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00:00:00.820 Speaker 1 Hello, this is Steven. So for today's developer commentary number three,
00:00:06.800 Speaker 1 I wanted to go over a couple different things. So we'll talk briefly about the story
00:00:11.560 Speaker 1 I just released, which was Soul Binder. And then I wanna talk about the upcoming
00:00:15.980 Speaker 1 production schedule and a little bit about what's coming up next. And then I wanna
00:00:20.800 Speaker 1 save the rest of the time to talk about really how I think about sound a-as,
00:00:27.580 Speaker 1 as it pertains to story. So we'll talk a little bit about that at the end, and how I
00:00:32.500 Speaker 1 think about sound design and how it contributes to the story. So first off, uh,
00:00:38.600 Speaker 1 Soul Binder just came out. Uh, as per usual, there's not a lot of sound design
00:00:42.880 Speaker 1 lately, which saddens me, but I really wanna keep a production schedule. I've got an
00:00:47.580 Speaker 1 arbitrary goal of how many stories to release in one hundred days, and I really
00:00:51.880 Speaker 1 wanna hit that goal. So you'll-- as I've mentioned in the past, you'll see after
00:00:57.340 Speaker 1 these twelve stories are released, uh, the next two coming up, by the way, are
00:01:02.620 Speaker 1 Mortal Steel, which I'm working on now, uh, that's a fun one, and the last one is
00:01:07.860 Speaker 1 Imagiserum. And after that, I'll have all twelve stories out with two episodes each.
00:01:14.400 Speaker 1 Um, and then I'm gonna slow down. I'm gonna slow down and do some proper sound
00:01:19.360 Speaker 1 design, really polish. Uh, and I think that's where I can kinda strut my stuff,
00:01:25.100 Speaker 1 and that'll be a great time for critical feedback on sound design especially. As I
00:01:30.420 Speaker 1 move away from focusing on narrative, uh, mostly writing, and I start focusing
00:01:36.320 Speaker 1 primarily on production, uh, directing, I'll have real voice actors. [laughs]
00:01:42.360 Speaker 1 So after these twelve stories are out, I'll probably just release a few developer
00:01:46.120 Speaker 1 commentaries to tie you over, maybe some teaser stuff. And then I'm going to do a
00:01:51.620 Speaker 1 full production of one of these twelve stories. Uh, right now the front runners are
00:01:57.780 Speaker 1 probably Dust, uh, Fractality, maybe Velaxis. I think those
00:02:03.820 Speaker 1 three are all pretty good. I know I'm gonna do Summoner's Rulebook at some point. I
00:02:08.080 Speaker 1 don't know when. Uh, so we'll do a thirteen-episode season for each of these
00:02:12.760 Speaker 1 stories. I'm planning on doing two full seasons, and then I have something much
00:02:17.180 Speaker 1 bigger planned. Uh, so that's enough about what's coming up. Uh, let's talk about
00:02:22.540 Speaker 1 Soul Binder. So Soul Binder came out. It is one of the sadder stories,
00:02:28.600 Speaker 1 uh, but, you know, sadness is a meaningful emotion as well. Uh, not everything can
00:02:34.460 Speaker 1 be fun and happy, although it certainly will have its lighthearted moments like
00:02:38.060 Speaker 1 everything. I can't help myself with that. Uh, it's got a very cool magic system. We
00:02:43.220 Speaker 1 got to see a little bit. Um, I won't give away too much, uh, but the way the magic
00:02:48.840 Speaker 1 system works is you can take, uh, attributes of anything in the real world around
00:02:54.800 Speaker 1 you and more or less copy and paste them onto something else. Uh, there's a lot more
00:02:59.800 Speaker 1 to it than that, and you can combine things in interesting and dangerous ways. Uh,
00:03:04.440 Speaker 1 but it's called binding, and I think it's cool. And it's sort of a backdrop to the,
00:03:09.420 Speaker 1 the main story of Estus Darkwater, who is on a journey north.
00:03:16.260 Speaker 1 Yeah. So that's Soul Binder. Uh, we'll probably hear more of that story at some
00:03:20.880 Speaker 1 later date. Uh, yeah. And moving on to some more
00:03:26.160 Speaker 1 general how I think about story and sound stuff. So I wanted to talk about
00:03:32.000 Speaker 1 sound in layers and how I go about creating sound for a story.
