{"id":650,"date":"2020-10-29T13:21:24","date_gmt":"2020-10-29T13:21:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/synchedin.com\/blog\/?p=650"},"modified":"2026-01-22T14:55:25","modified_gmt":"2026-01-22T14:55:25","slug":"4-tips-for-great-sound-design","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/licensing.routenote.com\/blog\/4-tips-for-great-sound-design\/","title":{"rendered":"Sound Design Tips | 4 Helpful Hints"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>Whether you&#8217;re making a film, game or YouTube video, adding some SFX and <a href=\"https:\/\/licensing.routenote.com\/blog\/foley-what-is-it-and-how-is-it-done\/\">Foley<\/a> is a great way to spice up your video. Here are our top sound design tips.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h3>Simple<\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p>It&#8217;s not always necessary to have a sound made up of many intricate layers, and more often than not, a simple sound is going to be more natural.<br>A good way of keeping SFX simple is trying a reduced listening exercise where you focus on the traits of the sound itself i.e, pitch, clang, tempo, rhythm, etc., away from the context of the sound. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Don&#8217;t mistake the word simple for meaning minimal! Think of the iconic <a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=I3Ak5VgyEoc\">1995 Windows theme<\/a> composed by Brian Eno.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h3>Unique<\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p>There are certain sounds that are instantly identifiable like typing on an iPhone, or the swing of a lightsaber. <br>Having a unique sound will not only solidify your branding but also make people think of your brand when they hear that sound or sounds that are similar. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<h3>Blended<\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p>This applies more to general foley sound than it does with SFX as a whole.<br>When creating or using pre-made SFX to accompany your moving image, think about the timing and the movement of the sound and how that accompanies the image. <br><br>Bad sound design stands out, and can detract from the main story or context that should be the focus. <br>Good sound design is heard by the audience without being listened to. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<h3>Contextual<\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p>Think about the imagery that you are trying to replicate with audio. Does it need to be abrupt and loud or does it need to be subtle and unobtrusive?<br><br>Two good opposing examples of this could be the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=TIDShT8cb4g\">character creation music<\/a> for Dark Souls which is a beautiful piece that has dissonance and resolve and isn&#8217;t heard again passed creating the character, and the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=7PHwym5QKMc\">Twilit Battle music<\/a> from The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess which can only be described as an onslaught of midi noises. <br><br>Finding or creating the right motif, sound effect or foley for that particular movement or scene is all about the context, and the emotion you want to convey. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Whether you&#8217;re making a film, game or YouTube video, adding some SFX and Foley is a great way to spice up your video. Here are our top sound design tips. Simple It&#8217;s not always necessary to have a sound made up of many intricate layers, and more often than not, a simple sound is going to be more natural.A good way of keeping SFX simple is trying a reduced listening exercise where you focus on the traits of the sound itself i.e, pitch, clang, tempo, rhythm, etc., away from the context of the sound. Don&#8217;t mistake the word simple for&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":8820,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[284,280,277],"tags":[310,335,147,236,175,181,177,333,85,160,176,334,332,330,331,15,293,148],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v15.7 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Sound Design Tips | 4 Helpful Hints - RouteNote Licensing Blog<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Whether you&#039;re making a film, game or YouTube video, adding some SFX and Foley is a great way to spice up your video. Here are our top sound design tips.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/licensing.routenote.com\/blog\/4-tips-for-great-sound-design\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Sound Design Tips | 4 Helpful Hints - RouteNote Licensing Blog\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Whether you&#039;re making a film, game or YouTube video, adding some SFX and Foley is a great way to spice up your video. Here are our top sound design tips.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/licensing.routenote.com\/blog\/4-tips-for-great-sound-design\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"RouteNote Licensing Blog\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2020-10-29T13:21:24+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2026-01-22T14:55:25+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/storage.googleapis.com\/routenote-licensing-blog\/2019\/07\/482139e8-routnote-licensing-blog-banner.png\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"1200\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"672\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Est. reading time\">\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"2 minutes\">\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/licensing.routenote.com\/blog\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/licensing.routenote.com\/blog\/\",\"name\":\"RouteNote Licensing Blog\",\"description\":\"RouteNote Licensing Blog - The World of Music Licensing - YouTube, Facebook, Film, Advertising and more.\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":\"https:\/\/licensing.routenote.com\/blog\/?s={search_term_string}\",\"query-input\":\"required name=search_term_string\"}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/licensing.routenote.com\/blog\/4-tips-for-great-sound-design\/#primaryimage\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/storage.googleapis.com\/routenote-licensing-blog\/2019\/07\/482139e8-routnote-licensing-blog-banner.png\",\"width\":1200,\"height\":672},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/licensing.routenote.com\/blog\/4-tips-for-great-sound-design\/#webpage\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/licensing.routenote.com\/blog\/4-tips-for-great-sound-design\/\",\"name\":\"Sound Design Tips | 4 Helpful Hints - RouteNote Licensing Blog\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/licensing.routenote.com\/blog\/#website\"},\"primaryImageOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/licensing.routenote.com\/blog\/4-tips-for-great-sound-design\/#primaryimage\"},\"datePublished\":\"2020-10-29T13:21:24+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2026-01-22T14:55:25+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/licensing.routenote.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/b40dcf11cfca7bde32d6e0068d9f412a\"},\"description\":\"Whether you're making a film, game or YouTube video, adding some SFX and Foley is a great way to spice up your video. Here are our top sound design tips.\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/licensing.routenote.com\/blog\/4-tips-for-great-sound-design\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/licensing.routenote.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/b40dcf11cfca7bde32d6e0068d9f412a\",\"name\":\"RouteNote Licensing Team\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/licensing.routenote.com\/blog\/#personlogo\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/e591c246bfa784cbfeb904b97fee92d0?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"caption\":\"RouteNote Licensing Team\"}}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/licensing.routenote.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/650"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/licensing.routenote.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/licensing.routenote.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/licensing.routenote.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/licensing.routenote.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=650"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/licensing.routenote.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/650\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8914,"href":"https:\/\/licensing.routenote.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/650\/revisions\/8914"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/licensing.routenote.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/8820"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/licensing.routenote.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=650"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/licensing.routenote.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=650"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/licensing.routenote.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=650"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}