Game Development Reference
In-Depth Information
Creating music and sound fx
It is not very easy to make a full list of the tools of a sound designer. Sounds can
be produced with many different techniques and tools and their creation requires op-
erations, such as playing musical instruments, recording from a source, mixing, and
then editing the sounds with software.
A sound designer works with several tools, such as musical instruments, everyday
objects that produce specific sounds, microphones, recording devices, sound librar-
ies, and digital audio workstations.
Sound libraries are an important asset for a sound designer, because they provide
already made sound effects that can be mixed together to get original sounds and
music. Some of these include the East West Quantum Symphonic Library, Sonic Im-
plants, Garritan, and ProjectSam Symphobia.
The following is a list of basic equipment that a sound designer should have at his/
her disposal:
• A multi track
digital audio workstation
(
DAW
) for PC and or MAC. There
are several such programs and it is impossible to list all of them. We can
mention: Garage Band (which is very cheap), Logic Pro, Reaper (which is
very cheap) or Sound Forge, Magix, Pro Tools, and Cubase. You can search
on the Internet to find out more about the specific features of each of them.
• A two track audio editor, such as Audacity (free license).
• A portable hard disk recorder, if you can afford it.
• Sound libraries of pre-made music and sounds.
• Software to keep libraries organized, such as iTunes.
The following figure represents the working station of a professional sound editor:
