Byron Bullock is a sound designer, sound engineer, and recordist. He has worked in games, film, and broadcast on a wide range of titles including Alien: Isolation, Total War: Warhammer, Need for Speed: Hot Pursuit, and the film On the Road. He has also worked on a plethora of documentaries, short films, and trailers, including high fidelity cinematics such as Improvise and the cinematic trailer for Total War: Warhammer.
In our interview, Byron discusses his journey as a sound designer working in games, trailers, and film. We also speak at length about the process and challenges of creating sounds for unscripted, dramatic, and ultimately sound-rich interactive properties like Alien: Isolation.
INTERVIEW
By Bailey Kalesti
Bailey:
I think one of the earliest things that I saw of yours, a few years back, was The Greatest R/C Car Chase Ever with the Rocket Jump crew.
Byron Bullock
Byron Bullock
Byron:
[laughs] Yeah, that was an interesting project.
Bailey:
Did they reach out to you to work on that?
Byron:
Well, I was working at EA at the time on Need for Speed: Hot Pursuit, and one of the marketing assets that came out of there was that exact piece with the Rocket Jump crew with Freddie Wong. We'd seen a few of his previous things, and the marketing team thought it'd be great to do something for Need for Speed: Hot Pursuit that we were doing at the time.
So, yeah, they put something together and they were looking for someone to do the sounds. So, I said that I'd have a go at it. At EA, we had a massive library of car recordings of all sorts that we had done for the game at the time, so I was probably best placed to put the sounds together for that. [laughs]
Bailey:
Makes sense. A lot of it was based on the libraries you already had in place.
Byron:
Yeah, and stuff that we'd recorded for the game. We didn't go out and record specifically for that trailer, but we'd done lots of car recordings for that game a few months before. So, I could dip into a few of those, which was useful.
The Greatest R/C Car Chase Ever, created by RocketJump. Byron worked on the sounds.
Bailey:
Cool. So, one of the reasons I wanted to talk to you is because I've a lot of respect for those that pursue the art of sound design, especially because it's so different from what I do (which is very visual). What was it about sound that drew you in when you were starting out? Was it always something that you were attracted to?
Byron:
Yeah, I suppose so. When I was younger I was more of a DJ. I suppose that's the first time I got into sound. So, I don't really have any musical background. That's what a lot of people say, "Oh, are you a musician?" As a kid I was a bit of a budding DJ, so I'd be remixing records and mixing stuff up there. I guess that's where it really started, and a friend of mine basically said to me, "You know you can do sound design courses in college." I think I was about sixteen, just coming out of school, really. I didn't really know what to do. It was either do that or go do something else.
So, I took a look at it and it really looked quite cool. It wasn't specifically sound design, it was more sound engineering. It was doing things like recording bands. There was also post-production in it, so it was doing sound for films and things like that. That's where it really started. I went into a B.Tech. [Bachelor of Technology] course in that for about two years. And then I decided I wanted to take it further because I was really interested in it at college. Mainly the film side, the sound to picture. So, I wanted to go to university and do a three year course here in London. It kind of went from there, really.
Bailey:
You were having fun creating sounds for cinematic mediums. Were you primarily interested in doing the digital stuff, or did you also like going out and recording sounds?
Byron:
My first professional job was in TV. I started out in broadcast audio. So, that's basically going out on location and recording. We did documentaries, live news coverage, daytime television, things like that. Recording the dialog and the on-set sound effects. I did that for about four years. And during that time we did a bit of post-production. It was post-production that I really wanted to do, because that was kind of the most exciting stuff for me. Being able to put sound to picture and not be so literal with it. That's what really interested me. So, I managed to move away from the location production side of sound and move into doing sound design which I was quite lucky at. I basically started doing that for people for free to get experience, and then I moved from there.
Byron on location for broadcast TV work.
Bailey:
So, you had more of an interest in creating sounds that didn't exist for sci-fi and fantasy.
Byron:
Yeah, sci-fi and all sorts of things. One of my first professional projects doing that was for games actually. I managed to get a job at EA doing sound for Need for Speed. I think I worked there for about three years. That was really good. It was a mixture of going out and recording cars, and the games side of things was really interesting because I'd never really done that before. That was quite different. Before that, I did sounds for trailers. That's one of my big portfolio things. But then I moved into computer games. That's kind of my career progression from TV through to trailers and adverts, and I still do trailers with my current games stuff.
Bailey:
For like Alien: Isolation.
