Open Panzer
Developer's Forum => Open Source Sound Dev => Topic started by: vonTirpitz on February 02, 2017, 12:16:20 PM
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I'm noticing that finding a good collection of sound files that are located all in one place is proving to be difficult.
Unless I've missed something very obvious what do you think of the possibility of starting a collection of non-copyrighted materials on the GitHub repository under the Open Panzer project? While I am unsure whom would be interested, I certainly would like a centralized locale for all those amazing recordings that are just floating around on hard drives. Plus it would save a ton of time trying to locate good files to work with. Maybe we could find a sound engineer "volunteer" to go to Bovington in April to get some decent recordings on Tiger Day 2017. ;D
Setting up a sub-categorized section (perhaps searchable) with all of the common sound types for the hobby such as engines, mechanical, gunfire and explosions would be ideal. I would recommend a minimum requirement for quality such as uncompressed .wav 16-bit 44.1kHz.
Any thoughts? Perhaps if it takes off we could solicit members on some of the RC forums to contribute what they may have in their private libraries. Just a hope I suppose... :P
-Marc
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I agree with you absolutely that a repository of freely-available sound files is a necessity. I have given this some thought several times and although I haven't initiated anything yet I do think Open Panzer is the logical place for it. I have grappled with the best way to host them, my initial thought was to create another page similar to the existing Downloads (http://openpanzer.org/downloads) page but just for sounds. The idea of using GitHub hadn't crossed my mind but now you mention it that is a good idea.
I am still new to GitHub myself. I'm comfortable posting but I haven't really experimented with pull requests or the community involvement side of things. But this could be a good learning experience for us all. And it might be less maintenance work in the long run than a static page.
For now I've created a repo with some empty folders: OpenPanzerProject/Sound-Files (https://github.com/OpenPanzerProject/Sound-Files)
Build it and they will come! :) Or so I hope. Let's use this thread for ongoing discussion.
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To get the sound-set discussion going again, i created a new sound set for the Kingtiger.. i will post it in the Repo..
Here is a small sample:
Now i got the reflowing of the soundcards down, i will start creating more soundsets...
Tell me what you think and what would sound better!
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Hi,
attached a Soundfile from the Saumur-Kingtiger recorded last year May at Overloon
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Nice, i will give it a try!
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Good work Johnny, glad to see someone working on this!
The throttle is using stepped sounds which I know is the way most do it. It does create a sound that is responsive to throttle so that is the advantage of it, but to my ear the pitch changes also sound synthetic. That is not a problem with your sound files specifically so much as with the approach in general.
The alternative is to have a long, relatively consistent sample play with little throttle responsiveness, it sounds more natural but doesn't give the user much satisfaction when he moves the stick. So it's kind of a trade-off either way, and regardless it's a difficult task and I salute anyone who takes the time to create something.
Jurgen's sample is also a very good one, for the right editor!
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Hi,
attached a Soundfile from the Saumur-Kingtiger recorded last year May at Overloon
Sounds very nice, i will start to cut it up in pieces with Audacity! I really like the startup and idle.. Much better than the IBU soundfiles i got now..
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Hi,
attached a Soundfile from the Saumur-Kingtiger recorded last year May at Overloon
Excelent source. I will give it a try too.
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Quick question, where can I upload my beta sounds? I have a file for the Sherman, that weights about 85 megas. It might grow even more.
I cannot upload them here https://github.com/OpenPanzerProject/Sound-Files/upload/master/SoundSets/OpenPanzerSoundCard
It is taking me ages, but I am trying to cover the lack of skills with loads of love. Hope somebody likes it. :)
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To get files on GitHub you have to submit a pull request, but I understand if you won't want to learn all about that.
Do you have a DrobBox or something where you can put it? I will post it to GitHub for you.
But you might as well wait until you feel it is complete because the transfer back and forth is likely to be cumbersome.
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Sorry to down you, but it will never, ever, be complete. There is always something to add, something to change, something to tweak, something to improve... Lol.
I will try to understand how that github works, and I will keep updating the files there. I will wait a bit more until I am more happy with the results, but as I said, there is always something else to fix!
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Well, I just uploaded some videos of the beta 2.0 sounds. I think they are way better than the ones I sent you back in the day, Luke. I am not looping 2 seconds sounds anymore. The end result is better, but as you mention, there is a strange feeling of less responsible throttle... Anyway I think it is worth it and the overall sound is more natural.
I might do a step by step acceleration too (in fact I am including a legacy folder with the old sounds too), but I might change the way I and most of people do it.
