Collaborating with animation

One of the projects this trimester, is to team up with an animation student and produce a soundtrack, complete with effects. This is very different to what we normally do, so quite a challenge in some respects. The reason I say a challenge, is that creating sound effects from scratch is not easy if you don’t know how or you are not taught. Creating sound effects, or Foley, as it is known in the industry is an art form an

It takes years of experience. We were not shown how to create these sound effects so I had to rely on uncle YouTube.

Watching the videos on creating Foley sound effects is astonishing. Simple things like a gun cocking is created by using a latch from a gate. The sound of a fire is created from crumpling plastic. To the layperson, you would be excused from ever contemplating the sounds from these items being associated with sound effects they result. In the videos, they also say that it takes many years to become proficient in Foley. That clearly puts me in the novice category.

We had a mass presentation in the lecture theatre by the animation students and we had to select who we wanted to team up with. I chose a person who seemed clear on what was required. The animation is a robot sequence with the obvious metallic squeaks, clanks and a bossanova based soundtrack. What I was not prepared for was how difficult it can be for a person to try and describe a sound and then another create that sound. It has taken many, many hours of research and attempts to create precisely what the animation student requested. To date, almost every attempts to create or use of pre-existing sounds from the internet have been rejected. The animation student is very particular on what they want and I respect that, however; it is proving quite a challenge to comply.

The sounds required are a metallic walk you would associate with a robot, the sound of the robot being picked up and shaken violently, robotic servos moving and more. The walk has been quite a challenge as I found a vast number of robot waling sounds on the Internet and submitted them with all of them being rejected. I then found a video of a Foley artist using a metal sink drain attached to a handle and recording that. I re-created that with parts I had around the house. This was not rejected, but required more bass. I set about finding items that would produce the bass like sound you could associate with the metal clanking of a robot walking.

Before bass: After bass:

The animation soundtrack also required a voice-over. The brief suggested a fifties style voice-over often seen with American commercials of the era. I recorded two separate voice-overs which were both rejected. I then approached a fellow student at SAE who is renowned for his voice-over work. I begged him to assist which he agreed, taking time out of his busy schedule. I was extremely impressed with the result and forwarded this to the animation student excited to have such a professional sounding voice-over. To my horror, his was also rejected. The animation student suggested a friend, who met the criteria, to record the voice-over. This will be carried out over the next few days, after the studio we had booked was cancelled by SAE due to an electrical emergency.

Monte voice-over: