Putting my recorded sounds into my Demo 1 (23/5/2013)

Today I concentrated on completing the editing of both my voice acting and the sounds I wanted to include in my demo.

Having struggled to get rid of some of the background noise last week I was told by a colleague today that an easier method to do so was by 'Capture Noise Print' as before, but then selecting 'Adaptive Noise Reduction' in order to remove the majority of the unwanted background noise. Thus I was able to fully edit both my voice acting and foley today which I was pleased with. 

The foley I have decided to include in my demo from last week is as follows.

• Traffic. 
• Tree rustling. 
• Air conditioning.
• Banging metal.
• Water running.

And if I find the time I will also try and include foot steps for the pavement and grass.

Putting our own sound into UDK (16/5/2013)

Having gathered a number of sounds we were told today how to put them into UDK in the form of triggers e.g. the sounds that play when a  player crosses a certain point.

You can read my notes on how to do this below.

1. Right click on 'UDK' and select 'Add Actor' before selecting 'Add Trigger'. 
2. Once the trigger has been added left click it twice in order to bring up its options. Here it is best to change the triggers 'Collision Height' and 'Collision Radius' in order to make sure the player definitely activates it. 
3. Clicking on the small green K at the top of  the screen whilst having the trigger selected will bring up the 'UnrealKismet'. 
4. Right clicking on the screen you then need to select 'New Event Using Trigger_0' before selecting 'Touch'. This will make sure that the sound plays when the player literally touches the trigger. 
5. Here you then right click the screen in order to select 'New Action', 'Sound' and then 'Play Sound'. 
6. Dragging the 'Touched' point of the trigger to the 'Play' point of the 'Play Sound' will make sure whatever sound you select plays when the player encounters the trigger.
7. Selecting the 'Play Sound' box with a left click then brings up the proprieties. Before continuing bring up the content browser and find a sound you want to incorporate under 'Sound Cues', select that sound. Going back into the 'Seq Act Play Sound' section on the 'UnrealKismet' you then need to select the small green arrow next to the 'Play Sound' line which stands for 'Use Selected Object In Content Browser'. 
8. Now the sound will play successfully! 

Luckily I was told by my friends how to incorporate my own sounds into UDK using the following steps.

1. Going into the 'Content Browser' I then had to select the bottom left 'Import' button in order to select the sound I want to use and fill in the details (making sure there are no spaces).
2. Right clicking the 'Content Browser' you then select 'New SoundCue' and fill in the details as before.
3. Having done this a box should appear named the 'Sound Cue Editor'. Right clicking the 'SoundCue' created from the previous action you then select the option 'Edit Using Sound Cue Editor' to bring up the box.
4. Now selecting the 'SoundNode Wave' that was made before you right clicked the 'Sound Cue Editor' box brought up on the screen just now select the imported sound under the file type 'SoundNode Wave' using the title you gave it. With a box now included you drag the two black boxes next to the two boxes on the screen together in order to link them. 
5. Now your own sounds will play in UDK!

Once I knew how to do the above I then started to place my triggers ready for when I incorporate my own sounds in the 3D demo I have yet to fully edit.

Going out and recording sounds (16/5/2013)

Today we went through the criteria needed to pass this module. Therefore I made the following notes.

• Explain on our blogs why we enjoy the sounds we made and why we wanted to make them in the first place, how will they be used to create atmosphere etc. The sounds don't need to be included in the game, but they should all be given in on a CD or memory disk with our name on it, thus the grader will be able to recognise what they are listening to, or in my case what I will say during certain lines.
• Look over my 3D demo and decide what sounds could be included in order to make it stand out more. Remember I have started this slightly already with the storyboard I created. 
• Create a audio design document made up of 1500 words. Talk further about the equipment used during this process and whether or not it went well or not.
• Perhaps use the website Sound Cloud in order to upload my own sounds onto it. Thus being able to open them up on my blogs.
• As long as we show an understanding on how sounds are made and have produced a fair few of any sort then it doesn't matter if some of them were not suitable for the demo or were chosen over others.

Afterwards myself, Adam, Jim and Bonnie made a list of sounds we wanted to record before going around the city for a couple of hours in order to record these sound effects which included the following.

