The Mana World Forums

yourmistakes wrote:i would much prefer a lightning crack sound than anything else for ingrav

i have to agree with this, a crack like ingrav would be nice for the effect. i am back in 2 days and i plan on helping with this kind of sfx.

see you all soon!

It is a lightning crack. Believe it or not. Try it without the Current sound and you have a gunshot, pretty much in the time span allotted. It was explained in above threads.

Ledmitz wrote:Well, I made the electric mono again as requested. Bet you can't hear the difference though.

Umm are you sure? it still sounds like its coming from the right side.

Positive. And I boosted the left side 3db before, not the right. If you are hearing it more in the right, then it is from the original source file. I will have to double check the meters to see if that is the case. You can load the file into Audacity or any media player with level indicators to see if this is the case too, if you want.

Ledmitz wrote:Positive. And I boosted the left side 3db before, not the right. If you are hearing it more in the right, then it is from the original source file. I will have to double check the meters to see if that is the case. You can load the file into Audacity or any media player with level indicators to see if this is the case too, if you want.

Audacity differently indicates that not only is the right side louder, but many sounds are only in the right channel. Is there a way you can just merge the two channels together?

"Is there a way you can just merge the two channels together?"
Sure... It's called mono.. hehe

On my system, loading into SoundForge brings the levels at digital zero on the left and clipping on the right. I would treat -0.3dB as your absolute maximum ceiling to allow for the way different devices handle levels.

Also our perception of 'loudness' doesn't work in the same way as those peak meters you get in most DAWs. If you can balance the loudness using RMS settings, this is a much closer approximation of the way we hear sound pressure levels.

Mono conversion would fix the stereo imbalance. In the stereo effect, the elements (and/or FX on them) have different settings and the sound is quite 'wide', given that distinct separation between left and right speakers; this is quite nice for musical components, but for the most part, FX are good in mono; often the audio middleware handles positioning relative to the player when necessary. I know that's not an option here, but I don't think it's too important. Best advice I can offer is to lower the levels till your Master Output level reads no more than -0.3dB on your meter upon playback of the full effect, and export that out as mono (or convert to mono afterwards, where you may possibly have to re-adjust levels)

loading into SoundForge brings the levels at digital zero on the left and clipping on the right

Yes, I forgot to mention that there was clipping and I can't see how to get rid of it. I am using Audacity... I probably need a newer version too. There is a recording lever and meter where I can see it go into the red on the right, but the levers from minimum to maximum, do nothing to the sound or meters. I probably have to do something lame like hit the record button, but I figured that function would just output a new file somewhere. I will try it.

Mono conversion would fix the stereo imbalance

You guys finally convinced me, with a set point of SFX origin on a map, that mono is the best solution. It probably has been for some time or always. I don't know, but I believe it to be true now.

Ledmitz wrote: Yes, I forgot to mention that there was clipping and I can't see how to get rid of it. I am using Audacity... I probably need a newer version too. There is a recording lever and meter where I can see it go into the red on the right, but the levers from minimum to maximum, do nothing to the sound or meters. I probably have to do something lame like hit the record button, but I figured that function would just output a new file somewhere. I will try it.

Those meters will probably be relative to your output level (the same as turning a volume knob on your speakers) but your waveform and meters may not have changed when you do that and are what defines the file's volume. To directly change this, you'll need to click Effects>Amplify and adjust the level from there.

You can also Normalise levels to -3dB (this is a good, safe level) using the Normalize function.

I got rid of the clipping by manually changing each track, but thank you for telling me about the amp effect. It will be used in future. I still see no way to mix into mono with Audacity, but if you check the levels, you can see, the echo bounces back and forth, very slightly, from left to right. I know it's not complete, but here is my newest submission. The panning is as even as possible without actually being in mono. I think it would be more like thunder to have it ring out longer and once cut off by another Ingrav, it may sound more like real lightning continuously starting over with each new Ingrav strike. I also noticed that Frillyar is a longer duration spell as is Kaflosh and these sounds will NEED to be longer in order to have the animations and sounds in sync.