almost 5 years ago - PlayWarframe - Direct link

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0s hello everyone and welcome back to the
3s third episode of deconstructing this
5s month community manager Megan Everett
7s sits down with audio director George
9s Spanos and sound designer Erik Preston
12s to talk about the process of sound
13s production and design and warframe so
16s wherever you are
17s grab some coffee sit back and enjoy
35s hello and welcome back to the
38s deconstructing podcast
39s I'm your host Megan Everett and I am
41s joined by George Spanos audio director
45s on warframe and I've been at de for 1300
49s years 13 years Wow
52s my name is Eric Preston senior sound
55s designer for warframe and I've been here
57s for over four years
60s a Batman for years warframe Eric Preston
65s sound designer senior 13 years four
74s years for plus 13 plus what were you
77s doing before working at D well I I
81s worked in the advertising industry for
85s about seven years doing post-production
87s work so I would record voiceovers I
91s would mix television radio commercials I
93s would do some sound design I did some
96s short film I did some albums I did a
98s bunch of a little bit of a little bit of
101s everything before joining to eat similar
103s to George I was in TV and film for ten
106s years sound design recording voiceovers
110s mixing and doing some music here and
112s there is there anything that sticks out
114s during that time is a good memory yeah
118s one of the things that stuck out for me
120s was the first film that I got to work on
121s which was saw seven so you saw seven oh
124s seven yeah that was fun
126s so the first time I got to work on like
127s a biggish kind of yeah movie but yeah
131s all along the way there was great
132s memories of meeting people and working
134s with different different types
135s voiceovers and directors and producers
138s and I'm gonna presume that it was like
141s gory sounds you were working on yeah
144s gory sounds and screams yeah you get
147s used to it effort desensitize turns into
151s tomatoes and Oh carrots cracking and
154s stuff was that it was the vegetable
156s route you took to the always always the
159s Viceroy's you don't do a pudding or
161s choking yourself oh you're on
164s and pudding I do the choking thing my
172s actually my first the first show that I
174s ever worked on I was an assistant
177s sound effects editor for must be Santa
181s oh well that's my claim to fame it was a
184s CBC special that's amazing it was it was
189s very joyous yeah it was like a kids
193s thing with you know I don't even
194s remember the premise but she had to find
198s Santa or something there's a long time
200s ago
201s yeah this is last century so your first
208s day or week here at de what sound you
211s remember working on that was your first
213s for warframe if you can remember that
216s far back George well yeah I know well
219s when I first started here at de we
221s weren't working on work right we were
222s working on Dark Sector and one of the
224s sounds on Dark Sector that I remember
227s having the hardest that took me forever
230s to make was the sound if any if any of
233s you have played that game Haydn was the
237s main character in it and he through a
239s thing called the glaive which is what we
240s have in warframe now but this was like
243s this is OG clave so and I remember I
246s tried a whole bunch of different sounds
247s for it like what what what would make
250s the sound of blade spinning in the air
252s and I tried just I tried like knives and
257s kind of just editing them and cutting
260s them up close to each other so that they
261s sounded like they were swishing through
262s the air that didn't really work I tried
264s a whole bunch of other things and then
266s the thing that ended up working for it
268s funny enough I had these little bowls
270s these little metallic kind of they're
274s called singing bowls or like Tibetan
276s bowls that were you like rub the ends
278s yeah you can rub the inside of it and it
280s makes like a note and it's it's you know
283s it's used for meditation and that kind
284s of thing but what I did with it was I
286s spun it on a wood surface and so it made
290s this
291s with a bit of a metallic sound to it and
294s that's the story of how I came came to
296s across the glaive sound and that's one
298s of my earliest memories from de was
300s having the challenge of doing that and
302s then yeah and then and then coming up
305s with that so yeah mining for a jewel
307s yeah well that's that sound design right
310s like it's like you got a you got to chip
312s away at things to kind of uncover the
315s true essence of it and sometimes where
317s you start doesn't you don't end in that
319s same place so yeah so that was one of my
322s earliest memories absolutely one of the
325s first sounds that I did I remember when
