Insights In Sound 191 Rick Allen: “Sound Design: the Art and Science” Live at AES 2025 S20 E1

Welcome to Insights and Sound, where we talk to the people behind the scenes, behind the technology, and behind the
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music. People you may not know, but you should. And please check out insights and
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sound.com for a full list of our podcasts and YouTube series. And big thanks to our sponsors, Mackie, Roland,
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Mojave Audio, Ozbot. Well, let’s get started with a little
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bit of background on you. All right. Started out. I best describe my career path as an add career path. Um
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I’ I’ve done a little bit of lots of stuff. Um started out in broadcast.
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Uh I got my first synthesizer when I was in college and that uh was back as you can tell from the white hair was back
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when synthesizers were very new and I switched from a being a trumpet player to a synthesizer nerd instantly. uh and
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also kind of shifted away from musicality into sound design before it was even called sound design. Something
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about the interesting new sounds that a synthesizer could create just lit up my
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my neuropathway and I was just hooked on it from the very beginning. Um and that
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led me into doing um a lot of uh production work and licensing production
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material for TV and uh radio mostly radio at that point in time. Uh
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then it it over time it it got to the point where um let me let me just show
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you. I think we got a we got a little little evolves into a career as you well and this will also show you how I
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have a little bit of a scent addiction through my life [Applause]
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from beds and beats. [Music] This is a typical day. This is a little
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promot
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Keep
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fixing.
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[Music] Heat. Heat.
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[Music] [Applause]
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[Applause]
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Beat Fix now available from BMG Production Music.
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Basically, that was a little promotional video from a project that I worked on, the beat fixing, which was uh music and
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sound design for movie trailers. So, it was I just wanted to show you that because it’s kind of a behind thescene look at a sound designer’s life can be a
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lot of fun and it’s it’s it’s like childlike uh play and exploration and
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that sort of thing. So, that’s what we’re going to talk a little bit about today. I moved from the synthesis uh style of sound design
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because eventually everybody had a synthesizer and and I’m always constantly looking for newer sounds. That’s one of the things I kind of uh
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want to pass along to you is just a kind of a a knowledge and a thought process
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of chasing the next thing. And one of the things I stumbled on to and you saw there is using organic sounds and mixing
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those in, blending them into some of the synthetic stuff and and using plugins to manipulate them, using some uh old
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school ways to manipulate them and starting out with interesting sounds. I think you saw there uh if anybody caught
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the video of electrocuting a pickle. Yeah. Yeah. Um that was probably I stumbled on
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one of the best sounds for an electrocution scene in a movie. Um it it
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was one of the best sparking sounds I’ve ever come up with. One of the worst smells I’ve ever come up with. Trust me.
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Yeah. You want to do that in a well ventilated studio. And then the other thing that I I had fun doing was there
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was the little cannon that blew up. That was actually a uh a settling torch tank.
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It was cut in half that we discovered the inside diameter of that happened to be exactly the size of a bowling mole.
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So we uh we ended up and by the way I I had the advantage of working out of
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Arizona where we’re were a little crazy. So we’re allowed to do some crazy stuff with explosions which actually got me
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into the wheelhouse of of recording that kind of stuff. Everybody likes to blow up and and break
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things. Heard that from the video. Yeah. Um so so that that kind of gives you an idea uh of there. But the
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creative focus of of today is is going to be talking about it’s not going to be a white paper discussion today. Um it’s
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going to be basically talking about creativity and kind of thinking a little differently and outside the box. Uh so
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coming up with new sounds and doing that. Our main theme today is going to be there’s going to be two two themes.
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One is going to be capturing and manipulating. So, for capturing, we’re
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going to be talking about finding and recording sounds. Then, we’re going to take those found sounds and we’re going
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to manipulate them and using plugins or or techniques for that. We’ll talk about various things for that. And we’ll talk
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about different levels, too. So, hopefully everybody will get something out of this thing here. So, let’s first
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talk about we’re going to concentrate on capturing. So, let’s look at a few different steps here because a lot of
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people think, oh, you know, just go out and hit record and you can record something. There’s a lot of planning
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that’s involved in that. So the first step would be doing your research. Um find out if something is in fact legal
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in your area if you are doing something like gunshots or or that sort of thing or asking permission to be on property
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if something I always like the example of if you’re assigned in a film to
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record a church bell for a scene. Well, you’re going to have to find one of your research is going to be finding a good church bell. Then finding out if you
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have permission or you can get close enough to it without getting permission to record that. Then you want to scout
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the location. Um, many times the world, and you probably already know
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this, but the world when you put headphones and a microphone out, sounds entirely different than it does when
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we’re just out there. Our brain seems to filter out uh the the extraneous noise. But when you put a microphone out and
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put headphones on, you hear everything, including small airplanes flying in the distance. We were doing a sound effect
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recording session for uh car tires on gravel and uh it was like a if if there
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was a comedy for sound recordus, this would have been it. We went out into the middle of nowhere. There was a tree next
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to us and a big black bird landed and just started going
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and what seemed like an hour, I’m sure it was only three minutes, but it finally went away. As it flew off, an
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airplane started flying over. as the airplane went off into the distance, somebody was riding a dirt bike out in
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the distance. So, I kind of threw down my hat and said, “Okay, let’s take a break and come back and do this later.