Byron:
Yeah, that was one of the things from a couple years ago, and I'm currently doing Total War stuff at the moment.
Bailey:
For the Need for Speed stuff, you guys weren't necessarily trying go for realism in the sound?
Byron:
No, I think Need for Speed is kind of one of those things that's larger than life. All of the cars that we'd record would be recorded with modified exhausts, crazy turbos, and things like that. Because you almost want that kind of hyper-real sound. If you said to someone, "What does a Ferrari sound like?" they have this image in their head that it's aggressive and really powerful. That isn't necessarily the true sound, I suppose, if you were sitting there actually driving that car inside the cockpit. So, we always tried to make it larger than life in Need for Speed. Bordering on that line of realism and hyperrealism.
Byron and crew recording car sounds.
Bailey:
Right. Moving towards telling a story and evoking emotions instead of being totally true to life.
Byron:
Yeah, totally. Trying to get emotion out of the audience is what sound is really good at. It's a key role. Most people don't notice sound unless it's bad. Most people just feel it and feel what it does to them.
Bailey:
It is invisible, but it's absolutely necessary for games and movies and all that stuff.
Byron:
Yeah.
Bailey:
So, you've been working in games for a while now. When you're working on a project, like the stuff you're doing at Creative Assembly, how long does your involvement on a game usually last? When do you come in?
Byron:
It kind of depends on the budget of the game and the size of the game. I've been lucky enough to work on really big budget games, and generally you can be drafted in at the pre-production stage. Games can take a long time to develop. I mean, Alien: Isolation was developed over a very long period. I think it was like four years or something. And at the start of that process it was a very different game to what it was released as. So, it's kind of working along side of the development of the game. You can be there from the very start. So, helping to kind of create ideas and helping the game designers to use sounds to tell the story. It's a very important tool, especially in Alien: Isolation. Using sound to help pinpoint where the alien was, but also to help put the player on edge constantly. We did that basically with the sound and not much else.
The Alien: Isolation audio crew. Left to right: Jack Melham, James Magee, Byron Bullock, Sam Cooper, Stuart Sowerby, and Haydn Payne.
Bailey:
There are a lot of really intense moments, and sometimes it gets very quiet too.
Byron:
Yeah, using silence and using contrast. Having loud moments and quiet moments next to each other kind of accentuates tension too. Makes the louder moments feel louder and the quieter moments even more so, which is a really good tool in a sound designer's arsenal, I think.
Bailey:
As long as we're talking about Alien: Isolation, what sort of things were the most helpful in figuring out how to bring those environments to life?
Byron:
What sort of things did we use when we were in development?
Bailey:
Yeah.
Byron:
We used all kinds of things. Obviously we used Ridley Scott's original film for reference. We had it on a constant loop on the TV in the game studio—as a reminder. One of the things that our creative director would say to us was that he didn't want anything in the game that couldn't exist before like 1979, because that was when the film was made. I suppose Ridley Scott's film is really trying to portray that kind of "used" vision of space. It's almost like truckers in space. There's no high-tech technology. It's all clunky, mechanical stuff that you could probably break at any time. So, any kind of hi-fi sounds, like holograms and things like that, weren't used. That kind of helped us forge the soundscape. Everything was mechanical and clunky and push-button kind of technology. That was one of our first starting points. It was very useful.
Also we have lots of artists in the studio, so there'd be lots of concept art for the game that would be put up around the studio, so that helps massively.
Alien: Isolation Survive trailer.
Bailey:
Did you have access to some of the older recordings from the film?
Byron:
We did actually. We were in contact with Fox quite extensively and they managed to go down to the archives in the Fox lot and actually pull out some original 8-track tapes for the original films. That was really useful. Some of this stuff hadn't been heard for years. 1979 was quite a long time ago, I mean I wasn't even born. [laughs]
So, they digitized this stuff for us. There were sound effects that were used with the score. I don't know if you remember the opening titles, but there's this kind of wailing sound that came across. And that was isolated on the tapes so we could take some of that stuff and create more of it and use it as a base. Because obviously in a game it's different than a film. The player can go anywhere, and they go past the same point in the level over and over again. So, we need lots more variation in sounds. We could take the reel-to-reels and use that as a base and produce more of those sound effects. That was super useful for us and gave an authentic feel to the game. We really wanted it to feel like you were back in Ridley Scott's original Alien.
Original sounds from the Alien tape archives.
Bailey:
I know that you had to have systems in place that helped drive what the players heard at any given moment. Could you describe a little bit about how the gameplay needs affected what you created?
