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How To: Record Bullet Whizz-Bys And Riccochets
Article by George Spanos
Article by George Spanos
© 2011 gamesounddesign.com
Loading up a slingshot with various metal pieces and
washers can definitely be a dangerous experiment in
sound design. However, if done right, you can
definitely obtain some great swish, whiz, and zing by
sound effects which can be used as part of bullet
impacts and as projectile whiz-bys. This can lead to
greater player immersion within your games, and also
provides a sense of reality and of utmost danger.
The sound of a red-hot bullet impacting the ground
near the player will surely make him/her aware of the
imminent danger that the game currently calls for.
First let me start off with the reason why we
wanted to capture these sounds. While there
definitely are some great sounding bullet whiz-bys
in the conventional sound effect libraries, it can
get tiring to always hear the same ones. Not only
that, but we thought that we could improve upon
what we found in our commercial sound libraries,
making for more interesting sounds in our game
development.
If you decide to attempt recording your own slingshot
whiz-bys I cannot stress enough the need for safety.
Make sure everyone on the team has safety goggles,
and that the area is clear of people who might
accidentally walk into the slingshot’s line of fire. Ok,
that being said, here are some tips for successfully
recording your own whiz-by sound effects.
Unfortunately for us, we could not find a room that was quiet or long enough for us to launch
projectiles in. So we had to make do with a hallway in the office… which was ok, but still had a
considerable amount of background noise from the air conditioning units and the nearby elevators.
Luckily, we were able to cut the resulting recordings pretty close so that background noise is
limited and didn't colour the resulting sound effects too much. If you are going to try this, I
definitely recommend finding a quiet and long room to do it in, if possible.
Secondly, it is important to experiment with microphone placement (as is always the case). We used
two AKG 414s, one set to cardioid, the other to omnidirectional. We made another error here in that
we should have opted for cardioid or even a hyper cardioid pattern on both mics. Ideally, we would
have got our hands on a quality shotgun microphone as well, but we did not have access to one on
that day. As always though, experimentation is key and what worked and didn’t work for us might be
the opposite for you… that’s the fun of this job!
Microphone placement relative to the source and impact is also very, very important. You’ll want to place the mic a
suitable distance away from the impact site so as to avoid picking up the impact before the tail of the whiz-by has
fully diminished. Again, this can be hard to achieve if you do not have a large enough space. Check out the video
and pics for more ideas of how to place your mic(s).
Now, on to the fun stuff. The slingshot I used was fairly cheap… $10 at a
local hardware store, and it performed impeccably well. These things can
launch objects at over 200 mph so you have to be very careful of people
who are around you. Not only that, but you must be careful around your
expensive mics as well. Unfortunately for the microphone, aiming pretty
much right in front of it will yield the best results, which can mean
potentially hitting the mic. We helped to avoid this by placing a little foam
on the side of the mic so if a washer happened to hit it, hopefully the foam
would absorb most of the impact.
It is very important to try out a number of different objects to get your
whiz-by sounds. We had some great luck with average sized washers that
were fairly light. We also had some luck with springs as well. Be creative,
that’s the key.
Take a listen to some of the examples below, after we edited and eq'ed
them. I've included some pics and a video as well, though the video only
captured audio from the slingshot's perspective, not the microphone's.
The Microphone Setup
Whiz-By One
Whiz-By Two
Whiz-By Three
Whiz-By Four
Whiz-By Five