00:03:39.100 Speaker 1 So I think about my sound in layers. First, obviously, I do the voiceover for the
00:03:43.320 Speaker 1 narration and all of the characters first. So what I have at the beginning is
00:03:47.480 Speaker 1 basically a long audio track of just me speaking. In the future, we will have real
00:03:53.040 Speaker 1 voice actors, but I will continue to do the narration. So we're gonna have a
00:03:57.520 Speaker 1 voiceover track or voiceover tracks, and then where I start from there is creating
00:04:02.400 Speaker 1 atmospheres. So atmospheres are really your lowest layer of sound. Uh,
00:04:08.400 Speaker 1 if you're an artist, a painter, this will be like, um, uh... it's like the
00:04:14.300 Speaker 1 background layers, you know, painting the scenery behind it, you know, broad colors.
00:04:21.500 Speaker 1 It's really the backdrop. So atmospheres are the bottom layer. Uh, they serve a
00:04:26.200 Speaker 1 couple purposes like immersion. So imagine getting onto a train,
00:04:32.660 Speaker 1 and you hear the sound of trains in the background, and you hear clinking, and you
00:04:37.680 Speaker 1 hear people talking. Just from that sound alone, you can get a sense of
00:04:43.340 Speaker 1 place. So it's also important for clarity. So I can communicate an enormous amount
00:04:49.340 Speaker 1 of information simply by playing some sounds in the background. Uh, so that's what
00:04:54.120 Speaker 1 atmospheres are for. They're for immer-immersion, uh, and for the first few seconds,
00:04:57.800 Speaker 1 especially in a scene, they tell you where you are, uh, really where the characters
00:05:02.380 Speaker 1 are, which is where you are, at least in your mind. So that's what atmospheres are
00:05:07.320 Speaker 1 important for. For the first ten, fifteen seconds, uh, I play them pretty loud just
00:05:11.800 Speaker 1 so you can hear, "Okay, here's where they are. They're in a cave. They're on a
00:05:15.100 Speaker 1 train. They're climbing stairs," right? "They're in a crowd." That sort of thing.
00:05:19.900 Speaker 1 Uh, so they're important for clarity at the beginning, and then they just kind of
00:05:23.180 Speaker 1 fall away into immersion. Uh, they don't ever completely disappear. Uh, I play
00:05:28.380 Speaker 1 around with atmospheres for other reasons as well, uh, but they really provide a
00:05:32.600 Speaker 1 sense of place. You know, chatter in the background, people talking, shopping, doors
00:05:38.160 Speaker 1 opening and closing, that kind of thing. So they're important for that. Uh, and for
00:05:42.480 Speaker 1 the most part, you don't notice them. So the next layer of sound is, uh,
00:05:48.620 Speaker 1 foley. So this is the term for people picking things up. This is stuff that happens
00:05:54.920 Speaker 1 because people are doing things in the story. Uh, so you don't even notice it in
00:05:59.860 Speaker 1 things like film and TV, uh, because it's just kind of- Just part of the experience.
00:06:05.624 Speaker 1 But in sound, especially for an audio drama or audio drama audiobook,
00:06:12.904 Speaker 1 which is really what I'm making, somewhere between the two, it happens when people
00:06:17.824 Speaker 1 are walking, clapping, picking stuff up, setting stuff down. So it's
00:06:24.064 Speaker 1 kind of boring, but also necessary. And what's interesting about Foley in a
00:06:28.344 Speaker 1 sound-only medium is that I can choose what sounds I want to play. In film and TV,
00:06:33.964 Speaker 1 they have a little less freedom there because, you know, somebody picks up a coffee
00:06:38.284 Speaker 1 cup and sets it down, you expect it to make some sound. But because I am painting
00:06:42.724 Speaker 1 the scene however I like, I can choose what to emphasize. So I have a little more
00:06:46.704 Speaker 1 freedom in Foley, and there's a little bit less of it. But it is important for
00:06:51.044 Speaker 1 immersion, but it's also important for communicating. There are some things which
00:06:55.204 Speaker 1 are easier to say. You know, he grabbed him by the back of the shirt and pulled him
00:07:01.064 Speaker 1 close. And then put his arm around his neck. That can be easy to say in words.