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The the universe is against us right now.” So, you do have to scout the locations and make sure that and and and
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listen for acoustics, listen for that sort of thing and get some ideas of that sort of thing. I would also add that uh
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there a certain factor of paranoia where you know if you go somewhere and people see you with recording equipment or
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cameras or things like that you know I’ve had for example um we were doing some some video work at a church we had
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a drone flying over just to get visual of the top of the building. Well, there
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was a daycare center in the church and they got really really touchy about, you
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know, and I explained to them that no, no, your kids are going to be little tiny specks. You’re not going to see their faces. No. So, when you talk about
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scouting, that’s another thing to be aware of is the other humans and, you know, their personal space, so to speak.
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You can also sometimes I always I always enjoy the phrase it’s easier to ask forgiveness than permission. I’m not
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encouraging anybody to do anything wrong, but one of the things that has it was
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surprised me one time is u I I drive a white pickup truck which looks like a construction cup truck. So I actually
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keep a a uh construction vest, a neon construction vest in the back of there. And so every once in a while I’ll pop
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that on, drive past some place. We were recording jets out of Luke Air Force Base and uh we were off base and and at
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that point in time we didn’t have permission to be on base. And I’m out there and next thing I know there’s a
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county sheriff pulling up going, you know, what’s up? And and and he saw me in the construction vest and he goes,
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“Oh, you just taking sound levels for the for the area.” And I explained to him what I was doing, but he was going to let me stay one way or the other. So,
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it was kind of nice. So, you can get away with get away with that kind of sometimes. Yeah. A lot of it comes down to looking
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like you know what you’re doing belong there. Yeah. Little little confidence goes a long way. Story of our careers. Definitely.
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Then after scouting, you really need to prep. One of the things that for for those of you who are used to working in
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a studio or working in your your working in your own workstation at home, when you are seven miles out into a
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remote location gathering some of these sounds, you forget a cable, uh-oh, you’re in trouble.
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It’s not like you walk down to the supply closet and grab a couple of XL XLR cables, stuff like that. So, be
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prepared. Um I I tend to actually set everything out the night before and and look at the signal flow and make sure
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I’ve got everything there. Yeah. Um after that would be and that’s that’s involved in in the prep and the setting
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up the mics, deciding whether you want a handheld rig, deciding whether you want to run cables and do for when I’m doing
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explosions. I’ll actually set up probably close to 10 microphones running to a table with a with a a field
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recorder set up there. Um, so that when you get back, I I hate the phrase fix it
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in the mix, but it gives you more choices and more variety and different perspectives when you get back there. So
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that helps quite a bit. Uh, then actually we finally got to the
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recording process and we’ll talk about this in a little bit. Your choices there. What type of field recorder do
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you want to use? What what what what features do you want to take advantage of? What sample rates do you want to
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use? What bit depth do you want to use? That sort of thing. it it can affect your final outcome quite a bit depending on what you’re trying to trying to
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capture. And then the the boring part, I’m a
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right brain guy. I don’t like spreadsheets as much as I should. Uh so then you when it gets to the process of
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ingesting and storing the material and then the next step would be uh going to the through the editing process. Um, so
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let’s move on to the the next the editing process. Um, and uh um mastering
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and cleaning it up. Uh my life has changed quite a bit with with the the
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advent of the progression of uh RX and that sort of the noise reduction tools has really helped. We we did a recording
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in LA of a fireworks and um it was it was a great sound accompanied by one
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scared cricket at 7K I noticed because when I put in RX and the spectral display it you could see the dots. Uh I
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was able to clean that up and that would have been a wasted effort in the old days. So it’s there’s there’s for those
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of you who are students and just starting out in the in the business, you are coming along at what I consider an incredible time um exponential growth of
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of our technology. So yeah, it’s it’s it’s a it’s a wonderful time to be alive, said the old man
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and then and then integrating and preparing for release uh and uh and use. And that’s that can can be, you know,
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what what release sample rate, who’s going to use it, what kind of metadata do you need to embed in there so people
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will license your material faster and so you can make a little bit of a living that way. All right.
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Yeah. Um and then uh um let’s do a little demonstration here. Um
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you know, I I don’t have the the balloon, so let’s go just jump to this. Uh this this is a spectrograph of a
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sound. Um, and it pretty Yeah. Um, things don’t always sound as
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good as they look. So, let’s listen to this. This is a U. Before you play it, this Let me just
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talk a little bit about sample rate and and manipulation. So, we’re moving into the manipulation stage.
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One of the things that sound designers use quite a bit is pitch manipulation, lowering the pitch quite a bit. I mean,
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I I I’m sure you’ve all listened to monsters in different movies where the alien creature turns out to be a dolphin
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pitched down quite a bit or a or a lion roar pitched down. Um, in order to do that, if you think about it, I’m going
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to go a little technical geeky here a little bit, but I want you to think about the sample rate affects your
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ability to do some severe pitch manipulation. There are two types of of uh changing pitch. There’s just straight
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ahead pitch changing and then there’s resampling. Resampling doesn’t give you the artifacts. It slows down. If you’re
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pitching down, it’ll slow down and lengthen the the piece. You’re just changing the the uh sample rate in the
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playback. And the problem with that is as you move it down octave by octave,
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you’re losing the high-end because you’re getting lots more low-end, but you’re losing that high-end. So, you’re
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losing clarity and that air as we call it. So, if you’re using a typical
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microphone that what tops off around 20k, by the time you drop something down
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four octaves, your top frequency would be 1.25k. Well, it sounds a little muddy, you
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know, but you’re going to have a lot of low-end energy. Um, Sankin came out with a 100k microphone. It records ultrasonic
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frequencies. Yeah. Um, that’s I’ve started to use that for a lot of things that I know in fact I’m
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going to manipulate by pitch shifting it way down. So in that case you got to stumble through a little bit
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of science there because the Nyquis theorem is involved there which is your
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sample rate has to be twice the frequency you’re trying to capture. So at 192 if you if you’re recording at
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192k sample rate um you drop something down four octaves instead of 1.25 25
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with a 100k microphone, you’re going to get five and a halfk. Not super high-end clarity, but you
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still have a lot of air there. And plus, you get that low end. So, that’s why that that’s why this is a sound I
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recorded. Um, and that’s what it looks like. Let’s hear what it sounds like.
