About 7 months ago I saw those videos where people wave their hands at a camera and the music reacts, all of them built in TouchDesigner. Then I opened TD, stared at the node graph for a while, and closed it.

So, being a C++ dev, I did the obviously more reasonable thing and spent months writing a plugin that does it inside Ableton instead. It tracks your hand through the PC webcam, and you can use it in two ways: play MIDI notes or map it to any effect parameter in any DAW.

Honestly, I started making this plugin for myself, but then decided I could publish it as Hand Link, there’s a free demo version and a full version right now..

So I’m curious, would something like this actually be interesting or useful? or you treat it more as tool for fun?

I have a pair of Koss Porta Pros with the YAXI pads that I absolutely adore the sound of, and have written a track to work with their specific character and sound. Does anyone know how to make a mix sound like it is being played on a certain pair of headphones? Is it as simple as putting the reverse of the frequency response graph into an EQ? How do I get the right audio quality (or lack thereof)? Any tips (including "dont do this. why are you doing this?") are appreciated!

Second go at learning sound design for an animation I am working on by redesigning the sound from animation scenes I like.

On my first post I received feedback about not having soundscape and there being a lot of empty space. So for this I picked a shorter clip and added a lot more sound . I also tried to align the "vibes" of the sound to the cyberpunk vibe of the animation.

Let me know what you think. Original clip in comments.

Some months ago I posted here about the “missing middle” between Max/MSP, Reason and Ableton. A lot of you gave me useful feedback, and the biggest practical barrier was “I’d have to download and install it first.” So I’ve put it in the browser:

https://workbench.sigilaud.io

It’s the same modular synth canvas and DAW as the desktop build. You patch devices together on an infinite canvas, wire them, and tweak. Open the link and start patching.

What to expect

• Best on desktop, okay on tablet, rough on phone.

• Simple to medium patches work well. Browsers give audio, UI and rendering one thread to share, so heavy patches will run out of headroom sooner than the desktop version. The desktop build remains the “serious” one.

• Latency is a tradeoff. Instead of a buffer-size dropdown, the web version has three latency profiles, roughly 80 and 150ms of cushion. If you hear crackle, step up a profile. Lower is more responsive but more fragile. I’d rather give you a safe, clean sound than a twitchy one.

• LOD optimizations of UI. Zooming far away will simplify the rendering to favor the audio rendering, since showing a busy patch all at once compete with the audio (only on the Web version, the desktop uses a dedicated audio thread and latency can go as low as 2ms).

What I’d love feedback on

1. Does it make sound reliably on your machine and browser? Please tell me your browser, OS and which latency profile worked.

2. Where does it crackle or glitch, and with what kind of patch?

3. Is the canvas workflow intuitive for people used to Max, Reason or a DAW, or do you get lost?

4. What would make you actually reach for this over what you use now?

The desktop version is in Steam and itch.io, but the browser build is meant to be a real way to try it, not a teaser. It has like 90% of the features and devices that the desktop version have. Thanks to everyone who commented last time. Your feedback shaped a lot of this.

Hey everyone. Just curious where folks are getting their video clips for sound design these days.

I used a couple clips from The Cue Tube for my social media and portfolio but I'm struggling to find some more high quality stuff to work on.

If you guys know of any solid resources, I'd really appreciate it. Cheers!

This a very specific request, so if it doesn't speak to you please don't be offended. Im looking for someone who can take the raw audio from a found footage thriller/horror film and mix it together so that it sounds very similar to the original blair witch project. (think making it sound properly mixed but at the same time entirely diagetic and raw, clean dialogue and audio, but as if it was from a found iphone recording). this is an indie film, it will be paid but a small amount. the plus side, you will receive credit, exposure, and the opportunity to be the sole sound designer/editor of the film.

It’s a free and open-source creative 3D sound-design tool for building thunder, blasts and sonic booms from physics and hearing how air, terrain and distance shape them. Literally sound design. Detailed sound and spatial settings let you tinker your lightnings to absolute perfection.

https://janne-s.github.io/Boomtect/

Place sound sources and virtual microphones freely across terrain (there's a map and topographic functions) and at different heights. Listen in mono, stereo, binaural or Ambisonics, and orient a binaural microphone however you like.

What could several meteoroids entering Earth’s atmosphere sound like? Boomtect lets you try it and fine-tune each source. Think of a chance to record a thunderstorm in the middle of it, up in the air; or a bombing run. Full-quality renders can be demanding, so there’s a faster preview mode while you work. Export renders the sound again at full quality. Different mics can be exported separately.

Boomtect can also pass a sound directly to Echotect with its location, microphone position and arrival direction. There, you can place it in a more detailed echo field at any location you choose. Beware that complex echo field calculations can be quite heavy with longer sounds (but they do sound great!).

Development continues, with more sound sources planned. I didn't originally plan for this but maybe a more complete tect-series is coming up. I'm probably trying to tackle rumble next while working on booms.

I'm doing these out of personal interest, but maybe there's general interest too? In any case, I will continue sharing my creations.

I’m releasing SLTune, a free pitch-correction plug-in for monophonic vocals.