Byron:
One of the key things in Alien: Isolation was we wanted the player to constantly be aware of the alien. One of the ways we did that was by using sound. In the game, the alien uses its senses and one of its senses is its hearing. It can obviously see light from the player's torch and things, but it can also hear the player's sounds. It picks up the player's footsteps, if they bang on a wall, or use a gun. It can hear that and pinpoint where the player is. That kind of puts the question in the player's mind as to, "Should I fire my gun right now, or should I be running, or should I be sneaking around?" Makes them aware of the sounds that they're making, because, obviously, you don't want the alien to hunt you down and take you out. So, that was a really interesting thing when we started doing that and using sound. It also made the player aware of those sounds, so it was kind of a double-edged sword. The sound had to be really detailed because the player was aware of it and was listening to it.
Bailey:
Were you doing any of the scripting or visual scripting, or were you mostly working with a designer or an engineer to get that hooked up?
Byron:
We had a bespoke engine that had lots of visual scripting in it, so we were able to do a lot of that stuff ourselves. But a core system, like the alien's main hearing sense, was done with the programmers because it was a core feature of the game. But a lot of the stuff, from a sound design point of view, was done using visual scripting. We could drop in all kinds of things into the level ourselves and use logic to drive our audio systems, which was great. We didn't have to rely so much on programmers and could just get on with it and experiment with things. And there's a lot of close tie-in with the level design, which is great.
Visual scripting for dialog in Alien: Isolation.
Visual scripting of audio in Alien: Isolation.
A script in Alien: Isolation.
Bailey:
It's very different from the work that you probably did for the CG trailer for Alien: Isolation.
Byron:
Yeah, it's quite different to that. My background is doing trailers, so I've done a lot of trailers over the past five years. I always find them very fun to do. I enjoy them immensely, but it is a lot different to creating the sound of a game. In a linear piece you have a timeline. You know what's going to happen in ten seconds time. In the game you just didn't. We had to build systems to help tell us or give us information about what was going to happen in the next ten seconds, because we couldn't rely on it being a predefined moment in time. We didn't know whether the player was going to go the other way, or whether the alien would hear the player. It was a completely unscripted alien in the game. The alien was just dropped in the world and it just used its senses to hunt the player down, which kind of presented a lot of problems—for the sound team anyway. We want to preempt those moments to create suspense. You can just imagine the player hiding somewhere and the alien getting closer. You kind of want to create suspense by manipulating the soundscape or adding in different sounds. When things aren't scripted it's very difficult to do that.
Listener network. From Mission 2 (Welcome to Sevastopol) in Alien: Isolation.
Bailey:
Yeah. I've found that one of the challenges of game development in general is that when you have that level of interactivity it's hard to create dramatic tension. I mean, it can be done, but it's certainly a much larger challenge.
Byron:
It certainly is. For us it became all about designing systems that would tell us what the player's up to and what the alien is up to, and then that interaction between the two. It kind of allowed us to create moments of tension before an attack. But certainly the biggest challenge for us creating the sound for Alien: Isolation was creating those moments of tension. Those were the most important things because Alien: Isolation is all about the suspense and the tension. So, if we didn't nail that and we didn't get that right, we wouldn't have done it justice.
Sound emitters placed in the level in Alien: Isolation (from Mission 14).
Alien: Isolation gameplay sound effects. From Mission 14, during the reactor purge sequence.
Bailey:
Yep, absolutely. So, to talk about more of your trailer work that you've done, like more recently on the Total War stuff, what's your typical day-to-day process look like when you're developing the short form stuff?
Byron:
So, I kind of head up the Total War audio pipeline for the marketing material. And there's a large team here of video editors, animators, and artists that just look after the marketing stuff. An asset like a short form trailer could take a couple of months to develop, depending on the size of it. From my point of view, I will direct music. I have a group of composers that we use, and I'll set a brief for music. I'll also book actors for the dialog, and will sometimes record and engineer the dialog sessions. I also have some guys that I use to do Foley and sound design, and a lot of the time I'll do that as well. And then generally I'll mix them here in the studio at Creative Assembly, but I also have a couple of other mixers that we use as well over at Pinewood.
The Alien: Isolation Pinewood Foley crew.
Foley recording at Pinewood for Alien: Isolation.
Gore Foley for Alien: Isolation.
Bailey:
So, a couple of months to do a CGI trailer?