00:07:07.344 Speaker 1 But sometimes it's easier to just say he slammed him against the wall by making the
00:07:11.844 Speaker 1 sound of somebody being slammed against the wall. And that communicates way more
00:07:15.784 Speaker 1 information. I don't have to tell you how hard he slammed him. I can tell you that
00:07:20.484 Speaker 1 by the grunt that they make when they hit the wall. Do they grunt loud in pain? Do
00:07:24.444 Speaker 1 you hear something break? Or is it just a gentle nudge, a push out of the way? I
00:07:30.404 Speaker 1 can communicate all of that with just a sound, right? I don't have to use words for
00:07:34.064 Speaker 1 it. So Foley is useful for that. And the next layer is
00:07:39.944 Speaker 1 sitting on top of Foley, going up in importance, I guess. They're all important.
00:07:45.204 Speaker 1 They serve different roles. Certainly becoming less prevalent as we go up in layers.
00:07:50.544 Speaker 1 There's more atmospheres. There's less Foley. And even less is spot sounds.
00:07:57.404 Speaker 1 So these are the sounds that you notice immediately. The sound of gunshots or
00:08:03.464 Speaker 1 magic happening. These are the cool spotlight-taking sound effects. So the
00:08:09.284 Speaker 1 spot effects, you spend a lot of time on them because they're cool and they step
00:08:14.424 Speaker 1 into the spotlight, which is a concept I'll talk about in a second. But spot effects
00:08:20.464 Speaker 1 are definitely the most noticeable ones. They're supposed to sort of
00:08:26.344 Speaker 1 break into your conscious attention. Whereas Foley and atmospheres kind of fade into
00:08:31.404 Speaker 1 the background most of the time. They certainly contribute and you notice when
00:08:35.584 Speaker 1 they're not there. And they convey information. But spot effects are really in your
00:08:40.364 Speaker 1 face. You know, this is the sound of like a creature growling, right? It's immediate
00:08:44.944 Speaker 1 and important. And there are very few of them. But they're kind of what you think
00:08:50.024 Speaker 1 about when you think about sound. Even though they're actually some of the most
00:08:54.404 Speaker 1 uncommon sound effects. At least by volume.
00:08:59.244 Speaker 1 So those are the different layers. And there's also voice modulation. I do this
00:09:03.184 Speaker 1 some. So some of it is not so much creating a new sound as modulating existing
00:09:09.204 Speaker 1 sounds. So if a character is in a cave or in a tiny room or they have a mask on,
00:09:14.564 Speaker 1 they're going to sound different. And that's important for immersion. I don't do it
00:09:19.204 Speaker 1 too often, but I do it some. So that's the last kind of sound design that I'll talk
00:09:23.924 Speaker 1 about. So now that we've got those pieces of sound, what do we do with them,
00:09:29.924 Speaker 1 right?
00:09:31.964 Speaker 1 I don't know if you've heard this before, but it's very easy to make sound design
00:09:35.184 Speaker 1 annoying. I'm sure you've heard it, you know, in some of my stories as I've been
00:09:38.584 Speaker 1 practicing. It's very easy to make the sound like an atmosphere take over
00:09:44.604 Speaker 1 everything. It's too loud. It's too intrusive. And you may not have noticed this
00:09:49.124 Speaker 1 consciously. You may have just turned off the story, whatever you're listening to,
00:09:54.004 Speaker 1 without knowing why. Maybe just a sense of anxiousness. And it's because the
00:09:58.444 Speaker 1 background sounds may be too loud or too intrusive.
00:10:02.964 Speaker 1 So that brings up the idea of telling two stories. I like to think of sound design
00:10:08.064 Speaker 1 and the written story as two different tellings of the
00:10:14.024 Speaker 1 same story. And they each contribute in their own way. So there's two stories.
00:10:18.144 Speaker 1 There's the first story, which is the one that you're being told, like right now.