328s I got here was probably about a month in
329s and I apologize for anyone who liked the
332s original sounds but it was the power-ups
336s like the pickups pickups yeah yeah
339s redoing and that was an interesting
342s challenge that was the first sound that
343s I ever made for video games so if you
347s listen closely there's still some of the
348s original stuff peppered in there but
351s yeah that was that was the first thing
353s that I cut my teeth on here do you
354s remember your first sound that was
356s outside of computer sounds like having
358s to do a bowl on a wooden surface yeah
361s totally the first sounds outside of that
363s would have been all of the ambient
364s sounds for the grenier ocean title sang
367s so we actually went to a pool and we
370s ended up recording horns underwater and
372s splashing right and that was like a day
376s long of just recording these organic
378s sounds and a pool was freezing cold and
380s it was so cold one of one of it was four
383s or five of us at the time I think and
385s one of the other sound designers on the
386s team we had this like little mixer like
389s portable hand blender thing you know
391s that you'd used to blend in a cup or
393s whatever and that you'd plug in and so
395s he's like oh look let me put that in the
397s pool and just see like what the sound of
399s the blade is in the pool so like okay
400s cool so he does that and then I noticed
402s that he's plugged into an extension cord
404s and the extension cord is slowly moving
406s to the edge of the pool and I'm like and
408s I it was one of those moments where I
410s ran and I loved it was slow motion and I
412s pulled it out of the way and and it was
414s like ooh yeah too close for comfort on
417s that but the things you do for your
419s craft things we do for warframe yeah for
422s all the players out there
424s we put our lives on the line regularly
430s so I do have some questions from our
432s actual players ask them on Twitter so
435s they'd have a few so I'm just gonna go
436s through them someone on Twitter wants to
438s know how are the spoken languages of
440s each faction created yeah well that's
443s that's an interesting story too actually
445s I forget when this happened probably
448s when he later part of 2013 the Grenier
452s used to just speak in English and they
455s kind of had some funny phrases actually
456s and I know some of you out there want it
458s want to bring those back maybe we'll do
460s that one day in a special pack but we
462s wanted we wanted to make them sound
464s different and guttural and meaner and so
469s one of the ways of doing that is is to
472s me anyway as an English speaker it's to
474s have hard sounding letters and hard
477s sounding like phrases for the enemies to
483s say and so what we did was Steve
486s actually developed a script a Lua script
489s where we can type in the sentence that
492s we want the enemy to say for a grenier
495s let's say you know attack or whatever
498s and then we can choose certain consonant
501s pairs and vowel pairs to make it sound
503s more guttural and so we set that all up
505s and then now you just type your phrase
508s in you hit enter and it spits it out in
510s grenier and we have a similar one for
512s the corpus and so it they all follow
514s that same kind of language convention
516s and it that's why if you hear some some
520s phrases like attack for example in
522s grenier zat's half if whenever you hear
525s that it's going to be consistent any
526s time I go near says attack it's gonna
528s sound like a Taff and so actually an
531s interesting story about that is that's
533s how Clem was born yet Clem because get
537s them translated into Grenier is get Clem
540s and so someone one day heard it and was
544s like yeah who drew up a comic of this
548s Clem character yeah then he was born yes
551s so that was kind of cool actually when
552s that happened it's like he's like it
555s came from from
556s in your language so yeah you can
558s translate it all technically yeah and
562s you can do it in reverse and I think
563s some people have done that actually so I
565s saw spreadsheet once where someone had
567s figured it out
569s really yeah someone posted it on Twitter
570s or something and then infested is
573s obviously just gargles and yes it is all
576s the saw seven sounds see this which is
584s an English language that's just voice
586s actors yeah most of the time now what we
589s do is is we is is we we get people to
593s speak in English at this point because
594s that's the other thing too I think for
596s us you know and obviously as English
599s speakers I think you it resonates more
602s with you to hear it in that language and
604s you know what they're saying and you
605s know warframe has come a long way in
607s story and character development and so
610s back in the day it was more about
