COLLECTIONS OF SOUND DESIGN THEORY (1)

PIERRE SCHAEFFER: THEORIES OF THE SOUND OBJECT

Pierre Schaeffer’s compositional studies in his work Solfege de L’objet Sonore (1998), establishes some of the fundamentals of theoretical approaches in sound design. In his foreword, he discusses how music composition is both a science and an art. As a science, music is essentially acoustic sounds that are received orally and can be calculated mathematically. However the listener will always project his or her own psychological and sociological disposition on what is received, rendering the process of fulfilling this criteria more of an art. Schaeffer acknowledges that both approaches are acceptable as long as they are both considered (ibid).

Schaeffer describes a sound as a ‘physical vehicle of music’ that ‘pertains to nature’ (1998: 11). How this vehicle is perceived constitutes a ‘sound object’, and how the sound object is perceived decides whether it is suitable for music, or, more specifically, the perceptive criteria of the audience. The choice and arrangement of sound objects forms the final composition music is created. Suitability is then assigned depending on whether the listener’s criteria is fulfilled (Schaeffer 1998).

Schaeffer (ibid), in three stages, diagnoses the basic problems of composition. Firstly, there is the difference between an acoustic sound and the perception of that sound. Secondly, the choice of sound objects based on their perceptive criteria needs to be considered, and thirdly, the consequences of the choice of sound objects within a composition must be evaluated. Schaeffer describes how Western Music has ignored these problems and relied on simple relationships between sounds, resulting in a musical typology or language. ‘Music cannot be boiled down to a well-defined language, nor can it thus be coded merely by usage’ (Schaeffer 1998: 11-13). Schaeffer’s Solfege de l’Objet Sonore (1998) seeks to consider the reception of the acoustic sound, but Schaeffer himself accepts that ‘each one of us hears with different ears’, making sound design a problematic art (or science).

MUSINGS ON VIDEO GAME SOUND (2)

THE IMPORTANCE OF VIDEO GAME SOUND

Axel Stockburger (2003) explains how sound can provide feedback, set mood, rhythm and pace, and convey narrative. Kristine Jorgensen (2008) agrees. By using experiments on computer gamers playing video games with the sound turned off, she gathered feedback from subjects which included, ‘a reduced sense of presence’, a need to ‘double-check’ visually and even ‘a loss of control’ and disorientation. Jorgensen says that ‘…when the sound was removed, the participant was reminded that what he saw were just computer graphics, and that the figures shooting at each other were animated features’ (2008: 171-172).

With this in mind, Jorgensen suggests that sound in games relates more to the gaming experience than in film, where sound is an accompaniment to, and dictated by, the image (ibid).

Referencing Michel Chion‘s audio-visual contract (Chion 1994), where sound will always transform the meaning of the visual, Jorgensen writes, ‘…sound and image work as two complimentary information systems that compete in the meaning making process, …’ (2008: 163). She adds that sound and vision are the two methods of communication to the player in video games and with the removal of sound, there is a loss of one of the informative systems (ibid).

Also citing what Jorgensen terms Stockburger’s sound objects (2003), sounds that are connected intrinsically to events, environments or even characters in a video game and triggered through the narrative, she identifies a major difference in the sound design of computer games from any other media. Jorgensen (2008) uses this sound object concept to emphasise the relationship of this audio-visual contract in video games, arguing a stronger correlation between an environment and its sound than in other media. This non-linear approach to sound design is critical in creating a spatial representation of a gaming environment.

MUSINGS ON VIDEO GAME SOUND (1)

THE DEVELOPMENT OF VIDEO GAMES AND VIDEO GAME SOUND

Gilbert Seldes, in 1924, suggested that Seven Lively Arts were the primary contribution towards artistic expression in American popular culture (Jenkins 2006). These arts, which include jazz, Broadway musical, Hollywood cinema, the comic strip and the vernacular humour column, have gained cultural respectability over the past seventy five years. Now, Henry Jenkins (2006), suggests the same artistic status for video games and argues for their equal respect.

The gaming industry continues to create increasingly complex multi-media gaming experiences, for example, with games such as Amplitude (2001) and Rez (2005) (Friberg & Gardenfors 2004: 2), where interaction with the sound dictates the gameplay and drives the narrative. Jenkins (2006) even implies that the intrinsic emotional and interactive responsiveness in video games is greater than that of cinema and that games create a degree of immersion unachievable in film.

With the increasing level of interactivity, sound has become a vital element in game design. From the early eighties, when game audio, described by Karen Collins, as, ‘repetitive, incessant bleeping’ (2008: 1), sound designers recognized the need for the audio to not only be less repetitive, but to actually respond to the gaming environment or the game player‘s actions.

In addition to this, the emergence of ‘movie envy’ (Rouse quoted in Bryce & Rutter 2002: 2) in computer game designers, raises awareness of the need for sophistication and interactivity in game sound. With the growing acceptance of video games as artistic expression or as a ‘lively art’ (Jenkins 2006) in popular culture, the industry has seen an increasing level of maturity in game audio design as sound now plays a more integral role than ever in the gaming experience.