Byron:
For the CGI trailers, the visual side of them are usually done outside of the studio. The last CGI one that we did [the Total War: Warhammer trailer] was done at Platige Image. And for the sound design and mix, because it was constantly changing and evolving, I think it probably took about three or four weeks in total. On that one it was myself and a sound designer here called David Philipp, and a sound designer called Matt McCamely. I think between us, on and off, we probably worked about three and a half weeks on it. And the dialogue was recorded by Rosalie Wilson.
Total War: Warhammer trailer.
Bailey:
For one of those projects, what part of the process do you enjoy the most?
Byron:
It's mainly the sound design. Definitely. Creating sounds that don't exist in the real world, but they need to sound real but also they also need to feel otherworldly. Being able to create something out of nothing. For it to feel real, fit the picture, and for you to believe that. For me that's the biggest challenge, but also the biggest reward. If someone goes, "I just imagine that creature sounds like that. That's how it should feel and sound," that's the best part of it for me.
Bailey:
Were there any particular sounds or moments in that trailer that come to mind?
Byron:
In the Total War trailer, I suppose it was the end sequence when you see the Lord of Change put his foot down and then there are these weird vocals as you see this huge creature. That was one of the best parts of the trailer for me to work on. I also enjoyed the bit when the wizard transforms. That was great fun to work with all the Foley there. All the little tentacles coming out of his arms.
The Lord of Change.
Bailey:
When you're recording that stuff or finding bits of sounds, was there anything particularly crazy you used? I always find it interesting when people use really creative ways of getting sounds.
Byron:
Yeah, for the vocals of the creature, I can't even remember how I created them, but I remember that a big part of it was using human voice, but through a special microphone that picks up very, very high frequencies. When you record something at extremely high frequencies, and when you pitch it down and slow it down, it's still workable and it still sounds like there's all the high frequency content there. So, we used a special microphone, a Sanken Microphone, to record a lot of vocals and also any sound. Things like Sellotape being peeled off and things like that. And then pitch shifting it to the extremes, so it doesn't sound anything like what it originally was. But then all of a sudden it takes on weird creature-like vocals. That's one of the interesting things about sound design. Just experimenting and trying to create new things and new sounds.
Some tools of the trade.
Recording screech material for creature vocals in the Total War cinematic trailer.
Bailey:
Yeah, even on the visual side of things, I think that experimentation is where a lot of the real joy is. Because you don't know what's going to happen. You don't know what's going to work.
Byron:
Exactly. And when you've got a giant creature that's the size of an eighteen-story building, looks half like a bird, and half like some kind of demonic creature, there's no real reference in the real world for that. [laughs] So, you've got to start getting creative and experimenting with stuff. It's part of the fun, isn't it?
Bailey:
Absolutely. I very often hear sounds that are synchronized with the music for various story beats and the like. I know that's definitely true for the trailers. How much does the music play a role in the way in which you're creating?
Byron:
I think for trailers it's especially important because trailers have beats and you have a small amount of time to tell a story and the music really plays an important role in driving the piece forward. One of the things I learnt from a colleague of mine called Charles Deenen was to work with the music and not work separately. When I first started, I would create my sound design completely separately to the music and then I'd try and make it work once I got the music. But now I'm very much working with the music at the same time, so my sound design always compliments the music. If it's fighting with the music then one of them has to give. So, like you said, working with the beats of the music, making sure that impacts happen on the beats of the music, and making sure that dialogue happens in lulls of the music. In my view, trying to get all of those things to compliment each other instead of fighting each other is one of the key parts of getting a great sounding trailer.
Project shot of the Total War: Warhammer CGI trailer in ProTools.
Total War: Warhammer CGI trailer mix in ProTools.
Project shot for Total War: Warhammer in Wwise.
Bailey:
I think that's good development sense because you want to work with what the final product is going to be.
Byron:
Yeah, exactly, and having a handle on the music and working directly with the composer. I'll have regular Skype meetings with the composers. I'll play them the fx tracks, we can bounce ideas off each other, they'll send me music ideas, and then we can work from there. That, I think, is the best way to work. Instead of just being handed a music track at the end, and them saying, "We need this work now."
Bailey:
Are you playing a role figuring out what these sounds are going to be during the early story development of a trailer, like during the animatic phase?
Byron:
Yeah. So, a lot of the time, especially with the animation, the animators will want sounds to work with because they want to animate their facial expressions and how they move. So, a lot of the time I'll do first-pass creature vocals for something. I just did a Beastmen trailer, and one of the key characters in it is a giant, beast-like creature. For his movement and growls they wanted some of the vocalizations to work with. Obviously that was at a very early stage in the trailer, so I didn't really have much picture to work with. I just created some movement sounds for them to start working on. When they had a first pass, they would pass it back to me, I would tweak the vocals, and that kind of worked and evolved from there. It's an interesting way of working, definitely.
