficiently. Due to the video editing choices, much of the audio that corresponded to the picture were from entirely different takes, which introduced a number of potential issues. Certain takes had different room tones, background content, performances, and even vocal tone differences. This would have to be dealt with to create concise dialogue. Some aspects of the audio takes had areas of clipping and distortion, which could render them unusable, therefore alternative takes were gathered as they might be required.

Today we were given the opportunity to speak directly with the Director, gaining his personal perspective, ideas, and vision for the film sound. Listening to the Director is an important aspect. This also gave us the chance to understand the story behind the scene, which gave us incite on how to go about the sound design.   He explained that he desired the sound to be as realistic as possible, almost as though we were merely documenting the lives of the characters. Therefore, he wanted to avoid hyper-realism, especially in regards to the gunshots (acoustically accurate usage of reverb). This also meant the Foley should be audible and accurate to reality.  He went into detail on how he envisioned the score. He believed the score should be utilized to set the mood of the scene - build tension, sadness, and despair. Furthermore, the score shouldn't be too complex, as it could possibly draw attention away from the story and away from the documentation-style. He gave us ‘Gone girl’ as an example, therefore we set about watching this film to get an idea of what he desired. Luckily, this was exactly the type of score we had envisioned during the Spotting Session.

The usage of Sound Effects can have an astounding impact on films and documentaries. They can be used to add realism to scenes, replicate or create another reality, add weight to objects, and more. Sound Effects can evoke emotions and even give films their own sonic identity. For example, as soon as people hear the sound effect created for the lightsabers, people instantly think of 'Star Wars.' They can also be utilised to create Hyperrealism.

A Sound Effect can be defined as any sound recorded or performed for the purpose of simulating a sound for a story. There are a number of types of Sound Effects, often utilised for different aspects of the film or documentaries. These are: Foley, Backgrounds, Hard/Spot Effects, and Artificial/Electronic Sound Effects. Background effects are utilised to fill the void on screen, and create a sense of location and surroundings for the listener. These types of effects include Atmosphere, ambience, room tone, and environmental sounds. Furthermore, no room is ever silent, and not all 'silences' are the same, therefore special consideration is needed to blend different audio takes together. Artificial and Electronic Sound Effects are created electronically or artificially (self-explanatory).  These types of effects are often created and utilised for non-real elements, such as a monsters, spaceships, laser guns, and hyper real events. Often-times, these are created using synthesizers and by abusing instruments, which is actually incredibly fun. Hard and Spot Effects are those that have an absolute sound associated with the picture on screen, such as door slams, punches, weapons firing, car horns, and so forth. Foley can be defined as sound related to movements, whether pertaining to a character or object, or the result of an object's movement. Foley can be used to completely replace production sound or augment already existing audio to create a smoother track. Due to the microphones used during the production stage, most movement sounds aren't adequately recorded. During the planning stages of the MU2402 assignment, we decided it would be beneficial to begin with the dialogue editing, as this was the aspect we had the least experience with, therefore we believed it needed to be our main focus. Then we would begin the Foley recording. Once the Foley was completed, one member will create the Background Effects, whilst the other will complete the Hard/Spot Effects for the 10 minutes of film. The last consideration will be the music.

The first sounds we encounter in our journey in life is the human voice, therefore it is understandable that we connect to the human voice more than any other sound. The human voice is the basis of storytelling - something we very much enjoy - and we have come to expect clear, concise, and convincing dialogue. In order to achieve this, vast amounts of editing, processing, and mixing is required. Production sound rarely sounds amazing. Well then, why is dialogue considered as an unheard art? 

For the module MU2402, we were given the task of creating, editing, and mixing the sound content for 10 minutes and 17 seconds of a film within small groups.   We booked the SSL studio to discuss the MU2402 assignment, beginning by deciding upon how we should approach the assignment as a whole. We started to consider the roles and task that could be completed individually, so we could gain the most out of the time available. The sound effects and backgrounds could be completely individually, but we believed the Foley and dialogue should be done as a group. Recording Foley within the studio would require at least two people - one to operate the desk and another to perform as a Foley Artist. Sure, some of the Foley could be captured using location equipment. However, we decided it would be best to complete the vast majority of the Foley within a studio - preferably the D-Control - and work as a team, as it would be beneficial to have the input from both of us. The dialogue editing is the area we both had the least experience with, but it was something we both wanted to learn, therefore we decided to complete this together too. 

Game Trailers are an absolutely crucial part of advertising upcoming game releases, essentially giving the public a preview of the game's characteristics, story-line, and content. Sometimes they're merely humorous or cinematic videos, but they still draw attention to the game. However, simply having fantastic visuals isn't enough. Another huge area of importance is the Sound Design, as brilliant Sound Design can truly breathe life into the trailer. 

Previously, I was presented with the task of producing the Sound Design for a cinematic game trailer by Futureworks. After analyzing three different trailers - Routine, Dead Island 2, and League Of Legends: A twist of fate - I finally decided upon completing the Sound Design for Dead Island 2.

My decision revolved around the assignment brief. Each cinematic trailer was within the 3-5 minute requirement. However, I also required a game trailer that had the right amount of content to truly show off my abilities as a Sound Designer, but not have too much that it couldn't be completed within the time given. Not too simple, whilst not being too complex. Unfortunately, this eliminated the trailer for Routine. The trailer for Routine is very minimalistic, and features game-play. This fits with the genre of the game. On the other hand, the League Of Legends trailer was full to the brim with exciting and fast-paced action, with different champions battling in several different scenes. Each champion within the game has unique abilities and characteristics, along with specific sound effects within the game that allow the player to identify them with ease. Something that Riot games considers to be of great importance to include in their trailers, which would make it difficult to reproduce. 

'One of the great challenges that we had with the sound for the cinematic was creating something that a player could close their eyes, watching the cinematic, and then instantly know that's the character they know and love in the game' (Brad Beaumont, 2013).