A SoundFellas Ambience Kit is a special collection of audio assets designed to help you create very realistic environmental ambience sounds for your projects. Apart from ready-made ambience loops that you can drag and drop directly into your project, you also get isolated elements, noiseprint loops, reverb impulse responses, and occlusion impulse responses. With all those assets, you will be able to create your own acoustic environments that fit exactly the style of your project.
This might be a bit complex for some creators, so in this article, we'll break down what an Ambience Kit is and the tools you might need to use it effectively.
Ambience Kit Contents
An Ambience Kit sound library includes the following asset folders:
- Scenes - Ambix
- Scenes - Quad
- Scenes - Stereo
- Noiseprints
- Elements
- IRs - Spaces - Ambix
- IRs - Spaces - Mono
- IRs - Spaces - Quad
- IRs - Spaces - Stereo
- IRs - Occlusion
Depending on the version of the library you have, you may see different scene format folders. You can always check what's included in a sound library by clicking on the PDF link on the library's webpage. There, you'll also find a detailed list of all files, with technical details and keywords for each file. This way, you know exactly the contents of each sound library.
Here's a simple explanation of what each folder contains and how to use them.
Scenes
The scenes are pre-made loops of background sounds that represent the main environments of the library's theme. They're great for quickly adding sound to your project, whether for testing or for the final version if they match your style.
The scenes come in different formats for various types of projects:
Scenes - Ambix
Ambisonics is a spherical format that includes sound information from all around. This folder contains 1st order ambisonics (ACN/SN3D) and is great for projects using Unreal, Unity, DaVinci Resolve, Wwise, Reaper (with IEM/SPARTA Plugins or similar tools), or similar programs. It's also good for immersive podcasts, audio dramas, and VR projects. This format is recommended for projects where you want surround sound with height, like Dolby Atmos or in movie theaters.
Additionally, when needed, scenes include sounds from below the horizon, making them even more immersive for applications that use special sound techniques, such as binaural stereo with head tracking, like those in VR helmets or video games that feature rotating sound fields, i.e. space dogfight simulators.
Scenes - Quad
This is a four-channel surround format and is perfect for any surround project. You only need 4 channels to create realistic background sounds. For example, in a 5.1 surround setup, the sound can come from the four corners of the speaker configuration, while the center speaker focuses on dialogue and the LFE carries special low-frequency effects. For 7.1 surround projects, you can create the side channels by mixing the front with the rear at a 50/50 balance. Of course, for any channel count greater than 5.1, we recommend using the ambisonic loops and decoding to your project's end format.
Our quad surround scenes are isotropic (balanced equally), making them great for applications that move sound around, such as video games or interactive VR experiences. They are also compatible with traditional surround sound systems, though for larger venues, we recommend using Ambix renders.
Scenes - Stereo
This is the traditional stereo format, but with a twist. We derive our stereo mixes from our fully spherical audio composites; therefore, we are capable of producing a more wide soundfield that covers a larger area than the distance of the speakers, making for a more immersive ambience. This format is recommended for any project that doesn't need multichannel output (common surround or higher).
In addition to the scenes in various formats available in our sound libraries, what sets our ambience loop sound libraries apart from the competition - and the reason we refer to them as Ambience Kits - is that our libraries include all the elements you need to effortlessly create your own custom environmental ambiences. Below, we describe those assets.
Noiseprints
Noiseprints, or room tones, are the background noise sounds found in a specific place. They consist of just the noise without any clear sounds like Foley or special sound effects. These sounds are important in making movies and games feel more real and consistent. Noiseprints capture the unique sound qualities of a space, helping voices, Foley, and sound effects mix well together while at the same time avoiding the digital silence that sounds artificial.
All our noiseprints loop smoothly, which means they can easily be used to create your own sound environments. They serve as the first layer of sound, allowing other sounds to be added on top. The way they sound and their volume set the basic feel of the overall sound. Our noiseprints are also short in length, making them ideal for creating realistic background sounds in games, especially for devices with limited power, like mobile phones and handheld game devices.
Elements
These are isolated sounds or loops that contribute to a scene, distinct from noiseprints, though some may be slightly noisy. Foleys, sound effects, walla, and car pass-bys are examples of isolated samples you can layer over the environment's noiseprint. Of course, the elements are related to the theme of each Ambience Kit.
All our elements come as anechoic as they can get, depending on the way they were captured. We dereverberate our isolated sounds, not only for our Ambience Kits but also for your Sound Effect libraries, and we also inverse all the artifacts from the recording chain, like the frequency response of the microphones, so you get the cleanest possible sound from the source. That way, the samples will sound more realistic when used with artificial reverbs or mixed in an immersive virtual environment such as a game level with virtual acoustics. Due to the cleanliness of those samples, it is also easier for the end listener to localize the location of the sound event, making them a great asset for immersive experiences such as games, film, and VR.
Having these elements as isolated assets allows for creative freedom. You can design custom acoustic environments, sync background sounds with visuals or animations (such as robot hands in a factory or thunder with flashes), and control the frequency and direction of each sound.
Our elements contain specific tags at the end of the filename, denoting specific characteristics of the type of sound. Let's see some of those tags:
- A, B, C, … ,Z: These are type tags, used to denote different types of similar sound sources. For example, Car_PassBy_A and Car_PassBy_B are different kinds of vehicles. This is useful when the library contains more than one type of the same thing, i.e. Laser_Pistol_A and Laser_Pistol_B are different pistols; one might be larger than the other or just a different technology.
- 01, 02, 03, … ,N: All our elements have many variations to use so the sound of your project is more natural and less repetitive. For example, Footstep_Boot_A_01, Footstep_Boot_A_02, and up to Footstep_Boot_A_12 are different samples captured from a Foley performance with boot type A. To compare with the type tags, Footstep_Boot_B_01 to Footstep_Boot_B_12 are again isolated oneshots of footsteps with another boot we call type B.
