Sonic Design - Final Project

Samer Muhamed Usef / 0357036 / Bachelors of Computer Science (Hons)

Sonic Design
Sonic Design - Final Project & Portfolio 

19/06/2024 - 08/07/2024 (Week 09 - Week 14)

"Students will given a choice of gameplay videos. They will then need to create the sound and bring the scene to life. Students will have to plan and organize their studio recording session for Foley and voice recording. They will also have access to the portable recorder if required."

For the Final Project, I have decided to go with the gameplay video on "Hollow Knight" because out of all the gameplays choices, I only knew of this one. Also, its one of my favorite platformers or you could say my all time favorite due to the elements of souls like being implemented within the game which I am very fond of.

Selected Gameplay (Hollow Knight)

Alright so first, I have to make the initial Audio Storyboard and Audio Asset List for me to put them all together.

After researching the items that would quite fit the criteria to design my sounds as well as the items and resources I could find at hand, these would be the following Audio Storyboard and Audio Asset List I plan to follow: 

Audio Asset List

Audio Storyboard

Audio StoryBoard.xlsx

Sound Effect Creation Process

Okay so after figuring out the needed sound effects and the time frames of each of the sound effects I had also figured out the different techniques I could use to make my sounds which is said in the Audio asset list and all of my sounds are recorded with the iPhone 15 Pro. 

The process of my 5 most favorite sound effects creation process are as follows: 

1. Electric Spark

The proud sound effect I had created would be the electric particle noise. For this one, my mind sparked after thinking about it cluelessly for hours and thought of one of the biggest problems within the Taylors library that was the charging outlets at Level 4 which I heavily use for studying reasons. I knew that at certain outlets of the study table area, when plugging in any type of charger, the outlet starts making noise and also burns the metallic coating of my chargers. This brought me straight to the Library and to record the noise, I placed my phone as close as possible to the outlet to record while plugging in my charger at a faulty outlet, which brought me this sound effect I have created.

With the recording in Audition, I first used Sound Remover to remove the background static of the original clip which went really well in handling all of the background noise which help tremendously and then proceeded to cut the clip into the section of the clip I felt provided a shock particle worthy  sound and also not much background noise allowing me to be able to use the clip into my Multitrack.

In my multitrack I added fade outs since the clip was a little bigger than it was supposed to be and to make the shock noise going lower in volume when the shock is complete and also, because the clip was to be used in majority of the gameplay and simultaneously as well, I had created 3 tracks specifically for the shocks only and added fade ins, fade outs, volume or volume keyframe adjusted for the situations when the character was closer or far from each of the shocks which gave me the shock noises.

2. Flying Bug SFX

To make the Flying bug I needed two components:

Wing SFX

Bug noise 

Both these components had been cut down and the sound removal effect had been used to get rid of background noise 

The Wing noise was done by using a bunch of paper and flapping it next to the phone to record it. With that, I created a lengthy clip but since the winged bugs screen time outmatched the audio length, i had looped the audio and adjusted the flapping wing noise's volume keyframe to get a consistent flapping noise.

For the Bug noise I had used a rubber band to with two hands, one of them is holding the band using the ends of my fingers from either side (pinky and index) making almost a rectangle shape while the other hand uses a finger to strike the band in a rhythm. in Audio multitrack, I had sped up the clip to make it almost sound like an alien creature like bug and added pitch shifter to change the noise into a high pitched noise (12 Semi tone) 

Hence I joined both the clips together in the multitrack to make the Bug noise effect.

3. Bug Walking SFX

Coming to the Walking bug, I had used the audio for the rubber sound mentioned in Flying bug, put the clip in multitrack, added a fade for when the character gets close to the bug, put the audio on loop and stretched it for the constant same noise, increase the clip speed a little lesser than the flying bug (85).

Added pitch shifter and put a semi tone of -8 for a deeper noise since this enemy seemed more masculine than the flying bug and lastly, made cuts within the clip for when the bug was to charge at the character by adding trims to the clip and adding the same clip with their effects and speed up the audio to 12% below the enemy noise clip to give the gameplay some visual cue for when the enemy was to attack making the clip of the sound effect I have.

4. Landing SFX

For this one I had a two decently bulky books stacked together and dropped them on my floor to make a impact noise for the character upon landing.

Before adding the sound to my multitrack I removed background noise by sound removal process, made the EQ of the original clip to have higher bass by increasing the L upward.

In my multitrack I dedicated a track for the land sound since its used constantly throughout the gameplay and adjusted the fade ins while also adding convolution reverb to the clip to give it an echo effect to the noise since the character is in a cave.

5. Coin Collect SFX

Lastly, the most satisfying sound I made would be the coin collection of the character. I proceeded with the coin sound aspect of the collection noise when the Character has picked up Geo from the enemies or boulder. This Audio was done with a single coin, placing my phone at the edge of the table and close to it, I flicked the coin, allowing me to make this sound.

Before adding to the multitrack, I had adjusted the background noise using the same effect as the others and made it a bit lower in volume (-7.4 dB) and in the multitrack I used it in and stack the same clip twice in together to make the coin pick up noises for more than 1 coin, as seen below this was for just the boulders coins when the character goes to pick it up.

Additional Sound Creations

1. Walking SFX

For the implementation of the walking sound effect I had used my shoes as the instruments and the tile floor in my room to make noise. I put my phone on the floor while next to it, using hands put in the shoes and tap on the floor in a continuous rhythmic flow to obtain the walking effect 

2. Atmosphere SFX

At the same time doing the footstep sound effect, I also recorded the atmosphere noise in my room with the ac on with my phone put a little further from the ac to get the Atmosphere of the Cave in Hallow Knight

3. Coin Fall SFX

Then I proceeded with using a couple of more coins and made the sound in such a way that, I did the same criteria's as Coin collections for recording process and then slid the coins off my hand, from 1 palm to another giving me this sound.

4. Jump SFX

For this one, I had to go outside in a area that was a rock surface with sand as well to make the lifting off the floor sound of the character to demonstrate a visual cue that he has lifted off the platform. It took a couple tries to get it to work

5. Boulder Break SFX

After obtaining the landing sound sound I had then went onto the Boulder sound done by picking up a couple of rocks from the ground and dropping on the ground to obtained the crack like noise that will used when the character breaks the boulder.

Multitrack Format

In total, I had 19 tracks in my project to make the video come into life, for that I had dedicated sections for Movement, Land, Jump and Shock since they were used almost everywhere in the gameplay, and the others were added in a dedicated section called Misc that had 13 track just for it.

After all of the effects were in place and all edited, I had exported it and added it into my Davinci Resolve with the original gameplay clip to sync them and brought what I have now.

Final Result

Reflection

Coming into to this project I wondered how I could make my sound effects by myself while also putting them within a gameplay? Sounded tough at first but as I explored the different sound effect making process for each of the sounds I needed in my gameplay, I came to understand and learn a lot more about Sonic Design as a whole. Many trials were went through to get where I am now and honestly, I feel really happy with my final results of my sound design for this final project. one big difficulty I had to mention using audition to edit my audio to the gameplay, I did not have the option of pan in my Adobe audition which made it hard to know where the sounds were coming from, especially for the shock particle but instead as a workaround, I had adjusted the keyframe and added keyframes within the volume to make the sound more appealing to the listener. Overall, I enjoyed the process of this module and the different assignments given to us and learned a lot more than I initally did.