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Okay. Like I said, looks good, doesn’t sound good. It was just me playing with the microphone the first time. So,
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that’s the normal um original recording. Let’s before you play it, I mean, I I
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want you to listen to it four octaves down. You will actually hear my vocal cords vibrating. At the end, you’re
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going to hear what sounds like reverb. It’s actually just me running out of breath. And listen and imagine some some
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strange sci-fi movie where this could could find its place.
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[Laughter]
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So it just it’s a it’s a simple example of an extreme example of how something can be heavily manipulated. Just one one
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option would be pitch shifting. Um and that’s just but there are some caveats that I just passed along to you just to
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make sure that you get it and capture it and do it as well as you can. Um there’s other sounds that we could do that too.
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the here’s an example of one of the things that’s
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so with a simple flame with a with a isopropyl alcohol in in a in a uh a
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water bottle alcohol in water it’s drinking problem but uh uh yeah but then slowing it down you can
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create some jet thrusters and that sort of thing so it’s it’s kind of fun fun to do that um let’s dig heavy into
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manipulation we kind of touched on it. Now, uh before we go diving in to to to look at a lot of this stuff, I have a
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and again I want to sit up here and tell you I’m not lecturing because I make
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more mistakes and learn I’m also an instructor at the conservatory recording arts and sciences and I will tell you I
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learn from the students there more than I teach sometimes. I really do think that. Um, and one of the things that I I
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kind of become aware of is a lot of us fall into the plug-in addiction, uh, where it’s uh, if I’ll just make better
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sounds if I buy the next plugin. And I really have found over time uh,
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one time I I still remember this. I I yeah, I saw this this uh, subharmonic
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plugin from Waves that was on sale. Surprise, Waves had a sale. Um, and uh, and and I I didn’t have it and uh, or so
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I thought. So, I put it in my cart and was ready to buy it and at least Waves was nice enough to put up a little
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warning going, “You already own this plugin. Do you want it?” And I went, “Oh.” I had had it for over a year in a bundle, but I didn’t explore the bundle
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all the way. I just used what I needed. And that just really woke me up to going, okay, you need to learn the
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plugins you have before you buy another one. And I know that’s kind of a boring lecture, but it’s so true. Um, and what
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I try to pass along to a lot of my students is learn the basics, uh, and
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avoid the the temptation of presets. Um, because a lot of us will just click
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through presets and find a sound, but everybody has those presets. If you learn the technology and learn what the
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controls do, you can make your own sounds. You can you can you can tweak these and make it better for what your ears are looking for. And and so with
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with that, it was like, how many of for those of us who who have done music, um would you ever just click a preset on a
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compressor? I Yeah, I hope not. Yeah. For for those of us who have done music, how many reverbs do you have?
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Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I I did a thing in my studio recently where I got rid of all
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but two reverbs. And because there’s a power to limiting
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yourself, there’s a power to saying, you know, I have only these many that I’m going to use and really kind of
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restricting yourself because that forces you to get more creative. You know, it’s like if you had one synth instead of 40,
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right? I think you have more than 40, but yeah. Yeah. But but and that’s the advantage of in the early days for those of you who are into synthesizers. The early days when I
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started with modular systems, I had to learn how to patch a sound. I had to learn what what waveform would make
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something sound a little more like a brass instrument as opposed to a flute and that sort of thing. You had to you had to understand it other than go flute
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preset preset number 47, which I mean it’s a it’s a blessing and
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a curse. Um it’s one of those things where it’s it’s a wonderful time to have all those presets available to you, but
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I just encourage you then to uh to kind of whip it a little bit and make it your own. Um and and doing that. So
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I like to then just kind of go through let’s we’re going to go through some of the categories of flood man. It’s very
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simple very basic and I encourage you those of you who are exploring sound design some other stuff.
