Audio For Games Evaluation

This module was aimed at creating, editing and implementing audio for games. We were tasked with creating audio for our UDK levels and editing it to fit the theme of the levels. Then we had to place the audio around our levels, and using the sound cue editors and effects within UDK, create atmosphere to our game level.

With this project, one of the highlights for me was learning how to edit audio. This was completely new concept for me, as I have never touched on anything like this before. I found using Adobe Audition to be easy and effective, and I really enjoyed the teaching method used in our lessons. Once I had learnt how to edit audio, I found it particularly easy to get things sounding how they wanted. I found it particularly easy to mould abstract sounds into sounds that I wanted. Once in UDK I felt equally as competent. I found it easy to place audio, and modify settings such as the attenuation. I didn't really encounter any issues whilst building a sound cue.

Like with every project, there were issues. One such issue was with placing a sound cue on a trigger or object via kismet. Whilst linking the sound to the trigger, the sound would play once you walked through the trigger. However, none of the attenuation settings that were applied to the sound cue would have any effect.  This is something that I feel needed to be expanded on during our lectures.

Another issue I had during the project was allocating time to edit the audio. I recorded enough sounds to go in my level; however I didn’t edit or even use some. I think this was due to the fact that my attention was focused on other projects, and as a result, I didn’t have as much edited audio as I would have like.

The last issue with my project was when I came to placing the sounds within UDK. Placing and positioning the sounds was fine, however when it came to figuring out the volumes of everything. For example, I have a radio model in the scene that has a trigger to play music. Where the model is positioned is near some other triggers that are linked to sounds. If you end up hitting one of these triggers whilst playing the radio, the sounds meld into a mess, because of the volume levels. I couldn’t figure out volumes for each item.

Overall, I feel that the audio did the job. Whilst playing through my level I did get the effect of being in a mine shaft. I feel though that some of the effects could have been tweaked slightly to sound better. For instance, the falling rock sound sounded a bit more like fireworks than falling rocks. I think the project could have benefited from being a couple of weeks longer, allowing me to tweak and maybe even edit the audio some more. If I were to do this project again, the main thing that I would change is the amount of focus I gave this module.  

Creating The Rock Fall Sound

As my level was consisting of a mine shaft, I thought it would be appropriate to have some falling rocks in the background to help add atmosphere to the scene. To do this, I started off with a base audio recording of some stones I picked up off the ground and dropped. This can be viewed in my recordings folder under the name of Dropping Stones.

I took this sound into Adobe Audition, and the proceeded with my first step. I started cutting up the audio and pasting it, until I had a sound that sounded a little more like rocks falling from a height. 

After this, I simply added a Full Reverb effect to the track and played around with the absorbency levels. This created almost a boomy, echo type sound which was ideal.  

Creating the Screeching Metal Sound

To create the metal screeching sound I first started off with the door creaking sound that can be found in my Audio recording folders. I used this as a base sound because it sounded as though it was really screeching. But to suit my needs, I needed to modify it to sound more metallic. So to start with, I started cutting and pasting the Audio, to get the desired effect.

After I'd got the sound how I  wanted it in terms of sequence, I then decided to make a metallic sound effect. For this, I used a Full Reverb effect, to make sure it echoed. Then to make it sound like a shrill metallic sound I used the Guitar Suite effect.In this, I played around with the distortion and the compressor, as well as the amplifier until I achieved a sound I was happy with.  

UDK Attenuation Radius

Attenuation radius is an important factor when dealing with sound in UDK. This allows us to set up the distance in which the sound is heard at. This is done very simply. 

To modify your attenuation radius, drag the sound file into your scene. When you do this, you'll notice, it is encompassed by circles. This is the attenuation radius. Whatever is outside of this attenuation radius is unaffected by sound, thus is will not be heard in these areas.

Double click on the speaker icon in your UDK level, and you should be presented with a small window. 

The top attribute should be labeled, Ambient Sound Simple. If you then click the down button, you'll be presented with the Ambient Properties tab. Once you're here, you'll need to click the down arrow on this, and all of the properties should be revealed to you. Simply open the attenuation tab and make sure attenuation is clicked on. Then, you can modify the values of the radius min and max to suit your needs. When you do this, you'll notice that the circles around the speaker change size.  

Creating a Sound Cue for UDK

Creating a Sound Cue for UDK is a particularly handy skill to have in your arsenal when building a living game-world. A sound cue allows you a bundle multiple sounds and effects into one file. This makes it easier to add sound to your level without having a billion sound files everywhere.

To create a sound cue, you need to start in the UDK asset window. Make sure nothing is selected, and right click in the asset window. You'll see a list of options appear. From this list you want to select new sound cue. When you select this, you'll see that a window pops up. This is the sound cue editor. This is where you'll be adding all the sounds and effects to the sound cue. At it's current state, it's pretty useless, because you need to add sound into it. To do this simply go to the asset browser and click on a sound, so that is highlighted. Then, switch back to the sound cue editor and right click, and you'll see the option too add the sound. Once this is done, the sound cue editor should look like this. It's important to note that you can add multiple sounds in by repeating this process.