00:10:24.084 Speaker 1 These are my words, or the actor's words in the case of dialogue. So if you were to
00:10:28.664 Speaker 1 print out the script, that would be the first story. The second story is the story
00:10:34.364 Speaker 1 being told by sound. And it's often in the background, which is the reason it's
00:10:38.744 Speaker 1 called the second story. For the most part, the second story supports the first
00:10:43.164 Speaker 1 story in interesting and meaningful ways. Like I've described, sometimes it is
00:10:48.624 Speaker 1 easier to tell the story with the second story. Instead of saying, wasting all of
00:10:54.284 Speaker 1 our time with, he picked up the coffee cup and set it back down. I can just pick up
00:10:58.704 Speaker 1 the coffee cup and set it back down with sound. And that's the second story telling
00:11:02.624 Speaker 1 the story. So sometimes they tell the same story. In an action scene, you know, I
00:11:08.624 Speaker 1 can say he ran down the hallway, and then you hear some footsteps going down a
00:11:12.784 Speaker 1 hallway, right? So they're both telling the same story. But there are times when
00:11:17.264 Speaker 1 only the first story is happening. These are like the character's inner thoughts. Or
00:11:22.184 Speaker 1 I'm giving some background on the world or their past, right? So in that case, the
00:11:27.084 Speaker 1 first story is telling one story, but the second story is either muted, there is no
00:11:31.104 Speaker 1 background sound, or it's playing some sort of atmospheric music, right? It's
00:11:36.364 Speaker 1 supporting the first story a little bit, but for the most part, it's telling a
00:11:39.264 Speaker 1 different story. And then there are times when the first story is not at all
00:11:44.284 Speaker 1 important, and the second story is far more important. Like when a creature is
00:11:48.024 Speaker 1 growling at you. It's just easier to tell the sound, the story with
00:11:53.864 Speaker 1 sound, than it is to actually come in and write it with words. It's kind of lame. So
00:11:58.824 Speaker 1 there's a balance there. Most of the time, the second story supports the first
00:12:02.944 Speaker 1 story. But there are times when the second story becomes more important. That is, it
00:12:08.464 Speaker 1 steps into the spotlight. And knowing when to say something with words and when to
00:12:14.104 Speaker 1 say it with sound is a constant balancing act, which I am still learning.
00:12:21.544 Speaker 1 And there are times when redundancy is annoying. He walked down the hall. You hear
00:12:26.224 Speaker 1 walking sound effects. If you do that every time, it will be so annoying. Trust me.
00:12:31.664 Speaker 1 I've done it.
00:12:33.864 Speaker 1 It gets obnoxious, right? There becomes a time when the second story, the sound
00:12:37.764 Speaker 1 story, becomes intrusive. It's ruining your imagination because it's too much sound.
00:12:43.904 Speaker 1 So you want just enough sound to indicate what is happening, but not so much that
00:12:48.964 Speaker 1 it's overwhelming. So that is a constant challenge, the balance between the first
00:12:53.984 Speaker 1 and second story, knowing which one has the spotlight. Which one am I focused on?
00:12:59.164 Speaker 1 For the most part, it's the first story. But there are times when you need to move
00:13:02.344 Speaker 1 the sound into the spotlight. And that's something I'm still learning. But it's very
00:13:08.304 Speaker 1 interesting. And it provides really a second channel of information that you can't
00:13:13.824 Speaker 1 get from just audiobooks.
00:13:16.944 Speaker 1 So there you have it. I think that's all I wanted to say about sound. So there's
00:13:20.844 Speaker 1 sound in layers in review. I approach it constructing from the ground up. I start
00:13:25.544 Speaker 1 with the voiceover. I add the atmospheres. And then I add the Foley. Then I add the
00:13:30.604 Speaker 1 spot effects. And then somewhere in there, I do voice modulation for reverb and
00:13:35.424 Speaker 1 other stuff like that. And then the other concept we talked about is the two
00:13:40.164 Speaker 1 stories. There's the first story, which is the written story, what I sit down and
00:13:44.204 Speaker 1 write. And then there's the second story, the story I'm telling with sound. There
00:13:50.124 Speaker 1 you have it. Well, I hope you enjoyed that. I hope you enjoyed getting a little bit
00:13:53.444 Speaker 1 of my thought process. I'd love to hear your feedback as I improve. Thanks so much
00:13:58.024 Speaker 1 for listening. And you'll hear more from me next week with Mortal Steel.