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Oh okay about uh recording stuff um that you can only get once. Ah
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yes yeah that’s yeah yeah let’s talk about about bit depth because one of the
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problems when you are recording something um uh there is a story behind this
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picture which I’ll tell you in a second uh one of the problems when you’re recording your own material is often
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times it’s not like setting up a drum kit and you having having a you know an assistant banging on the drum the
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drummer hitting it and being able to set levels. These are situations where you have one time to do it. And this is very
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applicable for when I’m recording explosions or breaking glass or or toilets. Um, and in that case, you have
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one chance to do it and say your your gain and that sort of thing. However, the the introduction of 32-bit float has
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helped us quite a bit. There’s still controversy on the the quality of 32-bit float with going between the two uh, you
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know, converters and things like that, and I understand that. However, from a practical standpoint, whether you’re
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going to catch it without clipping or not catch it without clipping, I think I would rather go with with on the side of
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having that safety net in post-prouction to be able to change things. Um, and so 32-bit float, for those who aren’t
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familiar with it, there there is not a sound on earth that can digitally clip a 32-bit float signal. There are enough
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numbers that it can capture it and control it. On the other hand, mic pres can be distorted. my capsules can be can
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be distorted. So, you do it’s not a it’s not a magic pill. Yeah. But but it helps
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a lot. I mean, I found off the other the other day I was working on a project where we were smashing things and I was
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able to not have to look down at my VU meter on my field recorder every once in a while to make sure I’m not clipping. I
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could actually had the mic on the boom pole and I was constantly looking on where somebody was going to be smashing something. And that helped. uh it really
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it really resulted in some some good material being passionate about sound. I also
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will warn you from a social standpoint um we’re we’re all a little bit nerdy um
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that we do have to interact with human beings and this was one of those moments where we have bulk trash pickup in in my
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neighborhoods where every once in a while they will you can put things out at the curb and the trash truck will come and pick them up. And this was a
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morning when I was walking my dogs and a couple of streets over. There were somebody was redoing their bathrooms and
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there were two toilets sitting out on the street to be recycled. Most people would keep walking. I went back to the house, got gloves and my pickup truck.
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And I’m in the curb picking up two used toilets, putting them in the back of my
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truck. And when I suddenly realized, oh, I hope nobody sees me and goes, “Poor Rick, can’t afford new toilets.” So, uh,
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you just want to explain. And there’s there’s actually a metal sculptor, art sculptor down the street, and he throws
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out on bulk trash, he throws out his his metal, large metal objects that he’s didn’t want anymore. And I go down and
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grab them and I take them in and I record them, bang on them, and sample them. And about a year after he had lived there,
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he stops me on the street when I’m walking the dogs and go, I just have a question. How come a month after I put something out, it’s out in front of your
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house? So, so I had to explain to him that why. And actually now it’s kind of
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nice before he finishes his big metal sculptures, he actually invites me down to throw some contact mics on them and
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and mic them up and and bang on some stuff. So it’s kind of it’s a neat thing. But um that that’s just a case in
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point of just make sure that you uh every once in a while or or the other the other one was capturing the sounds
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of an ATM machine and I had a shotgun microphone on a pistol grip and I was in there at 2 am because I wanted it to be
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quiet and I’m sitting there doing beeps and buzzes and spitting out cash and some poor some poor guy walks in and I
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turn around and and I I I think the quote is he made
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a different kind of deposit that time. Yeah. So, yeah. So, be be aware that that
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we’re all, you know, we’re all aware of of our our tools and that sort of thing. Uh, is everybody familiar with the the
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blimps, the windcreens, and what we call the little furry things. Uh, those are referred to as dead cats. I learned the
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hard way that not everybody knows that. When I posted on Facebook, when I found a box of dead cats in my
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studio closet, I was all excited without a picture. I posted on Facebook, “What a glorious day I found a box of dead cats.
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I I got a lot of when he was sick. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So, uh just be be aware that
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there is there is society out there besides us crazy people. But but to your point, I I want you to
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go back and and and let’s talk about this a little bit because with 32-bit float, we were
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talking about the idea of capturing things that you only get one chance at. Yeah. Whether it be smashing a toilet or
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blowing something up, which you have a fondness for as we know. and and and as
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if if you don’t know a 32-bit float is their files are in very much larger than
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24-bit. Um and so if you don’t need to do it, it gives you that that that ability to fix the level in
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post-production. Um but if you don’t need to do that, it’s not totally necessary. I have a lot of students that
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ask me, well, why don’t we just record everything until they float? that um it’s it’s it just makes the file size
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bigger and if you do a good job of gainstaging you you don’t need that. But when you are in fact recording something
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you don’t have control over then it’s a good it’s a good option.
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Oh yeah, here we go. Talk about this a little bit. Um oftent times experimentation in sound
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design is is is really important having a childlike approach to it. And in this case, um, I
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had a bunch of my older synth sounds, um, that I just kind of wanted to repurpose and see if I can do some
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things. And I just decided instead of using some plugins to remmanipulate them, um, I remember as a kid sticking
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my face in the fan and going and hearing that that that sound. So, in the studio,
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I set up a speaker and ran and got a fan and set the fan in front of the speaker,
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set microphones off to the side so they weren’t getting hit by any wind turbulence. Uh, and we just ran sounds
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through there. And so, and and you kind of hear it. It’s this is some atonal sweeping type synth sounds. And it added
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some really interesting textures to it.
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[Music]
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So the point there is just experiment. Um, you know, I I do I’ve done some crazy things being in Arizona, we have
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those saro cactuses with the cactus needles. I’ve taken a cello bow out there and I’ve I’ve bowed one of the one
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of the needles on the cactus and came up with the most incredible screeching sound you can you can think of. Um, and
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it’s just it it’s it’s really kind of fun to think of challenging ways to make new weird sounds. Um, you know,
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squeaking balloons and and things like that. Yeah. Great.
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Great. I only had one job. You had one thing to bring.
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So, let’s let’s look specifically at the diff the different categ.