Most of us, mere mortals use a low loop deep sound at the beginning (low speed) and fast sound when full speed... But such a sound would be like this in the case the tank has only one gear.
Ill try to explain this with a small graphic, we all used to do the sounds like this:
_______--------¨¨¨¨¨¨¨
And it might be better something like this:
__---¨¨__---¨¨__---¨¨
So it feels like you are changing the gears. If you sinchronize that with my way of changing gears, the result would be very good too. I also found the equilibrium in having 3 gears, no less, no more.
But enough words and more sounds!
First user sounds and sound banks. Using a rotary for the user sounds, and push buttons for the sound banks.
In the sound bank I have as you can see, buttons for next track, previous track, and play/stop current track.
The other button is for the sound bank B, (not used in the video) with ambient sounds like artillery strikes, stukas diving and so on.
In the second video motor sounds (I want to redo the idle sound) machine guns (Now clips of 20 seconds instead a 2 second sound looping) turret rotation sound hand cranked and motor powered, main cannon with several reload sounds and more. I think I have a bug or so with the transmision engage. I will open a new thread today.
Beware! The video does not make any justice to the actual sounds. Crappy phone....
In the soundpack I am going to upload I will include everything and more. Some alternative sounds too. The King Tiger sounds I am making will have a very similar setup, but german voices and more drama music like Wagner and Mozart. I am really sorry for time it took me, but I am really decided to make some sound sets. I owe you that.
If after the king tiger sounds I keep some sanityin my brain, I will try to do Panzer IV sounds too.
Luke: Can you add a sound for when toggling the smoke machine on and off?
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Actually I think your engine sounds are sounding very good now. It is hard to tell exactly how they are responding to commands but the sounds themselves are sounding very realistic and if a moving model were generating those sounds I would be impressed.
When you collate your sounds for a specific model you could probably leave out all the music and spoken commands and basically anything that would fall under a "User Sound." Those are applicable across multiple models and are optional depending on the user's preferences.
However you have a nice collection of those types of sounds and we can still include them for download. Maybe you can put together a bundle of "German user sounds" (German commands, German music), and a bundle of "American user sounds", etc... That will keep the file size for the model-specific sounds smaller and we don't have to repeat these optional sounds for each model, people can download the extra sounds once and apply them as they desire.
For the model-set I think we just want whatever is specific to that model - engine, turret, MG, cannon and whatever specifically applies to that vehicle. Of course including alternative sounds as well as the original MP3s and such are fine and would be valuable to those wishing to modify or create their own versions.
Luke: Can you add a sound for when toggling the smoke machine on and off?
It's possible and I will ponder whether it is worth it, but I might file it away for now. From long experience I have learned that adding extra features is not necessarily an intrinsic improvement as each small thing contributes extra clutter and complexity. Any individual addition is probably not so bad by itself but when multiplied by many dozens of such changes we can actually end up with a worse experience. Therefore I try to weigh each addition by how useful it will be to a large number of people. But sometimes I am not sure if there is anyone on earth who will use as many sounds as yourself!
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Actually I think your engine sounds are sounding very good now. It is hard to tell exactly how they are responding to commands but the sounds themselves are sounding very realistic and if a moving model were generating those sounds I would be impressed.
When you collate your sounds for a specific model you could probably leave out all the music and spoken commands and basically anything that would fall under a "User Sound." Those are applicable across multiple models and are optional depending on the user's preferences.
However you have a nice collection of those types of sounds and we can still include them for download. Maybe you can put together a bundle of "German user sounds" (German commands, German music), and a bundle of "American user sounds", etc... That will keep the file size for the model-specific sounds smaller and we don't have to repeat these optional sounds for each model, people can download the extra sounds once and apply them as they desire.
For the model-set I think we just want whatever is specific to that model - engine, turret, MG, cannon and whatever specifically applies to that vehicle. Of course including alternative sounds as well as the original MP3s and such are fine and would be valuable to those wishing to modify or create their own versions.
Luke: Can you add a sound for when toggling the smoke machine on and off?
It's possible and I will ponder whether it is worth it, but I might file it away for now. From long experience I have learned that adding extra features is not necessarily an intrinsic improvement as each small thing contributes extra clutter and complexity. Any individual addition is probably not so bad by itself but when multiplied by many dozens of such changes we can actually end up with a worse experience. Therefore I try to weigh each addition by how useful it will be to a large number of people. But sometimes I am not sure if there is anyone on earth who will use as many sounds as yourself!