612s creating a vibe for the enemy NPCs to
615s have but when you want to tell a story
617s it helps to to for it to make sense in
621s that respect and that's why for again
623s there's a lot of you will remember or
625s used to speaking Grenier but now he
628s speaks in English just because you got
631s to be annoying to hear him in
633s transmissions speak yeah yeah even
637s though you have the translation I think
638s if it's something that's in the
639s forefront you kind of need to it needs
641s to make sense in that well the source
643s monologue is one of the most popular
645s memes right we've seen that I know which
649s one his is a corrupted war when he talks
651s about like come to this place you think
654s you are pure whatever is like that giant
656s section of his monologue is on like Know
659s Your Meme calm is it really you I didn't
661s know that oh there was actually I don't
663s know might have been you might have been
665s someone else but in today or this week's
667s update there'll be a fix for him not
670s saying his monologue and people were
672s very upset about it oh he got fixed
675s he added thank goodness thank goodness
677s keep the meme alive alright so what
681s inspires the theme of the toons lore of
683s the enemy or the feel of a planet well
685s the inspirations behind
687s yeah so we look at a lot of the concept
689s art we look a lot of a lot of sort of
692s what the level designers are doing and
694s we kind of get a vibe for a feel for
697s what it's you know what the tilesets
700s gonna be about you know like or valise
702s for example coal this desolate it's
704s windy a lot of blue a lot of gray for us
708s that meant electronic and more kind of
710s hard and angular sounds whereas a lot of
713s the Grenier music in the game is more
715s orchestral it's it's it's a little more
718s kind of not futuristic technology but
721s you know current day or older technology
725s kind of a thing and so that's also what
727s we do with the weapons sound weapons
730s sounds for any of the factions because
732s we try to keep keep it you know corpus
735s stuff is very high tech and grenier
737s stuff is more more organic and oily and
740s mechanical sounding and so that kind of
743s feeling and methodology goes behind
746s music and sounds and everything
748s depending on faction and depending on
750s planet so yeah and that's that's that's
754s the basic kind of idea behind it we
759s think through it quite a bit and we
761s iterate a lot autumn as well usually the
762s first pass is not what what people end
765s up hearing in the in the final the final
767s game so and it usually evolves as well
770s with with the arts and the other
771s departments as as things happen and
773s things change we we sort of change with
776s it so yeah it's it's like a long process
779s there's a lot usually lots of discussion
781s yeah yeah and that's that's a you know
784s it's it's always interesting whenever
786s there's like a dev stream and it's like
788s a work in progress it's always like yeah
793s what's the is that thing in or whatever
795s and um cuz you guys are working on so
798s much and then it's like oh we're gonna
799s show this part that's obviously not
801s released yet and it's like - have I had
802s time to touch that yet or don't work on
804s that yeah and a lot of the times it's
806s kind of like it's it's not at the place
809s that you want it to be right and so
811s things change but I think people
812s understand that they understand that
814s work in progress is worth 6 years and
816s they better understand that work in
818s progress
819s exactly
820s the charm of it I think yeah I agree
822s absolutely do you guys have a favorite
823s theme of anything like or Valis favorite
829s theme
829s I love the Grenier yeah I really like
832s the grineer I think they're just a solid
833s package altogether the music and the
835s voices and it's just such a it's just
838s such a solid identity that they have and
842s such a unique look as well so yeah but
845s I'm a big fan of all that is grittier
848s yeah I was a big fan I am a big fan of
852s we all live together actually the song
855s the Keith Road you know I think for us
857s that was such a big departure and we
860s were a bit kind of I'm nervous isn't the
862s right word but sort of like you know
865s when you're trying something new you're
866s like is this gonna work
867s apprehensive apprehensive is this gonna
869s be the right thing and you know when he
871s wrote it and we listened to it we were
873s like man this is gonna be really cool
875s and and I think for us to anything that
878s kind of has lyrics behind it really
880s carries weight and I think that really
882s there was a first for us you know so
886s yeah that for me is a proud moment I
889s think it's something I I never get tired
892s of hearing so I remember when we heard