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So, we’ve got EQ. Um, and and that that you can do some really interesting things. One of the things I actually
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like to do, and I specifically use ProTools, but most most DAWs will do this. I will automate the highp pass
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frequency or do a do a bump and then use the automation to sweep through that. And that actually kind of turns that
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into a synthesizer uh filter uh voltage controlled sweep filter and you can do
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some really neat sweepy sounds and change that sort of thing. But EQ also lets you change perspective. Uh high
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frequencies, as you know, don’t travel as far as low frequencies. So you can place it in the sound field. Um, one of
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the things that you can use all these to do is absolutely layer things when you’re doing sound design. Uh, you can
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have one piece that does the transient that does the really attack type thing and then another another track that will do the druming. You can place them in
28:07
the different different stage locations and frequency locations. Um, delay gives
28:14
you space and rhythm. Um, and and you can use something as simple as the hos effect, which is you take take a mono
28:21
sound and just duplicate it and and offset it just a little bit. And that gives our brain a little little ear
28:26
candy. Um uh and then um one of the one of the tricks back in the days even tide
28:31
when they came out with the the harmonizer the H 910 um doing microtuning too. So by delaying
28:39
it slightly left and right and then just doing a little bit of micro tuning up and down on each side really changes the
28:46
the way our brain hears things like that. Keep in mind that when you do tuning, usually the first sound of the
28:52
delay is perceived by our brains as the louder sound. So listen with your ears.
28:58
Um don’t just don’t just look at the waveform in the in your on your DAW. Listen and see and get your placement
29:03
right there. I think that’s a that’s a point that needs to be stress and reiterate because
29:09
I think since we have had DAW technology, everybody listens with their eyes. Well, everybody looks at the
29:16
waveforms and um you know, one of the things that I’ve stressed in music mixing is close your eyes,
29:24
accentuates your other senses. Yeah. You know, really use your ears. And one of the ways to use your ears is to block
29:32
out some of the other senses and and and your typical Yeah.
29:37
bypass and unpass do that. Just make sure you’re actually improving the sound a little bit. That’s that’s true in the
29:43
music industry as well as as well as sound design too. Absolutely. I mean I I remember having a session with a couple of guys and we
29:48
were my assistant was saying oh the meters are you know and this one guy just leans back and he says the meters
29:57
Jimmy and Terry don’t use no meters you know and it’s really true and you know we rely too much on the visual.
30:06
It’s a business of sound. Yeah. Yeah. Um I’ll al although I mean on the other hand I’ll I’ll argue I’ll
30:11
be I’ll be an old man arguing in the other direction too. Visuals also do give us a lot of clues. It’s a great
30:17
place to start. Um looking at a spectral analysis you can see where problems will will happen
30:22
or looking at some of the like the fab filter EQ and all these EQs that are giving you visual displays. You can kind of see where some of the frequencies are
30:28
building up or where you want to want to do something like that. So it does it does help but the bottom line is this is
30:34
yeah this is an audio audio world. um modulation for movement and placement.
30:39
Uh you can assign things. You can modulate obviously modulate gain or modulate um panning um or pitch. Uh
30:48
harmonics. It’s amazing how much it you can take from listening to a guitar player uh and
30:56
and taking advantage of saturation and distortion. You can add quite a bit there. I’ve found that often times if
31:02
something doesn’t have if I’ve pitched something down quite a bit and it doesn’t have enough high-end or clarity
31:08
in the in enough air, you can add a little bit of harmonics in there, distortion, and it’ll bring back some of
31:13
that that upper upper end. Um, dynamics are incredibly important for
31:20
just just like recording a snare drum or or a kick drum or something like that. Then that if you squashing the
31:25
transients too much, uh, it, you know, it’s not going to sound the same as if you let a little bit of the transient through and then and then work with it
31:32
there. Um, transient shapers are something I use quite a bit, which are kind of in the same same vein. Uh, I’m
31:39
surprised. One of the one of the techniques that surprised the heck out of me, which was I always thought when I wanted to do a big huge impact for a
31:46
movie trailer, I always thought that the harder I hit the object, the bigger I would have the sound. It’s the opposite.
31:53
It’s counterintuitive because what you want is a little transient and have the after everything after that. So when you
32:01
do the when you limit or bring everything up, the after. Same thing with gunshots. You know, everybody thinks, you know, it’s that big loud
32:07
pop. Well, most gunshots before Hollywood sound designers getting a hold of them are this. They’re they’re like
32:13
popcorn. But what we’ve done in in our TV and movie business is made it sound bigger than life. So, it’s pop. It’s all those
32:21
reflections. And to do that, you you squash the transient and bring up the a the the sustain sound. Um, so dynamics
32:29
has a lot to do with that. You can dull it up if you do it too much, but you can really kind of tweak it. you that’s
32:34
where that’s where learning how to how to uh use a compressor or use a limiter is is imperative for that kind of stuff.
