Multimedia
Blogs
Forum
Affordable HD
Whitepapers
Newsletters
Events
Advertisers
DCP Directory
MillimeterWorkflow Evolution
Dec 1, 2007 12:00 PM, By Dan Daley
As the tools for video-game audio get more sophisticated, the sound gets more complex and the workflow has to adapt.
Nick LaMartina, sound designer at Cheyenne Mountain Entertainment in Mesa, Ariz., uses Sony Vegas and Sound Forge audio software for games such as Stargate Worlds (pictured).
Workflow starts at conceptualiz-ation
LaMartina is currently working on Stargate Worlds, a massively multiplayer online role-playing game (MMOPRG) — which is exponentially more complex than your basic console title, with as many as several thousand players anywhere in the world engaged simultaneously, each confronting hundreds of scenes whose sequence and audio are determined by the course of play. “As a result, the sound image has to be more intricate,” LaMartina says.
In order to achieve that level of detail, the sound workflow starts with the conceptualization of the game itself — another way that game audio differs from film, where audio generally doesn't begin until location recording. The art team developing the visuals will provide the audio team with a list of narrative assets — characters, environments, climates, landscapes, etc. “If it moves or shakes, it's going to need sound,” LaMartina says. His methodology is to poll the other departments involved in the development process and ask them for as much description as they can provide about the assets — especially any movements they will make in the course of play. “From that, you begin to figure out what kind of sounds need to be associated with the assets,” he says.
Marc Schaefgen, worldwide audio director for Midway Home Entertainment and studio audio director for Midway's facility in Austin (the city that has become for game development what Silicon Valley is for computers), says his audio development follows the same track as the overall game structure: a two- to three-month conceptualization period followed by up to six months of prototyping; as many as four months of virtual simulations; then preproduction, production, and post (including authoring) comprising nearly an additional two years.
“It's not like film where the audio comes in closer to the end,” Schaefgen says. “One of the key things that's being worked out in the early stages is: Which type of world is the game and the audio going to live in — realistic or sci-fi? That determines how the sound effects are going to play out.”
The early stages of a game are also the point at which budgets are worked out and when some developers decide if some of the audio will be outsourced, which will also affect workflow in terms of file formats. Music, which is the audio element most often outsourced, has a wide variety of file formats to choose from. Even among Midway Home Entertainment's several facility locations including Austin, Chicago, and Seattle, multiple multitask formats are used — including Steinberg Nuendo, Apple Logic, and MOTU Digital Performer. However, the gold standard remains Digidesign Pro Tools session files, converted to WAV files for mastering and authoring. “We expect our vendors to do their own file-format conversions and deliver Pro Tools files to us,” Schaefgen says.
Ascent Media's game audio division, in Los Angeles, is a prime outsource provider. Sound designer Peter Zinda says that the close and early collaboration that characterizes game development means that files are frequently flowing both ways between Ascent and its clients. “We send a lot of QuickTime movies out that show our sound ideas matched to their pictures,” he says. But most files are Pro Tools sessions, and Zinda says Ascent is transitioning from the FTP transfer mode it has been using to Digidesign's DigiDelivery protocol, which he says is better suited to the Pro Tools files.
The choice of audio platforms is often driven by which functions that audio departments choose to prioritize. Creative Design Network (CDN) NetMix Pro's high degree of compatibility with Pro Tools is what clinched it for Midway, which relies on Pro Tools as a primary digital audio platform; on the other hand, that same criticality of naming tens of thousands of audio tags is why Cheyenne Mountain Entertainment uses Sony Vegas and Sound Forge audio software. “It automates files in a logical manner,” LaMartina says, and it offers other automated functions such as dithering and resampling.
However, live collaboration has to occur at some point in any outsourced scenario, according to Zinda. “Sometimes, a developer will send their audio director to our studios to collaborate with us,” he says. “We have high-end PCs, as well as, for example, Xbox 360 test kits that the audio director can work on. They bring a build of the game with them on a drive and our designers pass sounds to them through our internal network. This allows us to hear sounds in the mix immediately. It speeds up the sound design process, and I think we end up with a higher-quality product. Hearing about how our sounds are working via email is one thing, but actually hearing it in context can be very inspiring.”