Now, the sound cue will not play any sound in this state. This is because the nodes are not connected. to connect the nodes, simply click on the black box by the speaker and drag a line to the other black box. When you release they'll be connected. To test this, once connected simply click the furthest button to the right on the top bar of the screen.

Now, that the basics of a sound cue has been covered, it's time to add in a little more complexity. To add other effects, you simply right click anywhere in the sound cue, and it'll bring up a list of effects. If you click one of these effects, you should notice a new node appears denoting to that effect. Again, you will need to join this up for it to have any effect. 

 If you want to edit an effect, you simply click that effect, and in the bottom window, an attributes box opens. The attribues tend to vary depending on the effect selected. Once you have finished editing, you simply just exit the sound cue editor, and you'll notice that in the asset window, you'll have a new sound cue.

Audio Asset List

• Pickaxe
• Small rock fall to help add atmosphere
• Creaking wood
• Chain sounds for Elevator
• Metal Hinge sound for gate
• Gravel Footsteps
• Heavy Metal music for Radio Easter Egg
• Metal scraping sounds for cart going along rails.
• Door creaking sound.

Importing Audio Into UDK

Importing audio into UDK is a fairly simplistic process. If you're experienced with importing models into UDK, this is a fairly simplistic process.

Firstly you'll need the correct format for the audio files. This is because UDK will not import anything other than WAV files. This, however isn't just enough. UDK will only accept a certain bit rate. So whatever audio editing software you are using you need to export the WAV file as a 16bit.

Once this is done, you'll need to then open the file in UDK. To do this, open UDK and click on the asset browser represented by the small 'U' along the top bar on the screen. Once this is open, at the bottom of the window, you should see an import button. Click this. 

After clicking import a load screen should appear. Simply locate the audio file you have exported from your editing software and load. When you load into UDK, you'll be presented with a small white box. You need to click the button that says 'Okay to all' and click Okay on any pop-ups. Once this is done, your sound has been successfully imported into UDK as a Sound Wave file. 

Key Words for Sound in UDK

Sound Waves

Sound waves are effectively just straight sound files in UDK. These are useful just for playing straight sounds in UDK. They can just be dragged into the level anywhere and placed, and will play the sound continuously whilst playing the level. You can also modify the attributes whilst in the game editor, to change the attenuation, so the sound isn't  playing at the same volume thought the level. Sound waves have to be imported to UDK as a .Wav files- 16bit.



Sound Cue

A sound cue is basically a load of sound waves built up into one file. This is a much more effective way of adding sound to a level, because UDK only has to load one file rather than 20 odd. Creating a sound cue also allows you to add in other effects such as attenuation, gain, Doppler etc. Sound cues are created by right clicking in the asset window with nothing selected. Then you pick sound cue from the list that appears and you are presented with a window. Then, simply drag any of the sound wave files into the window. To add effects to a sound cue, simply right click in the sound editor window and pick the desired effects.  

Attenuation 

Attenuation is the overall radius of the sound. This dictates where the sound will be the loudest and where the sound will no longer be heard.

Concatenator  

This places two sounds together but will only play one sound after the other.

Delay

This delays the audio sound by whatever number that you dictate.

Distance Crossfade 

This fades two sounds together dependant on distance. The further away from one sound you are, the more you'll here the other sound.

Looping 

Looping sound is fairly self explanatory. This allows a sound to play continuously in a loop as long as the level is running.  

Sound Node Mature

Sound Node Mature is an effect that filters out inappropriate language within a game.

Mixer 

This mixes at least two sounds together .

Modulator 

This effect modifies sound and pitch.

Continuous Modulator 

This is very similar to a the standard modulator, however it allows you to only edit the sound in real time.

Oscillator

This is another one similar to modulator, but allows to to edit the sound in real time without the use of a code.

Random 

This randomizes effects and allows the sound to play irregularly.

Basic Interface of Adobe Audtion

What is Adobe Audition?

Adobe Audition is a sound editing software, which can be used to edit and produce Audio for Games, film and music. It can also be used to create audio for a variety of other media outputs such as web.

Interface

The above screenshot is a quick look at the main interface in Adobe Audition. Taking a closer look we can see the top left hand side of the window is a file section.

Files Section

The files section is one of the most important part of Audition. This is because it contains all files that are currently open, allowing you to close, start-up new projects, or convert a project to be used within the multi-track editor. 

The next most important part of Audition is the main Editor interface which can be seen below. 

Empty Editor

The main interface is where the audio wave is shown once loaded up. This is the main place where you edit Audio. You can cut, copy, paste and delete here. I feel that when trying to create a decent audio file, it's good start here and setting up how the audio will generally sound. 