32:42
Pitch, we’ve already talked about that resampling versus shifting. Um the
32:47
I’m a big fan of of resampling as opposed to just pitch shifting because that’s when if anybody’s ever missed
32:54
messed with uh pitch shifting um to an extreme, you get all sorts of nasty artifacts. You don’t get that with
33:00
resampling. um reverse. That’s a that’s a good catch
33:06
for strange effects and things like that. Uh and then tempo um creating a
33:11
rhythm and creating creating something that the brain anticipates. So some of the reflections, the delays, that sort
33:17
of thing, but you can you can do that or if you go into an extreme grid mode and start deleting sections, you can start
33:23
glitching things. Um, and besides those plugins, we, you know, there are so many
33:29
advanced plugins out there now that will just do some really crazy stuff. But try chaining some of these basic ones
33:34
together and seeing if you can match the sound of a sound of one of these uh crazy plugins that you have, kind of
33:41
analyze going, what are they doing? Are they delaying it there? You know, what how how are they getting there? And the more you know that sort of thing, the
33:47
more you can create sounds that are unique to yourself, which I think is really important. Didn’t even talk about, but I’ll I’ll throw that out
33:53
there. samplers u are are something that’ll kind of give you access to a lot of that stuff pitch bending and that
33:59
that sort of thing. Um I’ve done a lot of work with native instruments with their um with their contact um
34:06
instrument and that is something that is very flexible and I know there’s a lot of different different types and
34:12
products out there that do sample and that granular synthesis is something that is amazing. So there’s the
34:18
technology is coming out more and more and more. Um and uh some of the some of the new stuff that even tide just came
34:24
out with with uh with that red we did their all their delayed packages, all their harmonizer stuff and they’re coming out with some really neat um new
34:32
material too that I’m that I’m impressed with. All right. Um, you know, bottom bottom
34:38
line, I think, is that that that I want I really want to push apart uh to apart is I think it’s a good philosophy to
34:46
start out by it’s don’t be afraid to imitate. There’s nothing wrong with that. Listen to things that get your
34:53
attention that you think are interesting and and try imitating that, but then go one step further and innovate. So, with
35:00
that alliteration there, just, you know, imitate then innovate. or for those of us in the uh the education area is
35:08
educate yourself and then explore. That’s that’s kind of two two ways that are kind of to good to to think about
35:15
exploration. Yeah. Okay. Uh before we open it up to Q&A, I
35:20
have one more video for you. And I think this one might be a bit of a surprise for you.
35:28
For decades, Rick Allen of Rick Allen Creative has built his reputation by
35:33
offering the biggest, baddest, most fantastic collection of sound effects,
35:40
stingers, and bumpers in the audio industry.
35:45
And nowhere has this been expressed more dynamically than in Rick’s contact instruments, assault available with
35:52
sample logic and industrial methods. available
35:58
directly from Rick Allen of Rick Allen Creative. But Rick has a quieter side. And to
36:04
celebrate this, Rick Allen of Rick Allen Creative is proud to announce his latest
36:10
contact creation sound of silence.
36:18
With this instrument, Rick moves away from the explosions and crashes and steps into a realm where sound is only a
36:24
rumor. I was talking to my wife one night and she said, “Rick, can’t you just be quiet?” I thought that was a pretty good
36:31
idea. At the heart of this unique instrument lies a stunning array of custom samples,
36:37
each captured using innovative recording techniques both in and out of the studio.
37:01
There’s nothing like gathering sounds that no one has ever heard before and probably never will.
37:08
Back in the studio, decades of experience come into play as these raw recordings are edited, processed, and
37:15
attenuated to become Sounds of Silence, the latest contact instrument from Rick
37:21
Allen of Rick Allen Creative. And the industry is taking notice.
37:27
When somebody mentions Rick Allen to me, nothing comes to mind. And this instrument really expresses
37:32
nothingness. Who’s Rick Allen?
37:41
Hey, Gary. You hear that? No.
37:47
Nobody records nothing better than Rick Allen.
37:53
I bet you I could do better. Yeah. [Music]
37:59
Here at the Conservatory of Recording Arts and Sciences, we feel the less we hear from Rick Allen, the better. Sounds
38:05
of silence. The new contact instrument from Rick Allen of Rick Allen Creative.
38:11
It’s like nothing you’ve ever heard. Okay.
38:20
Sorry, I’ve strung that on you last minute here, but uh you know, [Laughter]
38:27
I will kill him and I will apologize to you now. Yeah. But but that but by the way, the Sounds
38:32
of Silence instrument will be available. [Laughter] Oh man. So,
38:39
so, so having said that, we’re going to open it up to any Q&A that you might have. There’s a microphone there. Feel
38:45
free to step up and ask Richard your questions.
39:01
I’m just learning about the process of going about the first way through kind of processing local accepted but whether
39:09
it be through library particularly for TV because I
39:14
understand process so you might not want to to go about this next absolutely yeah my my job is mainly
39:21
creating the tools for the sound editors for the TV shows and the movies so I I I don’t place them in there and spot them
39:27
um so most of My work is involved in recording original material and then providing that licensing it. That’s
39:34
where that’s where some of my revenue comes from is licensing that sound to a TV show or a movie, that sort of thing.
39:40
Um, so I’m constantly It’s interesting. It’s it’s a balance of when I get an assignment oftentimes I’ll I’ll the
39:47
sound effects editor will ask me for something like the uh the Luke Air Force Jets happened because uh there was a TV
39:53
show called Seal Team and Charles Mains is the was the sound effects editor on there who just called me up hey do you
39:59
have any jets and I didn’t but I was like give me a give me a give me a week and so I went out to Luke Air Force Base
40:05
and recorded the F-35 slime over and got that done. Um so sometimes I get assignments like that. Uh, other times
40:12
it’s just a matter of of maybe people might want that. That might sound
40:18
interesting. I mean, it’s like nobody ever asked me to bowl a sorro cactus. But it was one of those things where
40:24
walking by one, you you brain, you train yourself to think of what’s that sound, that sort of thing. What What is that?
40:31
The other day we were actually taping down some mic cables with gaff gaffer tape and it just made a really good rip
40:37
sound and I was like going while we have it out, let’s record that. So that you’re always kind of looking for things, which is another good point.