• Ambient background noises of people talking and area interactions both within and outside the city.
• Seagulls flocking.
• Walking at different paces on pebbles, sand, metal, concrete and grass.
• Shaking of tree branches and bushes. 
• Water flowing and splashing.
• Sliding ones hand against metal bars. 
• Fiddling with a metal lock and banging it on other metal surfaces.
• Air conditioning.

Editing my voice recordings (13/5/2013)

Deciding to crack on with some work outside of lectures I went over my recorded voice acting and edited them appropriately. Thus removing any background sounds and cutting out stutters, bad lines and long pauses.  

Overall I was very pleased with the results as I was worried that I would sound different when recorded particularly since I had to put on a deeper voice. However, for my first time at voice acting I feel I did pretty well. Not only did the dying man's voice convey pain, I thought it sounded natural. Also, the deeper voice I had to use for my main character ended up sounding good and not forced. So I am pleased to hear I was able to use two decent voices.
My only complaint is that you can sometimes tell that both voices are done by the same person which is a shame, otherwise I think they are different enough for those listening to know they are separate characters, plus its early days for my attempts at voice acting and this should become less obvious in the future (I hope).

I was also able to help Ryan by lending my voice acting for his 3D demo. For his game I had to voice a confident thief which was slightly difficult to do as I used a similar deep voice to my main character's voice. I then had to incorporate elements of confidence in order to make the voice match the personality Ryan wanted. This was difficult at first, but Ryan said that he was more than happy with the results and therefore I trust he was pleased with my work. Plus, it gave him experience in directing voice acting so it was beneficially for both of us. 

Finally I was able to add all my cut scene audio to my presentation and edited it so it would play automatically. Overall I am happy to hear my voice play alongside the illustrations I drew.

Voice Recording (9/5/2013)

Being told that we didn't have Audio Practical today I decided to use this free time in order to record my voice acting for both the 3D demo and the story board for the cut scene. Taking out the professional voice recording equipment I was joined by a number of my colleagues whilst I did my lines. Admittedly I was skeptical about this as I had planed to record on my own, but I am glad I didn't turn them away as not only did they prove to be good loyal friends for sticking around, but they also helped me a lot. For example, they provided feedback on whether or not the voices sounded good and even gave directions on how I could deliver the lines I had written.

As for my own skills I have always wanted to try my hand at voice acting for a very long time and was therefore excited that I could do so today. Using the advice given to me by the voice actors I was lucky enough to email, I spent a good two hours recording my lines.
I found using advice such as drinking lots of water to be crucial as using my voice for a long time did make me very thirsty. However, I found myself ignoring one piece of advice which was not to force a voice as I had to do since my character was meant to be between fifteen and twenty years older than me and a smoker. Thus I made my voice deeper and slightly raspy, trying my best to avoid sounding too much like Christian Bale's yelling Batman voice which is mocked worldwide for being ridiculous. Whereas I feel I did a reasonable job of this voice the second character I voiced (the dying man) felt more natural as I used my own voice for him even though I offered the role to my friends who were supporting me. I have to admit I am glad I did this as it allowed me to use a range of my own voices for my 3D demo and will thus demonstrate my skill to those who watch the slideshow and hear my voice acting.

I was also given the opportunity to voice for a friend's 3D demo and intend to do this as the only way to improve my skills is to practice. 

I also feel that I should set myself a personal goal over the holiday to continue practicing and recording with my range of voices for a number of different projects. After all, I had a lot of fun today but feel that I could do with some more experience in order to hone my skills. Though for my first try I feel confident that I did well.  

Audio Theory 5 (9/5/2013)

First we watched a video involving John Cage's silent piece known as 4'33 which was actually presented in a theatre to a paying audience. Personally I found this pretentious as no sound can work in drama, but for me a musical piece is meant to be heard. Granted it allows people to hear things they otherwise wouldn't and contemplate, but the same could be said and done with meditation.

We were then asked to find and play a number of audio based games which would be developed for and played by the visually impaired.