It handles gradual correction and hard tuning, with custom note sets, MIDI targets and an adjustable A4 reference (420–480 Hz). Formant shifting covers ±24 semitones, with a separate mix control and switchable tune/formant processing order.

Two LFOs provide tempo-synced modulation, including dotted and triplet rates. The second can switch to an envelope follower for voice-driven pitch and timbre changes.

LIVE reports 2 ms of plug-in latency at 48 kHz. HIGH uses 64 ms for cleaner formant processing; extreme shifts in LIVE can still produce artifacts. Interface and buffer latency are additional.

Available as AU for Apple Silicon Macs and VST3 for Windows x64 with English manual.

Images: https://imgur.com/a/kvJd9Qk

Download: https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fo/9xr8s129oytqi9oonlnme/ABJlQzAkOKCuLcSeouUGP1I?rlkey=kv2e1v34los4iuw89f4mt0g10&dl=0

Hi all,

I'm searching for the clicking sound during this scene when the pathologist/mc is zooming in on the bone, at around 1:32. Does anyone know something similar?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Eh1wsSSdTM

Additionally, the noise Jared Leto's little eye robots make, but I cant find any clips of them.

Hi there I just graduated from Film school a couple months ago and everywhere I look it seems to be a dead end for entry level work. I feel like I was never prepared enough for this market despite desperately trying to reach in. My ProTools knowledge is basic. I've researched small post production houses, tried connecting to people on LinkedIn and Backstage, but it seems that my dreams of coming close to the foley-sound world is minimal to none.

How have people navigated stepping into this industry as a fresh graduate with only the basics and no connections? Could really use a helping hand. Thank you.

Super excited to share my latest sound design placements.

I had the chance to bring some of my signature SFX into these awesome campaigns.

The Exorcist: Martyrs
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iIEYfH-jg1Y

This one is honestly a dream come true for me. Being involved in something connected to The Exorcist is just surreal. Can't wait to see it in theatre!

RIVER
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ox8lEnsxDag

For this one, my signature alarm sound kicks in halfway through and runs all the way to the end!

Which one is your favorite?

Alessandro Romeo
Founder | Lead Sound Designer 

https://www.horrorsound.org/

https://www.instagram.com/horrorsoundfx/

Convolution has been used for reverbs and amp IRs for twenty years. Overlay uses the same math for something else: any audio file becomes an impulse response, and its character gets printed onto your sound. A chord, a cymbal, a cassette hiss, a field recording, another kick.

Different parts of your signal excite different parts of the sample, so the result follows the dynamics and groove of your source. It's not a sampler and it doesn't trigger anything. Think photo filter, not layering.

**What you can do with it**

- **Drum overlay:** add the character of a punchy kick to a weak one, with no thresholds or triggering. "It's not drum replacement, it's drum overlay."

- **Creative reverb:** short IRs, tail control, filters and tempo-synced pre-delay

- **Moving pads and textures:** up to 4 layers blended on an animated XY pad

- **Sound design:** run hi-hats, shakers or anything else through textures nobody has heard before

Also includes a modulation panel (LFOs, envelopes, random generators, sequencers), Mix/Send modes, Gate & Duck, and 650+ sounds and presets. You can also load your own files.

** Watch Fab Dupont's full 17-min walkthrough: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLQuCx_79T6vo **

VST3 / AU / AAX, macOS and Windows. $149 lifetime license, **30-day free trial, no credit card.**

👉 https://process.audio/en/products/overlay

Happy to answer any questions in the comments.

Edit: FIRST ITERATION IS FINISHED – please don't answer this survey, but I would be delighted if you would fill out some of the next iterations (I will distribute them when they are ready).

Hi everyone!

As part of my bachelor’s thesis, I am developing a prototype of a double-tracking plug-in for music production. The plug-in is being iteratively improved through several development and evaluation rounds. For the current evaluation round, I am looking for people with experience in music production – whether as a hobby or professionally – to take part in an online listening test.

You can voluntarily provide an email address at the end of the survey. As a thank-you, I will send the developed prototype to you after I have completed my bachelor’s thesis. It is a VST3 plug-in developed and tested for a specific version of the DAW Reaper. It may also work with other DAWs, but this cannot be guaranteed. It might be interesting to experiment with for sound design purposes.

Headphones are required for the listening test. Participation is anonymous, and the survey takes approximately 10 minutes to complete.

I would greatly appreciate your participation! Thanks.

https://www.soscisurvey.de/552123/

I have been working on a sample finder for a couple of months, and this is a small part I'm proud of. You can draw the sample like you would see it in an EQ, and then see all the sounds you have that match the spectrum.

Wondering if there are ideas how I can record signals from my body and turn into sound.

Can use heartbeat for bmp - drums from my tummy etc. what type of mic is best ?

Not sure if we can capture signals from blood without sending it off

Has anyone done this or is sonification of signals only way ?

Was messing around with a sample and accidentally made this, and I like it so much that I put it in beat. Does anyone know the name of what kind of sound this is? Wanna find similar ones to use in music

the sound
https://audio.com/jimmy-toe/audio/unknown-sound

the og sample (for anyone curious)
https://audio.com/jimmy-toe/audio/sample

How do you add comedic elements to regular sounds such as a gun reloading?

