Sound Designer/Foley Artist
Skybooter
Skybooter is a first-person shooter where the player will jump, swing, and blast their way across enemy ships in the sky in order to take down their enemies and steal anything not bolted down. Machinery has brought the seven seas to the clouds, and it’s your job to plunder as much as possible from the other residents of the sky. I was the sole audio designer on this project, working with Bungie mentors to bring a solid sound experience! In this project, I practiced more mixing within the middleware technique, as well as mixing with more layers in general, to create more cohesive and defined sounds within my soundscape. I also did a lot with ambience on this project as well!
Player Footsteps SFX Creation
Player Steps: Layers
For this project, I wanted the main character's footsteps to match their player model as best as possible. To accomplish this, I studied the model of the character and added multiple layers to the footstep SFX to give them more character and "oomph". Rather than just use an impact, I focused on what foot the character was stepping with, what objects they were wearing and how that would affect the sound itself, and the mechanical aspects of the character as well!
Mentorship - Bungie
In this project, I was able to collaborate with many members of Bungie. This Triple A experience gave me tons of good feedback and critiques on my work, and allowed me to improve at a rapid pace. I appreciate everything they did for me, and hope to make them proud! Their advice was integral to my growth as a sound designer, and now I can say that my work has had professional eyes on it. It gives me confidence to know that, since now I have the courage to show my work to anybody, and feel that it is worthy of the professional quality.
Ambience SFX Example
Ambience Work
The ambience in this game was really fun to do. There were so many moving pieces to the game that it felt like everything could be exuding a sound, and that was a fun challenge to navigate for sure! I did SFX for the sails, the boats creaking in the wind, the oil lamps, and even the moving platforms! Figuring out how they would all work together in the soundscape helped me learn and get better at mixing in general, which was one of my weaker areas. This also gave me the chance to do more field work, in which I got to go out and hunt for some good wind ambience!
Conclusion
This project was awesome to work on! I was able to experiment and play with things that I sometimes struggle with, like ambience, and working on those weak points improved my overall expertise! I also was able to hone my stronger skills, like Foley work and layer use, increasing my proficiency! And finally, thanks to Bungie, my work was given a professional look, and their feedback was extremely valuable. Thanks to this project, I am more confident going out into the games industry with my head held high and a chip on my shoulder!