Bailey:
Going back and forth and collaborating in that way.
Byron:
Yeah. The animator's job is to make it feel real just as much ours is, so we're able to give them sounds to work with. And they're able to say, "It'd be better if it did this," or I can even give them some ideas, saying, "We could have them do this kind of growl, so he might need to move this way." That's a cool way of working instead of the animators just being off in their own department not really talking to the sound guys. We have a very close relationship with the animators, which is great.
Animation tagging in the Creative Assembly - Attila animation tool.
Bailey:
Yeah, you gotta. Were there ever any moments where you had a great idea for a sound but there was no real plan for that visually, so they then created visuals for the sound? Does that ever happen?
Byron:
It's happened in game development, definitely. But for the trailer stuff, it does happen to an extent. Very early on, at the start of a trailer production, there will be meetings with the cinematic principle (who's basically the person in charge of the trailer), the brand director, and the script writers. We'll all sit down and talk about it. I certainly put in ideas like, "It'd be great if we could have room for this sound at the start of the trailer, and then we could do a reveal or something like that. That would work." So, there's definitely room for sounds to influence trailers. It definitely influences the edit, totally. But for the very early ideas, it can certainly influence it.
There's a trailer I'm working on at the moment where we've added a whole opening section just with black and a few logos, and it's just sound. That lasts for like fifteen or twenty seconds and then the trailer kicks off and it's a reveal. That's definitely an example of how sound takes a leading role in telling the story.
Bailey:
Where you can just hear the audio. That's cool.
Byron:
Exactly. It's cool, and it can set up a scene or it can kind of set the tone.
Bailey:
So, you've worked on games and you've worked on trailers. You've also done some work on film, like for the film On the Road.
Byron:
Yes, I've done a little bit of long form feature film kind of stuff. Mainly as a sound editor. It's another way of working.
Bailey:
Were you working remotely for that project?
Byron:
I was, yeah. I was working with a friend of mine, who was the sound supervisor, and she asked me whether I wanted to come onboard and cut some sound effects for a few of the scenes. That was definitely good fun. I do like working on feature films, but you do tend to be a little more isolated, I suppose. I mean, I haven't had the opportunity to work in a larger production where everyone is working together.
On the Road trailer.
Bailey:
How big was the team that you interacted with?
Byron:
Probably three people. It was just the sound supervisor, and two of the editors. It was quite a small team I think.
Bailey:
Did you only do a few scenes for that?
Byron:
I did a couple of reels, focusing on specific sounds, which was fun.
Bailey:
Anything in particular from that movie that you could point to that you played a role in?
Byron:
I cut a lot of the vehicle sounds. There's a kind of chase moment in there that I cut, that was pretty cool. It's mainly vehicle stuff that I did. They're all old cars, so they were difficult to get a hold of. But we did manage to get original recordings and cut them in, which was good. They're really old American cars.
Bailey:
What was one of your favorite projects to work on in your career thus far?
Byron:
I'd probably say my favorite moment so far has been Alien: Isolation. I think just because of how important a role audio played in that project, and also because it's Alien. [laughs] I mean, I grew up watching Alien, Aliens, and all the different incarnations of it. To be able to work with that franchise was, for me, a massive high point in my career so far. The whole marketing campaign for that was fantastic. Working on all of the game development through to all of the marketing assets, it was definitely the highest point in my career so far.
Improvise, the Alien: Isolation cinematic trailer. Directed by Ben Hibon.
Bailey:
You worked directly with Ben Hibon on the CGI trailer?
Byron:
Yes. So, originally Adelphoi did some of the sound for it, and they passed it over to us and I did more sound to it, mixed it, and had some fun with it. I added in the real creature vocals from the game and made them a bit more bespoke. I updated the Foley and I also did a lot of the sound design on that. That was actually a really fun trailer to work on.
One of my favorite moments in that trailer is the moment she crawls into that vent shaft and it all just goes quiet. Creating that space around her was really fun to do. I used a new reverb technology, it's like a plug-in that we've got that creates real reflections. You can play sounds in moments inside a scene. That was really interesting to do. So, I used that extensively on that trailer. That's one of my favorite parts of it. The way everything feels in the space, and you kind of believe everything in there. It was a challenge to get everything right, but in the end I think it sounded quite cool.