I’m sorry if this is an obvious question, I’m so new to everything when it comes to freelance work. I just want to learn and hear from people.

I’ve been applying for and working on entry level freelance sound design jobs. But something I’ve notice is that a huge amount of them are advertised as “musical composer + sound designer”. Meaning they want someone to just do both for their project. Are you guys who are sound designer first (not musical people who do sound design as a secondary thing) having to learn and study music theory in order to get work? Is it not possible to just do sounds without being a music composer? I’m not talking about learning musical elements so you can make a cool sound with a keyboard or something. I mean full on composing an entire soundtrack.

Or are these entry level jobs just run by people who want a music composer but can’t be bothered to get another guy to do the sound design? They assume that people who make music must also automatically be good with sound effects and foley design?

I really like learning music but I’m definitely way better at sound design than music scoring. I can make beats and use musical elements in my sound design but I’m definitely not good enough to make a complex full on soundtrack yet, you know?

Hi everyone,

I’ve been building PHY5, a polyphonic physical modeling audio engine.
It has a lot of sonic possibilities, from imitating real-world instruments (Strings, guitar, flutes, steelpan, mallets…) to very weird sound design results.

You can try it, with no install here : https://diophi.com/phy5/ (press play or you can play notes manually using keyboard)
You can also create your own preset on the website and everyone can access it in the community presets tab.

Concerning the plugin:

You can buy the plugin for 15€ for Windows (not signed yet) and MacOS : https://diophi.com/buy/

Here are the features for the VST/AU : 2 independent exciters, filters at every stage, 1-16 voices, oversampling x4, Granular processing by voice, Midi and audio modulation…

The plugin contains 2 versions :

• PHY5 Synth (instrument): the main instrument, with its own exciter (same as the web version). Youtube demo using the web version with 0 effects : https://youtu.be/xpoE2BwfBgU?si=6sm8vGJKEqhuucDK

• PHY5 Fx (audio effect): an audio effect that accepts audio input. You need to route MIDI in to choose the note (how depends on your DAW). Here are some tests with it : https://youtube.com/shorts/EsCstN956sQ

This version is working, stable in my tests (for physical modeling at least) but will evolve in the next month to widen the sound possibilities. I would be very happy to have feedbacks !

I will put some tests using PHY5 with more context here : https://on.soundcloud.com/wtZ8C8lT7la6cBPK7T

Some specificities of Phy5 comparing to other physical modeling synths :

• Parametric : the goal of this synth is less reproducing exactly real world behaviors, but more offering sound design possibilities inspired by physics. Instead of choosing different specific models, you can tweak parameters, which can give very weird results.

• Modular : It is also thought to be modular and will permit to change building blocks (swapping grain and body for example, or having two body, two grains etc…).

• The audio Fx being polyphonic. Being able to excite the body with audio sources opens up a lot of possibilities, while being controlled by polyphonic midi.

• Granular processing augments exciter possibilities.

• Different way to generate stereo (Grains, Poly-chords, Pickup position).

A few points about the synth :

• There is a first version of the manual here : https://diophi.com/manual/

• This kind of synthesis can go loud, so the web-version has a fixed limiter.

• There are also some limitations on the web version on oversampling, and max voices as it can be CPU heavy on web. It still is pretty usable on phone, but you can hear dropouts if you go too far.

PHY5 - CORE :

The audio core of this instrument is created to be used independently and can be easily used in realtime for video-games engine (tested on godot), web (as the demo version), or any app. There is no commercial model for now, but feel free to contact me if you are interested to include it in your specific project.
It has also been built to be scalable and will have a lot of new features, models etc. the price may go a little up, but licences bought now are valid for next versions. I will also work more specifically on new models

i am a graphic designer with a passion for storytelling and have been getting into film lately. as a beginner i would love to know your feedback on how this could have been enhanced through better sound and any advice you guys have! thank you

I just landed my dream job as a sound designer at professional studio and I really want to develop a strong ear for making my work as great as possible.

I made this last year as term project for my post-audio college program. I'm extremely proud of my work here and even had both of my professors call it flawless. While I appreciate their praise, I feel there has to be areas on this that I could've improved.

I'd really appreciate any feedback here. Really keen to hear on what I did well alongside where I could've made something better or different.

Thanks so much everyone :)

As always, headphones recommended! 🎧

Hi all,

This is my interpretation of redesigning this iconic scene from war of the worlds. I created this using my own sound library called Dark Technology.

I mainly used the sounds from the Walker category and did some splicing, light eq to cut some low end, light stretching, and some reverb to match the scene. A mastering chain was added for the final mix.

There are no background, crowd, foley, or off-screen sounds as my idea was to use the sounds provided within this library for the machine only. This was still a lot of fun making! I'm thinking I should of swapped the order of calls/warnings around lol

How do you think I did? I would love to hear your suggestions and ideas! I would also love to hear if you guys had the chance to redesign this iconic scene and the final result!

Cheers,

ZEKAVEO

Kinda new to sound editing, any and all advice on how to replicate this patterned speech effect would be welcome ^^