895s his first demo it was just him on the
897s piano right yeah we have yeah yeah we
905s only the first part of the song - he's
908s like kid was crying in the back it was
912s it's literally the name of it the file
913s he sent me when you record like I guess
916s on the iPhone it's like it was called
918s home m4a you know I was like just like
920s whatever just and and he must have said
923s - he said his iPhone down and hit record
925s and he's like playing on the piano and
927s he's like here here's a melody what do
928s you guys think and really oh man that's
930s awesome let's develop that let's make
932s that into something and then the lyrics
936s kind of just came together for it and
938s kind of worked out really well and I
940s think that's that's one of Keith's
942s strengths is is matching music to lyrics
946s which isn't easy to do
948s yeah and I remember when he sent the it
951s was almost I think it might have been
953s the final version it was the first time
955s that I'd heard the lift when the
956s arpeggios come in and and it takes off
958s from the the beginning of the song
960s that's my favorite part
961s and I read yeah I remember hearing that
963s and like getting insane shivers yeah and
966s I was like okay there's something's
967s going on here this is special a sound
971s team that hear sounds all the time work
973s on them give you guys goosebumps then
974s you know it's gold yeah totally yeah I
978s remember before I'd even heard it I got
981s a message saying you're gonna love it
983s it's literally like an opening to frozen
985s yeah Disney movie and I was like I'm
987s sold
987s I don't even care what it is yeah we're
989s turning into Disney and I'm okay with it
991s yeah actually frozen was one of the kind
993s of like song that song the worker song
997s was we looked at that as one of the kind
1000s of inspirations for it and wanting it to
1003s feel like like that kind of choral kind
1006s of piece so so you kind of George you
1010s talked about the glaive being one of the
1012s hard sounds that you had to do is there
1014s any other sounds that you recall both of
1016s you that were super challenging to do
1019s mm-hmm
1021s it's always the short small sounds that
1024s are challenging like that the things
1026s that you just feel they're really quick
1028s it's the suit that the sounds that you
1030s hear over and over and over though and
1033s they're very short those are by far the
1034s hardest so like the hit notifications
1037s what do you shoot somebody getting that
1038s sound right is extremely difficult
1041s because you hear it all the time right
1043s and even then right we put in a toggle
1047s so you could turn it off if you don't
1048s like it because all right every single
1050s time you guys have to put in exactly
1052s what's it's like you know he hears a
1054s sound that you're gonna hear for hours
1056s especially if you play a lot you can
1058s hear it for a very long time those are
1060s always the hardest sounds for me for
1061s sure they take a long time and it's
1063s because as soon as you hear something on
1064s repeat all of the flaws start to become
1067s extremely apparent so it's it's like you
1069s have to you have to file it down it's
1071s like it's like crumpling up a piece of
1073s aluminum and then just and then just
1076s rubbing it until it's this smooth
1078s ball is perfectly smooth ball it takes a
1081s long time yeah yeah yeah it's funny
1084s because like especially if it's
1085s something you that you need to
1087s communicate an idea with that players
1090s need to hear and be aware of but it
1091s can't be annoying and and one thing that
1093s I just remembered right now is the
1095s shield the shield down and shield up
1097s sound which I think some people probably
1100s hate exactly I like it yeah but like I
1104s think I worked on that for forever to
1106s get to that point and it's such a short
1108s sound right I mean it's like they're
1110s what maybe half a second to a second for
1112s each and I went through so many
1114s iterations of it and I don't know it's
1117s not probably still not the best it could
1119s be but it's one of those things it's
1122s like well how do you communicate to
1123s players what's happening probably during
1126s a really intense situation so there's a
1128s lot of other sounds happening how do you
1130s make this sound kind of cut through and
1132s let you know what's happening and not be
1135s annoying and so that took a long time to
1137s work on and and to get and again it's a
1140s short sound aim gliding and bullet
1143s jumping I worked on those and I worked
1145s on those forever simple just simple
1148s sounds now that you hear and you're like
1149s whatever but I tried so many different
1151s things for those it is it's it's the
1154s sounds that are the shortest that you
1155s think are the simplest sounds are
