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Best libraries for atmospheric sound design without discernible pitch

Bee_Abney said:
That's fantastic. I've added it to my Loot Audio watch list and will probably never get around to buying it since I can do this stuff with my existing synths/sample players and I like to tinker. But it likely won't be this good.
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I can neither confirm nor deny that it will or will not be on discount at a time in the near future. 😉
 
Syncopator said:
For example, the scene in which John Coffey "infects" Percy with the "kiss of death." I cannot find that cue on the album.

No obligation of course, but in case anyone's interested, it occurs at 2:26:49 in the movie (in media res). Much of that cue is dark and atmospheric with indiscernible pitch.
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Here's the scene:

 
Bee_Abney said:
Spitfire's Mercury is especially well suited to thrillers and horror; but can certainly be used for other contexts.

Spitfire also has a scraped percussion library called Resonate that might be useful.

Bioscape definitely has suitable sounds as it has a lot of textural options.

You might want to take a look at Audio Reward's libraries on Loot Audio. Roomscape and Quarantine could be good. Also on Loot Audio are the Genius Loci libraries from Atom Hub that have location recordings used to evoke an atmosphere of a place.

Loops de la Creme often includes textural material in his libraries, such as Prehistoric Percussion. And with Songbird Virtuoso you can actually play birdsong. Yes, that's melodic; but it can become textural depending on what you do with it.

More generally, I think you could do very well by checking out sample packs. You can load any sounds into your preferred sample player and mess about with them; you can also load samples of your choosing into Bioscape, Haunted Spaces, and the Audio Reward libraries.

Radio static, fridge hums, breezes, latch sounds, buzzing bees - all of these are great for filling out a texture that makes a kind of sense to the listener and evokes a place or state of mind - including happiness.

One thing that can be very useful is taking any non-tonal sample (say, a door opening; wind through the trees; footsteps in a wood; beach sounds) and then slowing them down. You needn't go so far as Paul X Stretch levels of slowing down, but that is always an option. Then layer the sounds, cut them up, and so on.

And, having mentioned slowing things down, I should probably mention cutting them up and playing them at all different speeds and pitches. A granular effects plugin or synthesiser might be really useful for you.

Sorry for straying into advice on sound design. That's not really what you asked for; but I've typed it now so I'll just leave it!
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No problem! I appreciate all of the tips, both for libraries and for sound design. All of this is very helpful. Thanks!
 
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Bee_Abney said:
Loops de la Creme often includes textural material in his libraries, such as Prehistoric Percussion. And with Songbird Virtuoso you can actually play birdsong. Yes, that's melodic; but it can become textural depending on what you do with it.
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What would you do with it to make it textural?

In another reply, you stated,

Bee_Abney said:
You can load any sounds into your preferred sample player and mess about with them;
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Again, what do you mean by "mess about"?

This may seem obvious to you, but to me it doesn't. 😊
 
Syncopator said:
What would you do with it to make it textural?

In another reply, you stated,


Again, what do you mean by "mess about"?

This may seem obvious to you, but to me it doesn't. 😊
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The answers are pretty much the same in both cases. If you like I can offer more information later, or maybe an example (especially once I've watched the clip).

Basically, modulation, delay, filtering, distortion and a lot of reverb can do a lot to transform a simple musical sound into a sustained, evolving, changing one. Experimenting with a transient shaper is also a good idea. You can enhance the transient, which doesn't have much tone, and dial done the tail. Then stretch the sound, or add delay and reverb, and you can lengthen extent the transient over time.

You could shorten the sound - if you can adjust the attack, decay, sustain and release, you shorten the attack and decay, and dial sustain and release right down. That would give you something more percussive. Or you could do all of that and lengthen the attack. That will then sound a lot like a reversed sound. (Or render it to audio and actually reverse it.)
 
I find this a fascinating topic. I generally throw foley or sfx into Paulstretch, Cecilia5 or a random granular engine so I think anything sample-based with stretching algorithms or Granular engines should give a person endless opportunities to create awesome sounds...

But if all else fails, I think Luftrum's Bioscape is amazing and very suitable.
 
Bee_Abney said:
More generally, I think you could do very well by checking out sample packs. You can load any sounds into your preferred sample player and mess about with them; you can also load samples of your
Click to expand...

Bee_Abney said:
The answers are pretty much the same in both cases. If you like I can offer more information later, or maybe an example (especially once I've watched the clip).

Basically, modulation, delay, filtering, distortion and a lot of reverb can do a lot to transform a simple musical sound into a sustained, evolving, changing one. Experimenting with a transient shaper is also a good idea. You can enhance the transient, which doesn't have much tone, and dial done the tail. Then stretch the sound, or add delay and reverb, and you can lengthen extent the transient over time.

You could shorten the sound - if you can adjust the attack, decay, sustain and release, you shorten the attack and decay, and dial sustain and release right down. That would give you something more percussive. Or you could do all of that and lengthen the attack. That will then sound a lot like a reversed sound. (Or render it to audio and actually reverse it.)
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Thank you.
Crowe said:
I find this a fascinating topic. I generally throw foley or sfx into Paulstretch, Cecilia5 or a random granular engine so I think anything sample-based with stretching algorithms or Granular engines should give a person endless opportunities to create awesome sounds...

But if all else fails, I think Luftrum's Bioscape is amazing and very suitable.
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Thanks!
 
Syncopator said:
What would you do with it to make it textural?
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Some of the easiest stuff is reverbs with a “freeze” type of feature.

If you have Reaktor, Boscomac made some really cool tools over the years.

https://boscomac.free.fr/
My favorites were :

Floodverb
Stellar
Freezbee

Send some non pitched percussion into these and play with the freeze settings and other controls to design some ambiances.
 
I know it’s not software, but this is what I use to create my own atmospheric and noise samples:



The physical aspect of these devices allows for continuous real-team adjustments that add movement and life. I can sample the output and then manipulate the results in the DAW with granular effects, time-stretching, etc.

Ina GRM Tools are particularly good for this. You’ve heard them used on Stranger Things, Mad Max:Fury Road, and American Gods - among others.
 
conan said:
I know it’s not software, but this is what I use to create my own atmospheric and noise samples:



The physical aspect of these devices allows for continuous real-team adjustments that add movement and life. I can sample the output and then manipulate the results in the DAW with granular effects, time-stretching, etc.

Ina GRM Tools are particularly good for this. You’ve heard them used on Stranger Things, Mad Max:Fury Road, and American Gods - among others.
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As I believe Kelis once said, I hate you... so much... right now. These are all things I've wanted to get but don't have!

But also, that is a great set up. I really like the approach too. I have recently started using a combination of hardware and in-computer digital processing myself. It would be interesting to extend the hardware options, such as including real tape - but soundwise I think it can be great.
 
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Crowe said:
As this was mentioned recently...

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75% off "Stigmata" by FluidShell Design

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Oh, nice. That sounds like a nice collection of samples and wavetables for inorganic sounds that evolve organically.
 
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