Proving to be a very difficult task I decided to think outside the 'box' and not just about video games. Therefore thinking about the games I play in my own spare time I thought that 'Dungeons and Dragons' could perhaps be played by the visually impaired since it requires just the use of the player's imagination. However, if the person playing is completely blind and hasn't had much experience with places and things then this game may not be possible for them to play as they don't have anything to draw from in order to visualise thing in their heads. Also, unless they have indented/braille dice and sheets it is hard to think about how the visually impaired would roll the dice and then compare their roll to their skills unless the Dungeon Master did it for them. Also the game could use audio in order to describe the environment for the player and have them say what they wanted to do e.g. like a text adventure game only audio based then perhaps my idea isn't far off. In fact, some of my favorite games have a lot of talking in them, therefore perhaps the visually unpaired would enjoy an interactive novel in which the story is told to them before they can decide how to react at certain points with a number of choices given to them.
Perhaps if I was ever given the task to develop a game for the visually impaired then I would maybe do this method as it would allow me to further explore my interest in voice acting and create a script for a game which I enjoy doing in my spare time.

Luckily the lecturer then came to the rescue with a website listing a number of games which the visually impaired could play. The site known as 'audiogames.net' featured the following games which I was able to play unlike other games that I couldn't download.

3D Snake: 
The classic game of snake that told the user to use the up and down arrow keys in order to select an option they would say aloud such as "Start New Game", "Speaker Test" and "Exit". Therefore for someone new to playing a game for the visually impaired I decided to close my eyes whilst playing. Unfortunately my play test of this game was unsuccessful as I couldn't tell when I was approaching something to eat or when I was nearing a wall since the sounds were not distinct enough. Thus I got very confused and kept losing as I understand others did to.

Star Trek - Final Conflict: 

Having written above my thoughts for a game in which it described the environment to the blind player I ended up finding this game that had the player using the directional keys and the Enter key in order to select the area of the Enterprise (spaceship) to go to and then what you wanted to do there. It was cool as it played sounds I would associate with the show and the inside the ship itself. However it didn't explain what I was meant to be doing and used a female voice that was meant to sound machine like, thus it was hard to tell what she was saying most of the time. Therefore once I got too confused I decided to activate the self destruct just for the heck of it. This gave me a good laugh as I wasn't expecting it to blow up the whole ship, even if it was short lived since it gave me a new one almost instantly.

Entombed: 
I was almost about to give up finding a game that would be playable for me until a friend of mine recommended Entombed on the company's website Driftwood. I was glad I took his advice as the moment you start the game you are told a story about a long lost city full of riches from a very cool sounding narrator whilst fantasy music plays in the background. This got my interest especially since it sounded very atmospheric and used some foley to add to the effectiveness of the game. I was also very pleased and surprised to see that you could choose your race, pick your class and even your character's name which the game would speak out to you. Sadly however, the game replaced its awesome initial narrator with a Microsoft announcer voice in order to speak the player's name. Thus whenever it spoke I could hardly make out what it was saying.
Overall though I feel that this was the best game I had played since it sounded epic at the start and included turn based combat as seen in other games such as 'Final Fantasy' in which I could attack, defend, use items and other such things. Therefore, if another game such as this was made and still included the cool voice together with clearer dialogue I recon it would make for an even greater experience.

Harvard Referencing: 

• Driftwood Audio Entertainment. (2010) 'Entombed' Game. Available at: http://www.blind-games.com/blind.games.download.aspx (Accessed: 9/6/2013). 
• Unknown. (Unknown) AudioGames.net. Available at: http://audiogames.net/listgames.php (Accessed: 9/6/2013).

Foley research at home (6/5/2013)

I thought that in order to get the sound of stepping on gravel or grass I would use those tools easily accessible to me. However, since the lecture with Graeme showed us the different and more creative ways of using foley I decided to do some research at home and see what effective sounds I could make from odds and sods around my home. Some may end up in my demo, others were nice accidents I came across.

You can find creative findings below.

• Taking inspiration from the video shown in which a pillowcase made for an affective bird flapping sound. I decided to see if the same effect happened when using a hot water bottle. As it turns out you get a very similar sound which also sounds as if it is making an inaudible bird call thanks to any left over water inside it churning around. The plastic also makes it sound more fleshly. 
• Using a pair of jagged scissors sounds like the clicking of type writer keys.
• Shaking the bag I store all my bathroom items in makes a sound as if someone is carrying something heavy such as tools or other such items. 
• Dragging the two stone hearts I have at home on the side of the clay fruit bowl gave the sound of something heavy moving across a track. Therefore if I put two either side of the bowl and moved both of them across whilst speeding up the action I should be able to recreate the sound of a train passing. 
• Using a large piece of wrapping paper and shaking it rapidly gives the sound of heavy rain hitting a window. At the same time quickly tapping your fingers across it gives it the sound of light rain. 
• Clapping two small tins of Vaseline together makes the same horse trotting sound a hollow coconut makes.
• Tapping the empty metal bullet shell I have against the thin metal layer surrounding my lamp makes it sound as if steel work is happening e.g. a hammer hitting an anvil.
• Surprisingly, lightly squeezing a bag of Rowntrees Pick & Mix gives the same sound one would hear when stepping on gravel due to the variety of textures of the sweets inside the bag. Thus if you're not near gravel and need the sound just buy a bag of the sweets and enjoy them afterwards. 