40:44
If you’re looking to record your own material, it’s always good to have some type of a recorder with you, which again
40:51
is a little geeky, but for me, actually uh Road came out with an XY uh lightning
40:56
connector for the iPhone. And with Twisted Wave, it’s a free uh app that’ll
41:02
do 2448 uh on the on the phone. And with that road capsule on there, it it sounds
41:07
I mean, it’s not the the it’s not the super duper field recorder setup, but if you’re if you’re gonna one of the
41:13
saddest things in my life is missing recording a really good sound as opposed to I’d rather record it poorly and mess
41:19
with it than miss the opportunity to record it. So yeah.
41:25
Yeah. I think there’s been something about
41:30
creating process and of course uh what do you think about the receiver like we
41:36
see both human perception how do you take this into account
41:44
I’m not sure if I didn’t quite hear it completely
41:52
what we have master so the human perceptive process is what
41:58
you’re talking about. Oh, in using psycho acoustics to it to your advantage. Absolutely. I mean that
42:03
that’s that’s something that um I I continually try to train myself and
42:09
learn about possibilities of doing that. I mentioned earlier the hos effect things like that is that I mean and that
42:15
sort of thing. psycho acoustic stuff with I just started working with the the
42:20
ambisonic stuff uh sounds and placement and in moving objects around in Atmos um
42:27
and some of that has just been using the term mind-blowing is not not small but
42:34
yeah I hope I answered your question
42:43
another question I had Stanton that’s benefits
42:49
us so
42:55
don’t worry about like your specific techniques for process.
43:01
Um as far as how do how do I resample? Um it’s one one of the most simple stock
43:06
plugins in ProTools is time shift 2. I think um it has mode mode selection
43:14
where it has polyonic, monophonic, rhythmic, one of the the one at the bottom is vary speed which is the
43:19
resampling uh mode on that and that will give you that that that ability or you
43:24
can import things at different sample rates. The two things to do that sometimes you I mean if you’re working
43:30
on a tempo specific project you you can’t afford to slow something down or speed something up. So sometimes you do
43:35
have to use straight ahead pitch shifting and then you just look for some of the better algorithms that are out there. Um I’m a big fan of RX’s
43:42
algorithm for for pitch shifting is the Yeah, definitely. Yeah,
43:48
it’s a it isotope. I’ve always I mean I I don’t want to I’m I’m not connected with them and I don’t want to hype
43:54
anything, but I’ve always kind of told my friends that I really believe that they found a little UFO crashed in the desert somewhere and pulled a little
44:00
green man out and said, “We’ll let you go once you design some plugins for us.” So, yeah, because it’s just they seem to
44:06
be otherworldly. Absolutely.
44:19
I’m here. So, I’m trying your language to see the
44:24
world in that way.
44:31
Like my language serious, but I’m still a student. But I could just pass
44:37
it. It You’re absolutely correct. I mean it takes a long time. Yeah. Yeah. Believe it or not, this is
44:43
what Yeah. Um it curiosity and that’s something that I think is really important in in our lives. Um I mean and
44:52
and it it seems like today we kind of I I found myself very curious. I think I’d be
44:58
classified as ADD OCD now. Um you know, but but before it was just thought of as just being interested and curious. Um
45:06
but just looking thinking differently. I mean, I I I find myself tapping on
45:11
things and it’s, you know, and and listening to the resonance and that and that uh watching a lot of YouTube
45:17
videos, 99.9% of them. I want ridiculous, but every once in a while I, you know, you find something that’s
45:23
like, oh, the the the whole electrocuting a pickle thing happened because I happened to watch a YouTube video that wasn’t about sound at all.
45:29
was about somebody who made a pickle lamp and he was running regular AC through a pickle and it lit up and I
45:34
went well I’ve got a neon sign high voltage transformer and and you know it’s like maybe if I run high voltage
45:40
through that it might work and it it did. So it’s like it’s just kind of just being kind of experimenting with that.
45:46
I think curiosity is really the that’s it’s really just you know you have to
45:51
kind of do away with a lot of the rules. Never get bored. In fact, actually that br that this brings up an interesting
45:56
concept of for speed, I use templates. And so I’ll have templates in and set up
46:02
to do that. But I I’m always scared that you can fall into a routine. If you ever
46:07
get to the point where what if for at least for me personally, if I ever get to a point where I feel like I’m just cranking something out like I’m working
46:14
in a factory, I take a breath, I stop, and I I I know I’m not going in the
46:19
right direction because that’s not what I want to do. Um, and and the old the old philosophy of do what you love and
46:25
the money will follow. Um, I’m not sure the money always follows, but I sure would like to rather do what I love um
46:32
than than have to go. I mean, I’ve got buddies that go to a job they hate. They they get done at 5:00, they go to a bar, they drink beer, forget that they hate
46:38
their job, they go home and go to sleep, wake up and do it again. It’s not the way. The fact that you’re coming to an AES event shows that you’re interested
46:45
and you have passion about something. And as long as that’s the case, then then you know, as long as you can pay
46:51
your bills, um, which is important, but you know, after that, if you can, if you
46:56
can get up in the morning, I’ve been doing this. I started I got my first professional audio paycheck when I was 15 years old, and I’m 66, so I’ve been
47:02
doing it for over 50 years. And there are days when I’ve wanted to kill my clients. But for the most part, I get up
47:09
every day going, I’m I’m going to work. And that’s pretty that’s pretty special. I I feel very lucky for that. So you
47:16
just keep keep asking the exact kind of questions that you just asked and you’ll just you’ll do fine.
