This time on Sunday Sound Effects Round Up we start with a free giveaway from Sonniss in celebration of #GDC2017. Next we have a tease of a new upcoming library Motors from Sonic Salute, then we have a new release from Boson "Stomps - Creature Footsteps". Pasi Pitkänen has released "Swish & Whoosh" which you can find on A Sound Effect. Detunized have released their Ambisonic Steam Trains Sound Library recorded with a Sennheiser Ambeo mic. Finally we take a look at an article on the A Sound Effect blog entitled "Surround Field Recording Adventures In Forests, Canyons, Parks, And Wetlands" and thee are free example sound effects from Rick Hernandez.
Sonniss Offer 20GB Of Free Sound Effects In Celebration Of GDC2017
In celebration of #GDC2017 Sonniss are giving away over 20GB of high-quality sound effects from their vendors. Even though they are free, you can still use them personally or commercially without attribution. You can download them from Sonniss.
Sonic Salute New Library Tease
No sooner than Mikkel at Sonic Salute has released two new libraries Construction Ambiences and Backyards & Alleyways that we covered in previous edition of Sound Sound Effects Roundup than he is on Twitter posting a tease picture and Soundcloud montage of his next library Motors SFX.
Bonson Release Stomps - Creature Footsteps
Michel at Bonson bills this as "These are footsteps like you’ve never heard them before! This is a "one-of-a-kind" sound library unlike anything you’ve heard before, with more than 8,500 files full of high-end recordings that will boost your creativity and help you add special footsteps sounds to your new project. If you’re looking for traditional footsteps, this is NOT your library – and if you thought WINGS was good, wait until you hear STOMPS!"
Stomps - Creature Footsteps has been organised into 3 categories - Source, Textures and Design.
- Source - Here you’ll find more than 7,500 files (with lots of variations) organised into 83 folders. You’ll find the sequences that include: 2 Legs WALKING, 2 Legs RUNNING, 4 Legs GALLOPING, 4 Legs TROTTING, and 4 Legs WALKING. They used all kinds of weird props to record original, versatile sounds with lot of character, different textures, and in very different frequency ranges. These sounds are organised to form the DNA of your future footsteps. You’ll have lots of different sound colours to play with, ranging from very small and harsh sounds to very low and bold ones, and all the ranges in between.
- Texture - Here you’ll find more than 600 sounds with different textures to help you customise your footsteps. These textures are also a very valuable sonic material that will help you construct lots of varying sound design work.
- Design - Here are more than 500 processed sounds created by Bonson's sound designer Michel Marchant, covering a wide range of characters like Robots, Snow Creatures, Distant Dinosaurs, Rock Golems, Armies, Colossus and many, many more.
Some of the microphones they used to produce this library include: Sennheiser MHK 8040; MKH 30; MKH 40; MKH 60; Neumann TLM 170 and the SANKEN CO-100k recorded into Sound Devices 702T, Pro Tools HD, and Metric Halo LIO-8. All files have appropriate filenames and complete Soundminer Metadata.
Special Introductory Price - For a limited time, you can get STOMPS at a special introductory price. You can get the 96 kHz version for $279 instead of $299 or the 192kHz version for $279 instead of $349.
Swish & Whoosh From Pasi Pitkänen on A Sound Effect
Swish & Whoosh is a collection of organic light and hard swishes and whooshes. The library consists of 62 individual objects ranging from a small metal sieve to a medium sized didgeridoo and covers fast, slow, fast multiple and slow multiple articulations. Pasi Pitkänen told me...
The main reason I recorded this library was to create a library that covers not only the normal and fast swish whoosh sounds but also the more subtle, minimal soft sounds that are usually missing from other commercial sound effect libraries. The library also comes with bonus content: 22 minutes of metal slinky sounds, including slinky laser sound effects.
Swish & Whoosh was recorded with Sound Devices 702 and a XY stereo pair of Sennheiser MKH8040 microphones in acoustically treated studio environment in 96KHz 24bit quality to make these sounds flexible especially if you want to experiment with pitch, stretch and other audio tools. For example pitching down the didgeridoo and plastic tube hollow item sounds by two octaves to produce low drone sweeps.
The library is available in two formats: 96 kHz, 24 bit and in 44.1 KHz, 16 bit. There are 242 files comprising of 5300+ sounds and is priced at $55.64 including VAT as an introductory offer . The normal price will be $70.80 inc vat.
Detunized Releases Ambisonic Steam Trains Sound Library
Ambisonic Steam Trains features recordings of 3 different narrow-gauge railways in Saxony/Germany where they meander through narrow valleys and bends. The library includes more than 3.5 hours of recordings that are taken directly at the train drivers position in the cabin as well as from wagon platforms and passenger seats. There are also recordings of train pass-bys, shunting and service operations in the depot are included.
With the Ambisonic format captures the surroundings of steam trains in action in a format that can be repurposed to a wide range of immersive formats.
- Ambisonic Steam Trains is available in 4 versions in a price range from 12.00 to 79.00 Euro.
- Live Pack: 26 Instrument Racks, 1.7 GB - Price 12 Euros
- Broadcast WAV light: 26 stereo files, 24/48, 1.7 GB 97 min total playing time - Price 18 Euros
- Broadcast WAV HD: 55 stereo files, 24/96, 7.5 GB 218 min total playing time - Price 39 Euros
- Ambisonic HD 2496: 55 takes, 24Bit/96 KHz, Ambisonic A-Format + Stereo 23 GB (extracted), total playing time of 218 minutes- Price 69 Euros
All recordings are done with the Sennheiser Ambeo mic in upright position.
Surround Field Recording Adventures In Forests, Canyons, Parks, And Wetlands
Recently Asbjoern from A Sound effect spotted that Field Recordist and Senior Sound Designer Rick Hernandez had shared some intriguing images from a surround recording project he’d just been undertaking. He’d been recording in forests, canyons, parks, and wetlands, and Asbjoern was curious to hear more about the project and his experiences.
Rick was kind enough to share the story – and not only that, he also shared some of the recordings he captured, and you can download them for free from A Sound Effect and apparently you are welcome to use those recordings in whatever way you like.
Recently I got the opportunity to demo a DPA5100 Mobile Surround Microphone. The DPA 5100 is a solidly-built, multicapsuled Surround Sound microphone that uses Windtex fabric technology to nest an array of five capsules. The capsules are Omni-directional and make use of the DPA DiPMic (Directional Pressure Microphone). It is incredibly easy to setup and has a very wide and astonishingly accurate 5.1 imaging. The recordings I was able to capture with the Zoom F8 and DPA 5100 were amazing and I’m really happy with the imaging I got from the locations recorded.
You can read the article in full on the A Sound Effect blog as well as download the free sound effects Rick has been so generous to share.