Sound f/x Sound Effect Troubles

EJTF

Member
I'm currently the sound designer and audio engineer for a small community college and I'm having some trouble deciding how to properly centralize a sound effect involving multiple explosions of fireworks coming from a "basement". The show is "You Can't Take It With You" if anyone has had experience with that show specifically. I'm running Q-Lab for my SFX through a Midas Venice 320 analogue board, but I can't decide how to keep the explosions sound localized and realistic.

Should I be looking at materials that will reflect the speaker's output in the area, while decreasing the output itself? Or is my problem that the sound cue wasn't recorded in a small environment and as such it won't be convincing that the sound could be coming from a basement?
 
What he said...
However, you are right that it depends on the sound recording too. If it's a recording of a big outdoor explosion, it's going to be really hard to make it sound right. You might go trolling around for a better sound before you spend a lot of time trying to make the existing one work. They aren't that expensive.
 
Seeing as no one in their right mind would lit a 4th of July's worth of fireworks off in only their basement, and anyone who would probably wouldn't be recording it, should I expect to layer multiple singular firework SFX? And does anyone recommend a SFX site they've had good experience with? I've always used SoundDogs and FreeSFX for the most part, but SoundDogs has always been a little lacking on quality from what I've found.
 
Try freesound.org. Even better, search iTunes for real sound effects libraries. Also, record yourself dropping heavy books or something onto a suitably resonant surface — depending how you place the mic and edit the sound, you might be able to get it to sound like explosions.

And yes, you should get a ton of different sound files and mix them together.
 
Definitely use multiple sound effects, and layer them together. This is where creativity is really the only limit. Door slams, gun shots, and thunder could all be added to fireworks (timing and mixing them well is important so people don't notice the individual elements)

Additionally, try to use reverb to alter the sound. Personally, I love Altiverb to push sound effects into unique environments (the program uses a processed called "convolution reverb" and is used extensively in film sound work). That program is expensive though, but the same idea can be used with other reverb programs to morph sound effects you find into something unique for the show. The "old fashioned" version of this is creating the sound effect you want, and then setting up a loudspeaker in a basement (or any location you want), and then recording the sound played back. Commonly used on movies before computer programs were good enough, dating back to "Touch of Evil" and "Godfather".
 
Alright, thank you all for your cordiality and information. I think that I'll be able to take it from here. Should be a fun two weeks :grin:
 
Try freesound.org. Even better, search iTunes for real sound effects libraries. Also, record yourself dropping heavy books or something onto a suitably resonant surface — depending how you place the mic and edit the sound, you might be able to get it to sound like explosions.

And yes, you should get a ton of different sound files and mix them together.

SoundDogs, at www.sounddogs.com You can get most for free at low quality but just "saving as" you get the high quality downloads if you pay for them. Some very goods stuff that's worth the couple of bucks for per sound effect. and the lower quality "save as"-demo audio gets you a good sense if it will work in your design.

Also what others have said about a small speaker "center stageish" faced away provides some muffling that works. The Local highschool just did that show at our space though we had a vent in the wall that some of the smoke came out of, and had placed the speaker behind it SR.
 

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