- Loop: If the 'loop' tag is in the filename, then this sample is created to render seamlessly. If this tag is not present in the filename, then the sample is probably a oneshot. Of course, in some edge cases, you can use them as you please.
- Multiple: This means that these samples contain multiple oneshots in a row, not because they aren't properly isolated, but because the nature of the sound makes it so. For example, a dog barking can contain multiple 'barks' and still be a oneshot.
- Short, VeryLong, etc.: Used only when it makes sense to separate from other groups of similar samples, these tags denote duration.
- LowRate, MediumRate, HighRate: Used only when it makes sense, these denote the rate of an event in the sound. For example, a rotating engine loop might have recordings from different rates.
- Diffused, Echoey, Reverberant: As our isolated samples are anechoic (dereverberated), in some cases the reflections of the sound with the environment or the body of the sound-generating object can play a significant role in the sound itself. In those cases, you will see an extra tag denoting that the sound is not anechoic, descriptive of what kind of reflections are predominantly present in the sample.
- DopplerInversed: This is a very special tag. Some sounds cannot be captured without the Doppler effect that is created by the movement of the object that makes the sound in relation to the static microphone. Car pass-bys or arrow fly-bys, for instance. As part of our PureSource™ audio restoration protocol, we inverse the Doppler effect, ending with a sound that sounds static and can be used in game engines and virtual auralization with a dynamic Doppler effect applied on top of them, making them easy to sync with visuals or relative speeds at runtime.
- Other tags: Depending on the case, you might see other tags that are used to help you make sense of the content specifications just by looking at the filename of each sample.
Space IRs
Sound samples alone cannot describe an acoustic environment. A big part of the impression we get from any environment is the reflection of the sounds when interacting with the surfaces of the environment's structures and bouncing back. You know it as the reverb effect and in some larger spaces as echo, or both in more elaborate environments like a vast lake in front of a high mountain with a huge cave in the back.
Impulse responses allow us to capture this acoustic property, and it's a great file format because you can recreate the same reverberation on any platform and device using only a file without the need to set algorithmic reverb generators that have many differences from platform to platform. For example, when a sound designer is working in a DAW (Digital Audio Workstation) and uses a reverb plugin to simulate a scene from a game, the game developer has no way to recreate that specific reverb in a game engine, meaning that the prototype and the end product will have differences in the acoustics, breaking the aesthetics that were agreed upon in the prototype review. By both the sound designer and the game developer using impulse responses and a convolution reverb, you ensure that the acoustics of your game level will be the same during all production phases. Convolution plugins are available for both audio editors and game engines, so it's easier to integrate the technology throughout the digital production pipeline.
Furthermore, our Ambience Kits include impulse responses from the most representative locations related to the theme of each Ambience Kit. That means that you don't have to search for impulse responses elsewhere, and with a little tweak - if you like - you can create shorter/longer or frequency variations of those impulse responses to use in your projects. Impulse responses are simple audio files that capture the reflections of a specific location; you can edit them with any audio editor.
We provide our space impulse responses in ambisonic, quad, stereo, and mono channel formats for your convenience. The recommended use of each channel format is similar to what we recommend for the ready-made scene formats above.
For extra convenience, for each impulse response sample, we provide different versions:
- The original full-length/quality sample: This is for archival use and to use if you want to edit the impulse response. Those are long files and not recommended for use as they require heavy processing to apply to the sound. Unless you know what you're doing, it's better to use one of the other versions. But if you have a powerful workstation and you know what you're doing, you can use those for the ultimate quality of acoustic simulation.
- RT120: High-quality (optimal duration) version. Use this version in NLE editors like DAWs or video editors that render offline.
- RT96: Medium quality (medium duration) version. Use this version in games and interactive applications that will play back on powerful machines. You can also use this version as optimized IRs in NLE editors while working to keep the editor responsive and save resources while editing, and then trade them with the RT120 ones for exporting.
- RT72: Low quality (very short) version. Use this version for optimized applications and games that run on mobile and embedded devices that have limited resources. This version is not the best, but it still delivers the main characteristics of the environment's reverb, super-optimized for low CPU use.
*The RT values are not real-world RT (Reverberation Time) measurements, but our own digital RT measurements that we developed and use to separate the duration truncation we do in the digital domain. The number following the RT tag denotes the negative dBfsTP value that we use to mark the point in time the impulse response is cut (with a linear fade-out to preserve naturality), calculated in a 64-bit audio engine. If you need more information, please contact our customer support.
Occlusion IRs
Same as with Space IRs, to properly recreate any acoustic environment's ambience, we must not forget the inward occlusion that we hear when sound is passing through objects and walls before reaching our ears.
This is a unique feature of our sound libraries, as we don't know of any other sound library vendor that includes these in their sound libraries. The Occlusion IRs we include with each of our Ambience Kits are monophonic IRs designed to simulate sound passing through objects and walls, acting like frequency filters when used with a convolver (convolution processor).
Again, as with the Space IRs, the Occlusion IRs included with an Ambience Kit reflect the theme of that Ambience Kit, making them a perfect companion for building believable acoustic environments.
Sounding Off
The SoundFellas Ambience Kits provide ready-made loops and additional assets like noiseprints, isolated anechoically restored elements, and space and occlusion impulse responses, offering a flexible toolkit for immersive audio design. Whether for films, games, VR experiences, or beyond, they let you quickly add realistic backgrounds or create custom environments, with your imagination as the only limit.
Eager to create the perfect atmos for your project? Get the Ambience Kits that your project needs and connect with us and other members of our community at our Forum.
If you have any pre-sale or post-sale questions, please contact us through our Customer Support Portal.