1158s actually the hardest like creating
1160s sounds for warframes it's hard work and
1162s it's it's it's intense but I think
1165s that's on it's on a different level
1166s mm-hm you know because it's sort of like
1168s once you figure out the sonic palette of
1171s a warframe you kind of go down that path
1173s but I don't know what it is there's just
1177s something about the shorter simpler
1179s sounds that are harder to harder to make
1181s and take the most time I remember
1183s spending a lot of time on the head shot
1185s sounds yeah and a lot of time on the
1187s keep on the kill shot sounds is the
1189s sound you make when you just kill a guy
1190s those take forever to do and correct me
1194s if I'm wrong but different factions have
1196s different headshot sounds with
1197s corporates you have the helmet grenier
1199s well corpus and grenadiers share the
1202s same sound a chance thing but if you do
1204s a headshot on like a mole or you kill
1206s them all there's slightly more
1207s mechanical that
1208s Organic but that's another thing too is
1211s you don't want to make too many
1212s variations either because you're
1214s communicating some information so you
1216s want to use a sound that people are
1218s going to learn and if you have too many
1220s different ones then it sort of takes it
1222s from I got a headshot - was that a
1224s headshot I don't know so it's it's that
1226s tough balance of like the same sound
1228s over and over about trying not to make
1230s it too annoying well and then it becomes
1235s almost musical too sometimes because
1237s then you have like you know like you're
1240s shooting it you're shooting a guy and
1241s you're hitting and you're hitting a
1242s metal surface you don't want it to feel
1244s like you're playing keyboard or whatever
1246s but you want to communicate the idea but
1248s you don't want it to be sound repetitive
1250s either yes so it's a challenge for sure
1254s I'm curious about wisp because she has
1257s some really interesting sounds is there
1258s any behind-the-scenes info on how you
1261s did whisper sounds yeah Eric
1263s Eric's been working on whisper yeah yeah
1265s yeah it was ma'am the wisp is all well
1268s we did a first iteration that what that
1270s was never heard on live stream and the
1273s first iteration was much more playful
1275s and total and it ended up just not
1277s fitting and suiting it very well
1280s so we went back to the drawing board and
1282s we went for a more like raw raw
1287s in-your-face approach with it so we have
1289s this weird blue tube in my office and if
1293s you make sounds into this tube it makes
1295s all these weird whispery effects so I
1298s used a lot of that that tube actually
1301s most of the sounds that you hear and
1302s there are yeah and then of course you
1307s know you reinforce them with other with
1309s other sound effects like like snuffing
1311s out a candle and like a match is being
1314s lit and little tiny things like that
1316s that when you feature them or you put
1317s them up against you know some cool
1319s effects they take on a completely
1321s different sound and then what it
1323s actually is but yes a lot of its that
1326s the tube that's the thing - I think
1329s that's an important thing for anyone out
1331s there who's starting to do sound design
1333s you know it's a perfect lesson of like
1336s don't think that you need the most
1338s expensive equipment or that you need to
1340s layer tons of sounds sometimes
1342s it's just the simplest things it's the
1344s blue tube you know or whatever because
1347s something that it's all about getting
1349s the unique sound and something that
1350s hopefully we haven't heard before and
1352s those sounds exist all around you and
1354s you just you just have to kind of open
1357s your mind to them and try different
1358s things and see what you can make some of
1361s the best sounds that's how they're made
1362s mm-hmm it like if you know the simplest
1365s kind of elements go into some of the
1367s most interesting sounds you know and you
1370s time stretch it or you pitch shift it or
1372s you do whatever to it and you get
1374s something really unique and different
1375s that way yeah thank you for the same to
1379s the deconstructing podcast and thank you
1381s very much to george Spanos Erik Preston
1383s thanks for joining me today you guys are
1385s amazing
1386s and I'm excited for the new sounds that
1388s you put into were free yes I learned so
1406s much thank you for listening to the
1409s third episode of deconstructing as a
1411s neat little tidbit just after we
1413s recorded this podcast the sound team won
1415s the webby People's Voice award for best
1417s music and sound design congratulations
1419s to the warframe sound team on their win
1421s tune in next month for another episode
1423s of deconstructing