Sound effects

Jan Tore Soerensen · March 13, 2016

I have been picking my sound effects from different sources on the internet, but I was wondering what the usual sources are for the industry?

Phil Rhodes · March 13, 2016

I tend to use Pond5 and Audio Jungle, but I can't claim any knowledge of what's used on big movies.

Jan Tore Soerensen · March 13, 2016

I tend to use Pond5 and Audio Jungle, but I can't claim any knowledge of what's used on big movies.

Thank you.

Satsuki Murashige · March 13, 2016

Most sound mixing studios build their own sound libraries and draw from there. Skywalker Sound for example has a huge collection that is growing continuously. I know a lot of mixers build their own personal libraries as well. I haven't gone off and recorded my own sound effects since film school but I remember it being a lot of fun. I worked on an interview with Ben Burtt a few years ago where he said he still does this while on vacation with his family.

Jan Tore Soerensen · March 16, 2016

Most sound mixing studios build their own sound libraries and draw from there. Skywalker Sound for example has a huge collection that is growing continuously. I know a lot of mixers build their own personal libraries as well. I haven't gone off and recorded my own sound effects since film school but I remember it being a lot of fun. I worked on an interview with Ben Burtt a few years ago where he said he still does this while on vacation with his family.

Ha, thats clever! I best get me a decent recorder then. And there is always websites like sounddogs etc.

Max Field · April 15, 2016

Are you speaking in terms of foley sounds or sci-fi/explosion stuff? I've accumulated thousands and thousands of sounds via recording and meeting sound engineers with their own sources. If you want I could add you on Skype and give you some via file transfer.

Jan Tore Soerensen · April 15, 2016

Are you speaking in terms of foley sounds or sci-fi/explosion stuff? I've accumulated thousands and thousands of sounds via recording and meeting sound engineers with their own sources. If you want I could add you on Skype and give you some via file transfer.

Yeah, foley sounds. Wow, that would be great! Ill PM you!

Landon D. Parks · April 26, 2016

In my opinion, the best source for production music is www.musicloops.com. They provide an unlimited use license for a low fee of around $20-$100 a song. You can literally use the song anyway you want, in however many projects you want, in whatever medium and with whatever audience. They curate music from hundreds of very good composers, and they have a long list of really good 'cinematic' and 'fantasy' and 'horror' tracks.

For sound effects, I primary choose Foley when I need something that is not available at www.freesound.org, though I also subscribe to audioblocks.com for misc music and sfx, thought their library is pretty limited in quality items.

I do not use audio jungle, nor premium beat, because both have rather unfriendly license terms, requiring expensive $200 or more licenses for some types of releases, and only allowing you to use what you purchased in one end product. If you're looking to build a stock music library, Smartsound has some okay (though general generic sounding tracks).

As most have said above, the 'industry' probably tends to build their own libraries for sound effects, racking up tracks and tracks of different foley sounds and things from the vast number of projects they do. Music is usually created for each movie rather than recycled.

Edited April 26, 2016 by Landon D. Parks

Bill DiPietra · April 26, 2016

I know a lot of mixers build their own personal libraries as well. I haven't gone off and recorded my own sound effects since film school but I remember it being a lot of fun.

Without question. I took a class in grad school where we had to re-record the foley for two scenes, but also give them our own style. I chose Blade Runner for my mid-term & 8 1/2 for my final. I know very little about sound as it is and that class gave me a true appreciation of just how precise (and exhausting) an art foley sound is.

But it was also a lot of fun. My teacher had her own online library and I was planning on starting my own but never got around to it. So I would say just be creative and start recording things from scratch. You'll have way more fun & control that way.

Nick Schafer · April 15, 2017

Honestly man, I would 100% recommend www.freesound.org I have used them to score almost every film I have done and they have what seems like an endless supply of sound Fx, and its completely FREE!! Here is an example of a film I just finished, EVERY SINGLE sound effect you hear in it was downloaded from that website. I hope this helps and I hope you enjoy the film!!

Video Link: http://www.freshfinishmedia.com/canadian-filmmaker-washington-election/

Max Field · April 15, 2017

To my memory, almost everything on Freesound is half the sample rate of CD quality. Stick with Youtube, they're below CD quality but at least it isn't a dead 22khz

Nick Schafer · April 15, 2017

im not to sure about the 22hz I know a lot of the files i dl are .WAV files. and for the amount of sound effects I download (if you checked out the video link) its way to much of a pain to find and then have to convert each one to mp3 through some 3rd party site to download them.

Max Field · April 16, 2017

im not to sure about the 22hz I know a lot of the files i dl are .WAV files. and for the amount of sound effects I download (if you checked out the video link) its way to much of a pain to find and then have to convert each one to mp3 through some 3rd party site to download them.

Why would someone attempt to convert a WAV to an MP3 unless they need it on an iPod? WAV is the the less compressed container.

Nick Schafer · April 16, 2017

What are you talking about..they wouldn't, i was eluting to the fact that with all the sfx I use, its too much work to find the sound fx on YouTube, then go to a YouTube-mp3 and convert them from a video file to an audio file.