47:23
Thank you so much. Absolutely. I just wanted to know like your thoughts
47:29
on manageable end especially when it comes to like impacts and really kind of deep sounds. Is it better just to kind
47:36
of do roll up and trim it up or how do you get kind of thinking all these page up and still have some
47:43
roll especially for for wide playback on on
47:48
different things. One of the things that um that I think uh the intuitive thing
47:54
with let’s just we want more impact let’s just bring up the bass a lot of times that just mushes everything up. Um
48:01
saturation has helps me a lot with that. Um um I’m trying to remember the plugin
48:07
where you can actually I mean you can do this with with what I talked about earlier which is just learning the plugins but um by severely
48:15
adding uh harmonic distortion to the lower end our brains and I think you know some of
48:22
our technical here already know this but our brains are wired to where sometimes even if that frequency is not reproduced
48:28
if we hear the upper harmonics of that frequency our brains will tell us it’s there. So if for earbuds and for
48:35
computer playback often times adding a lot of distortion to that low end will
48:41
create these high-end frequencies. So even if your playback device does not provide those frequencies will hear that
48:47
as more of an impact. Um so it’s it’s and that’s another reason old school you
48:53
know we we listen back on a lot of different monitors for that very reason. So, you know, start off with any kind of roll off
48:59
anything like 20. I I Yeah, I I won’t go too low because I mean that’s one thing too is like if you
49:05
have if you have signal energy at that low, it can affect this the thresholds of all your other, you know, of your
49:11
processing. So, I yeah, I will roll off and that changes it changes. But yeah, I
49:18
it’s probably a good frequency to to 30 20 in in that area. Um because you just
49:24
unless you unless you’ve got an incredible, you know, LF system. Um you know, and that’s that’s a whole another
49:30
matter. We have to I think we have time for one or two more real quick ones here.
49:35
I’m getting signals. First off, it was cool to hear you talk
49:40
about the Rian being a fan. I saw that video on Instagram video
49:48
and then also as somebody who’s been working clients and like for a long time
49:54
as a beginner and a student where would you recommend distributed? Great question. Um I would start out uh
50:02
if I was starting out today I would be I would it would I would I think about this a lot when when I get asked that
50:07
question. I’m not not totally sure, but there are websites out there like a sound effect.com. Um, some some people
50:15
that will curate the the libraries and distribute them. Um, we live in a world
50:20
where our work is undervalued. Anybody agree with that? Um, and so you’re not
50:26
going to make a ton of money starting in those kind of categories. U, but it will get you get your work out there.
50:33
networking you guys. Uh if if you’re if you’re trying to make a profession out of this, networking is so incredibly
50:38
important. And by networking, I hate the term because it always makes me feel like you’re going to a party going, “Hi,
50:43
please hire me.” That’s that’s not what I’m talking about. Just volunteering to help out somebody, being a second engineer somewhere or or or I mean, I’ve
50:50
I’ve I had a person who um who’s now working in LA, fact, just uh just got nominated for an Emmy, and she ended up
50:57
um getting getting interested in this. She wanted to be a music engineer but helped me on just volunteered to help
51:03
out on one of my um excursions out to record stuff and uh she got interested in it. I get was able to recommend her
51:10
to a few people that sort of thing. So just meeting people and being being helpful goes with goes for pretty much
51:16
everything in our industry. Getting out there making sure you meet people. Okay, we have time for one more really quick
51:21
one and then we got to wrap here question. cognitive version typically we
51:30
want some services as high as possible and acoustics or do you want to capture
51:35
also the acoustics natural acoustics for gunshot and how do you do this this
51:40
decision when you do great question um specifically with gunshots I I kind of mentioned earlier
51:47
that I will I will use multiple microphones and that helps me capture the different reflections I’ll use I’ll
51:53
use directional I mean it’s people are are very surprised when they see how I record explosions, anything like that, I
51:59
will have uh again microphone selection. I’ll probably use a dynamic microphone close to whatever’s happening because
52:04
it’ll handle some high pressure um sound pressure levels. But then I I’ve had I’ve had shotgun microphones not pointed
52:11
toward the object far away, but pointed away. So actually away from everything to pick up reflections coming back. I’ll
52:17
have a stereo XY pair placed there. um and and just various microphones all in
52:22
different places, which a lot of you probably are thinking, “Oh, that must be a phase nightmare.” Um and it is, but
52:30
you you’d be surprised how sometimes that that phase relationships that’s a
52:35
little whooshy with with works in your favor. And if it doesn’t work in your favor,
52:40
you can time align them, you know, once you get back in in the in the studio. you don’t the mic splits afterwards.
52:48
Usually one mic I do specifically try to do that. Um and for those of you I I don’t know if everybody knows what a
52:54
contact mic is but that can become a real friend in noisy situations. Um I
53:00
was having to record a big metal dumpster. I wanted I wanted a big huge metal slam and there was construction
53:06
going on. The biggest one I could find was at a construction site. So, I was able to use a a couple of contact mics
53:11
and get some really great sounds without being having to pick up sound waves that was picking up was picking up
53:18
vibrations. Okay, thank you. That’s a wrap. Thank you all so much for
53:24
coming.
53:29
And you guys, if um if anybody wants to, I’ll hang around and chat too. So, if anybody has any more questions, I don’t
53:34
want to cut anybody off. But thank you so much. I appreciate it.
53:41
Hey, I’m Daniel Keller.