Hello There Readers!
Well, I want to start with talking about the “Texture” section of our reading. I find this important because I find that with the right texture any game can become a memorable game, or a lack of texture can be game breaking. Now, to me, I don’t think texture simply applies to what we see and feel, but the levels of what we experience in a game are derived from the textures of everything within that system that are made up from different textures. One such texture would be sound. Now, how are sounds made? Well for games and movies a like there is a very important person who makes those sounds, or group of people who fabricate those sounds. Those people are Foley Artists. They use various methods and means to produce sounds but they have to do it with means one would not associate with the sound they are making. For example, I watched a Foley artist take a small airline glass alcohol bottle and run it along wind chimes to make the sound of breaking glass. Or, for a more modern version, here is Foley art behind Arkham City.
For those of you who don’t watch the video, I’ll give you a brief overview of one of the things I find so amazing about Foley. While playing Arkham, you break bones here and there of the enemies and baddies you fight, obviously they wouldn’t break real bones to make those sounds, but can you guess what they use to make it? Well you will be astonished to know that they use the sound of celery! One breaking is the sound of the celery coming off the main bunch, and another break sound is the celery actually being broken. This is astonishing because in what would would you think that the sound of celery breaking could be the sound effect for the sounds of breaking bones. In order to think of these sounds, and make them up, they have to get their hands on these abstract and even obscure items to make these believable sounds. But, once you realize just how much Foley does, you’ll never “hear” the sounds the same again. Another example, in Gears of war, one of the monsters with squishy feet sounds was actually an orange cut in half and splatted against the floor to make the sound of their squishy foot steps. I hope you learned something about Foley and sound texture.
I hope you enjoyed this reading and maybe you’ll look at some Foley art and be blown away like I was when I first saw it!
Quin
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I found your blog very interesting. I like your connections of the sound effects to textual design. It really adds an element to the game that immerses you in a new world and time. I never knew they used celery breaking as a quick swap for bones breaking. You would think they would just break a real bone and record that, but I guess they have found better ways to reproduce the sound. It really does help to add to the game when you can hear the bad guys arm snap as you kick it though.
Wow! This is really interesting! I always seem to forget just how they make different noises in video games. I remember seeing a behind the scenes thing on a Disney movie when I was a kid about the different things they use to make character noises. I thought it was very intriguing. I’m glad that they really put effort into making authentic sound effects for the games!