Editor with sound

It is also important to note, that whilst editing a sound, you can use fade controls. These are represented by two boxes in the top of the editor window, at each end of the track. To make a track fade, simply click the box and and drag. As you do this a visible curve will appear and you'll notice that the audio gets smaller.

Top of Editor

At the top of the Editor window is the timeline. This allows you to scroll through an audio file and find a specific place within the audio that you want. 

At the bottom of the editor is the levels bar. When an Audio file is played, you can see how many decibels it is using this bar. 

Now, when editing in Audition, you want to add different effects to the audio file. This can be done via the effects rack. 

The effects rack is located just underneath the files section in Audition. This is a really handy feature enabling you to quickly select from pre-set effects and apply them to your audio. To do this, you simply use the drop-down pre-sets menu and select which pre-set you wish to apply. However, some may want to manually add effects too. This can be done easily using the effects rack too. If you select the arrow on the end of the number 1 box, you'll be presented with a list of the various effects that you can apply to the track. To apply them, you simply click the desired effect, and it'll appear in the box. 

To add multiple effects to a audio clip, you simply just select the arrows at the end of the numbered boxes. (Each number correlates to a separate effect. This can be seen below)

If you wish to modify an effect and tweak it to how you want, you can double click the effect on the effects rack, and a window will pop up listing all the editable attributes. This way you can tweak the effect to exactly how you want it to sound.  

Now whilst working in Audition, like any software you can make mistakes. To undo these mistakes, you can use the CTR-Z button to undo. Alternatively, and if you're looking for a specific point to undo, you can use the undo History window.

History Window

The history window is located in the bottom left hand corner of the scene. This window lists, in order, everything that has transpired whilst you have been working on the clip. To undo an action, you simply click on an earlier segment and everything will undo up until that point. Now if that's not enough, when you've located the offending segment and highlighted it, you can delete using the delete key. You will then be prompted by a message that you cannot undo this option. Deleting a segment will always delete any other segments/effects you have applied after that particular segment.   

Lastly, but by no means the least important part, is the multi-track editor. The multi-track editor is a handy and powerful tool that enable you to quickly create a more complex sound than you initially started with. To access the multi-track editor, right click on the audio file in the files section of Audition. Then select 'Insert to Multi-track editor'

The screenshot above shows a simple audio track imported into the multi-track editor. Even with one simple audio track, the multi-track editor is a handy tool. When your project changes to a multi-track session, you will see that the tools at the top that were greyed out beforehand are now no longer greyed out. (The screenshot below shows the tools)

The tools available to us now are; Move Tool, Razor Tool, Slip Tool and Time Selection Tool. 

The move tool is a fairly self explanatory tool. When this tool is selected, it allows you to move around the audio and position it where you want. This tool is handy when you have cut audio up, and you need to move the segments around and position them.  

The next tool is the Razor Tool. This is one of the most useful tools within the multi-track editor. It allows you to slice up any section of the audio file. For example;

Cut-up Audio Track

When using the Razor Tool, simply select the tool and hover your mouse over the audio track. You'll notice when this happens, a line appears over the audio track. This line indicates where you will cut the audio. To cut the audio, you simply click on the desired part and it'll cut. It is good to note, that once you have finished cutting up the audio, click back onto the move tool, otherwise you'll end up cutting up more audio. If you wish to cut multiple audio files up, you will  need to do this one by one. 

Sound Induction/Equipment

What is a zoom recorder?

A zoom recorder is a stereo condenser microphone. These recorders are used within the production of sound for video games, film and music alike. They generally come in handheld format, making them portable. This allows the user to be able to record a range of sounds without being constrained to a studio. 

Condenser Mic

Condenser microphones use metal plates to generate a signal powered by an external power source, such as a battery. A condenser microphone will provide a louder, and usually clearer recording than a dynamic microphone. They are generally better at recording louder sounds than dynamic microphones. Condenser microphones are usually more expensive than dynamic microphones.


Dynamic Mic

Dynamic microphones are all round versatile and generally cheap microphones. The have no internal amplifier, so they to do not require batteries or external power. Dynamic microphones are typically used by pop artists. They tend to be fairly sturdy and compact, allowing them to be more resilient.

Rifle Mic

A rifle microphone is a long, thin microphone. Is it named such, due to the fact that is shaped similar to the barrel of a rifle. Rifle microphones are 'directional focus' microphones, designed for picking up sound in on particular direction. A rifle microphone will not pick up any sound coming from behind it.

Shotgun Mic

A shotgun microphone is a long, but wide microphone. It's named such because it is reminiscent of a shotgun barrel. Like a rifle microphone, a shotgun microphone will only pick up sounds within one particular direction. However, where it differs from a rifle mice, is that it's pick-up range is higher. So it has a wider angle that it can pick up sounds in.