Audio Practical 3 (2/5/2013)

In this session we used the Marquee tool in Adobe Audition in order to cut out background noises in an interview e.g. as a bell which I never knew was possible.

To do this we had to bring up the Spectral Frequency Display (Shift + D) in order to see a sound wave that looked like a heat signature. If you have never seen this then please use the example image I took below to understand.

Using the Marquee tool to cut out red horizontal lines which represent sound anomalies, such as the bell mentioned above then, using the Spot Healing Brush tool to try and repair the line you should get something that looks like the below.    

A really useful technique we were shown was to highlight a section of background noise by going onto 'Effects', 'Noise Reduction/Restoration' and then 'Capture Noise Print' whilst making sure nothing is highlighted. Then go back through the above first two stages before selecting the 'Noise Reduction Process' in order to apply the separation of that certain area of sound to the whole track. Since we directly told the program what sounds we didn't want it made sure to get rid of them and therefore leave us with just the verbal interview.

The rest of the session was spent going over the sounds we collected last week and cutting out anything non essential. Thankfully my partner Ed remembered to save these sounds as I had forgotten to.   

Video game music presentations 2 (2/5/2013)

For this session we watched the remaining presentations from out group.

Below are a number of tracks I heard that I want to listen to again.

• The Legend of Zelda: Link's Awakening - Mysterious Woods.
• Mirror's Edge - Still Alive.
• Tomb Raider: The Last Revelation - Main Theme.
• Spyro: Year of the Dragon - Main Theme.
• Resident Evil: Outbreak - Main Theme. 
• Alan Wake - A Writer's Dream.
• Columns - Main Theme.
• Jet Set Radio - Oldies But Happies and Funky Dealer.  
• Viva Pinata - Night Theme.

They were also a number of tracks I had forgotten existed and therefore want to listen to again.

• The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess - Courage.
• Bioshock 2 - Eleanor's Lullaby. 
• Halo 3: ODST - Overture.

I also found out that a 'Ghost in the Shell' video game existed based on the important anime cult film which I will look up at some point in the future. 

We then watched a presentation called 'The Power of Sound'.

• Obviously sound can influence people greatly, especially when it uses people's imaginations to power it/bring it to life e.g. the 'War of the Worlds' radio drama which caused a huge panic in America. We even listened to the drama recording itself to hear how it sounded and how it used certain techniques to make it more grounded in reality e.g. asking a witness to get closer to the mike.
• Foley was first created by Jack Foley in 1927.
• Radio dramas need to add sounds in the background during narratives as, without them they would lack the reality of everyday sound e.g. cutlery being used when talking in a kitchen etc. 

We were then given sticky notelets and were told to close our eyes and wait for a minute, listening to the environment around us before writing down what we heard.
My list was:-

• Air conditioning. 
• Shuffling. 
• Creaking of chairs. 

We then had to put the sounds in order according to dominance and then stick them on the wall with everyone else's choices. My list above is in order of dominance.   

Once we all shared our opinions a lot of people agreed that chair creaking was the least dominant with the second being a mix between shuffling and breathing, finally the most dominant sound seemed to be the air conditioning and is important as it tells others that the scene is taking place inside a room that needs extractor fans/conditioning.

Whilst talking about our choices however, we realised that if we wanted to recreate the room in a video game then it would be wiser to focus on the sounds computers would make and students talking since the room is based in a technology college and the player would not necessarily want to hear constant fans at work.

New task for our research:
Our latest task, which will need to be completed before the end of term will consist of us creating a 200 word description for a cut scene that would be featured in the game we made a demo for. Whether it be a script, regular description or monologue is up to us. Once completed we then have to add a storyboard for it which explains the sound scape and foley used in the cut scene.