There are a few different scenes with very specific audio requirements in the animation.
- Outdoors around the clocktower
- Along the water/canal which isn’t flowing very fast
- Street noises but not too loud
- 18th/19th century world noises
- Set in Belgium so French chatter…
Specifically, I needed audio like:
- Clock tower sounds
- Horse and carts on cobbled stones
- Children laughing and playing
- Water flowing slowly in the canal
- Trees in the wind
- A splash (for the fairy in the water)
- Sound of fairy dust
- The inside of a Clockmakers shops(wood, doors, clocks)
- Nightsounds like owls,or Christmas(like choirs) to signify season&time of day
- Cartoon-y type sound effects, like speed, magic dust falling, bounces…
The most important thing was to eliminate all modern-day noises and references. Audio is very important for building up and adding to ambience.
The first online locations I went for (royalty free and relatively easily accessible ) sound effects were; and to ascertain which sounds I would not have to re-create myself :
I was very lucky with the BBC’s depository. I discovered Parisian children playing and talking with birds tweeting in the background, horses on cobblestones and at the Grand Palais. There is very little background noise and no modern noises(I.e.planes flying overhead, phone noises or cars beeping).
Unfortunately I could not post the audio for the children playing as its too large for this page.
Overall, collecting the audio was a pleasant experience.
I will need to figure out how to manipulate the existing sounds and which Reverb/production techniques to make them combine together naturally. Tidying up the audio in Audacity or Logic Pro is definitely a post in itself.
I also need to check what is the process of audio within Unreal and how well does it read Audio for images.
Until tomorrow, which is back to modelling…