LOL, yes, I am a sound sick guy. I love sounds... And lights!.
In this particular case (smoke), I think having a sound is indeed very usefull, because it tells us that the smoke machine has been toggled on. I am using custom smoke machines that are very silent and not always work, lol, so sometimes it is handy for me to actually heard something from the tank.
Regarding user sounds, yeah I have a couple of gigabytes of them, and in english, german, russian and japanesse... I will happily upload them somewhere so everybody can download and use them on their will. But I think including some of them to the sound packs brings life to the model. Makes it more enjoyable and shines a bit more. My experience also says most users wont even bother to install their own user sounds..
And a Sherman driving around is cool... But when playing Dixie is ten times cooler. Lol.
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In this particular case (smoke), I think having a sound is indeed very usefull, because it tells us that the smoke machine has been toggled on. I am using custom smoke machines that are very silent and not always work, lol, so sometimes it is handy for me to actually heard something from the tank.
Can you not simply assign a User Sound to the same trigger source you use to toggle your smoker? This is why we have 12 user sounds! You can even have a different sound for on or off.
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In this particular case (smoke), I think having a sound is indeed very usefull, because it tells us that the smoke machine has been toggled on. I am using custom smoke machines that are very silent and not always work, lol, so sometimes it is handy for me to actually heard something from the tank.
Can you not simply assign a User Sound to the same trigger source you use to toggle your smoker? This is why we have 12 user sounds! You can even have a different sound for on or off.
Yep I considered that option... And even to make the transmiter play a sound too. Dont worry too much, it was just an idea.
Hi Forum, I am sounds addicted and I need an Intervention.
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Hi Luke, I am feeling stupid. I dont know how that github works, so I dont know how to upload files there. I tried to understand it several times, but I guess I need another wiki just for that, lol.
Anyway I just uploaded a small file with no less than 255 german voices. This voicepack is not my fauvorite, but I had to start somewhere, and somebody might find it usefull. Honestly I dont know the source of the three voice packs uploaded... I got them years ago. If you want to upload them to github just tell me, so once uploaded I can delete them from my google drive account.
https://1drv.ms/u/s!Ag10Kxs8SgAKlVWoXKRr87RG4atj
I have TONS of different sounds. How big is the biggest file we can upload there? Do we have any space limit?
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GitHub is definitely not for the faint of heart, I really didn't enjoy learning it myself. If anyone is curious, I use SourceTree as a client and it works well.
Anyway I don't mind uploading them for. I was able to download your file, however I noticed none of the sounds in the "2" folder are in 16 bit 44,100 Hz format. Would you like me to just discard those sounds? Or possibly you can change them, but it would take forever to do them all 80 by hand so I'm not going to volunteer for it (possibly Audacity has some scripting or macro you could use to run through them all, but I don't know).
GitHub wants us to keep a given repository under 1GB in size, and there is a hard limit of 100MB per single file. That still leaves a lot of room for small sound clips, but no need to go overboard either, you are probably the only one who will use most of these. Our main focus are the vehicle sound. Anyone can Google for random sound clips, voice recordings and music, but engine sounds have to be assembled by somebody through a laborious and skilled process, so that is where the value is.
But your German voices collection only comes to about ~15MB zipped so it's fine.
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Hi. I did not check the sound quality of those voice packs I uploaded. I think you can uploaded them to github like that, and if somebody wants to use the sounds, they can convert it to the required format themselves. Converting all of them is a pain, and maybe you are right and nobody is going to use them...
So I think I wont upload more voices or extra sounds until somebody requests them. Please tell me when (or if) the sounds are uploaded (sherman sounds too), so I can remove them from my one drive account
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So I think I wont upload more voices or extra sounds until somebody requests them. Please tell me when (or if) the sounds are uploaded (sherman sounds too), so I can remove them from my one drive account
Hi, i downloaded the german voices, would you please make the Sherman sounds available too? I really would like to use these!
*nevermind, i see that the sound sets are uploaded to Github... Thank you for sharing!
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So I think I wont upload more voices or extra sounds until somebody requests them. Please tell me when (or if) the sounds are uploaded (sherman sounds too), so I can remove them from my one drive account
Hi, i downloaded the german voices, would you please make the Sherman sounds available too? I really would like to use these!
*nevermind, i see that the sound sets are uploaded to Github... Thank you for sharing!
Hi, I have literally hundreds of more american german and russian voices. I could upload them too.
I am glad somebody likes them too!