Bailey:
For those sounds, when you're in that tight enclosure, what do you do to kind of get the right reverberations?
Byron:
Ideally you'd record stuff. We recorded inside vent shafts to get the footsteps and things like that, but I also used a plugin that allows you to put an object in a space and move that object around a space. It calculates different reflections and reverberations. And you can move that object through the world, so over time. So, you can get really, really realistic reflections and reverb from it. That was one of the main things I used. That along with a lot of the source that we'd recorded for the game. Inside vents, so when you'd go into a vent and you can hear the creaks and the moans of the vent shaft move. We used a lot of things like that in there, which was fun.
Bailey:
I'd say it was definitely very cinematic! It was a lot of fun to watch and listen to.
Byron:
Also, another good moment was when the alien comes down for the first time and you see his foot just hit the floor, and then all those foot falls and his vocalizations really puts you on edge. It really makes you feel like you're Ripley in that moment.
A shot from Improvise.
Bailey:
Yeah. So, what are you trying to learn more of right now? What excites you these days?
Byron:
I think it's finding new ways of approaching sound design. For Alien: Isolation I used a process where you record sounds using a contact microphone, and also an electromagnetic microphone which picks up sounds that you can't hear. So, it's out of your hearing spectrum, but it turns those into audible frequencies. That opened up a completely new world to me of sounds that I'd never really heard before. So, it's just extending that and finding new ways to extend my knowledge and my sound library. It's being able to create new and interesting sounds that no one's ever heard—that's what I want to be able to do, if possible.
A good example is when I heard the creature vocals of the MUTOs in the film Godzilla. There's this weird clicking sound. At first I was like, "I'm not sure whether it fits the moment." But then I sat back and was like, "No, actually it works really well." And that was something I'd never really heard before. I'd never heard that sound, it was totally alien to me, but yet it fit the picture so well. So, being able to create sounds like that and new sounds that people have never heard before is what drives me at the moment.
Bailey:
What was it about that sound that was particularly novel to you?
Byron:
I don't know. It was haunting. It was very different. It had this almost croaking element. It didn't necessarily straight away say "giant monster"; it wasn't a conventional monster sound, which was great. It was completely different. And the way it kind of echoed across the landscapes in the scene—it just felt huge. It felt massive. They did a fantastic job on that. So, kudos to those guys.
Byron's studio at Creative Assembly.
Bailey:
So, in addition to them, are there any other works out there that you follow or people that you kind of draw inspiration from these days?
Byron:
I mean, most sound designers always say Randy Thom and Gary Rydstrom and people like that. And I totally find those guys amazing. But in the trailer world, one of the guys that I look up to quite a lot is a guy called Charles Deenen. He and his crew over at Source Sound make absolutely fantastic sounding trailers. Whenever I get the opportunity to work with him it's fantastic.
Bailey:
What did you collaborate with him on?
Byron:
I first worked with him at EA on Need for Speed: Hot Pursuit. So, I worked on some trailers for that. There was a Pagani Zonda live-action trailer that I collaborated with him on. And I've worked with him on a few other things. Some Crysis 3 trailers and a few other bits and pieces. Working with him is always fun because he always pushes you to create great sounds, and pushes you hard. But the ultimate product is always a great sounding one.
The Lethal Weapons of Crysis 3. Byron worked as a sound editor on this trailer with Charles Deenen, supervising sound editor and mixer.
Bailey:
What were some of the more challenging sounds to get just right, from a project in the past?
Byron:
Going back to the CGI trailer for Total War. That section with the giant bird-like creature at the end. Getting his vocals as he moves through the air, and getting that size right was quite challenging for me. It took quite a few attempts to get that sounding ominous, big, and oppressive. We went through loads of different variations. I think, in the end, we used some morphing software to morph different animals together. I think it was a few different vocalizations from alligators and myself. And morphing that and stretching it out so it was very, very time-stretched and pitched down, and adding different effects on to it. That was very difficult to get right. I didn't want it just to sound like a normal everyday monster, I wanted it to sound different and interesting. That was one of the biggest challenges for me anyway.
Bailey:
Well, thanks for taking the time to talk today. It's been a great pleasure.
Byron:
Nice, yeah. No problem, Bailey. I hope some of the stuff I've said has been useful. [laughs]
Bailey:
Absolutely! Keep up the good work.
Byron:
Thanks very much. And you. You keep up the good work.
The views and opinions expressed in this interview are solely those of the people in this interview and do not necessarily reflect the views of their employers.