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Head to Head with David Chan As head sound designer for Canadian game developer Bioware, David Chan has had his hand in creating the sonic environment for some of the most highly praised action and fantasy titles to hit the gaming industry in recent memory. With a legion of diehard fans eagerly awaiting the release of the much anticipated Neverwinter Nights, David gives us a few precious moments to discuss the challenges of figuring out what another world sound's like.
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1) So how did you get started making all these funny noises for games ? I actually started as a systems admin, I have always had a love for music/sound and computers though. So, when the opportunity came up at BioWare to do sound I jumped at it. I have posted a more in depth article on that subject at www.penny-arcade.com/chan.php3 2) What's been the most exciting project you've undertaken so far ? I know this sounds clichéd, but every project presents it's own challenges so they are all fun. Although working on a Star Wars game does make a little giddy. 3) What does the process of getting an idea for a sound you have actually connected to an event in the game look like ? What sort of development stages are involved ? It depends on the type of sound. An ambient sound for a forest is fairly easy to do technically because you don't have to sync to an animation. However, it's quite challenging creatively because you have to make it sound alive and real. Other sounds are usually described by designers or come about from the visuals. In the case of spells, creatures, guns, etc the challenge is to make them sound good and fit the animations. 4) Are there specific challenges you have to deal with in developing for games that would differ from designing for films or CD ? Memory constraints and storage constraints are the biggest issues. On our latest game Neverwinter Nights the audio has the largest portion of the CD space even after compression. You also have to make sounds fit into small spaces, on the Dreamcast version of MDK2 no memory resident sound could be longer than 3 seconds at 22K. It makes you think differently than a film sound designer. Our primary job is how to get big sounds to fit in small spaces. Lots of looping and animating of pitch and volume is involved. Film sound designers have limitations as well, they are different. The situation is much better now that it was 5 years ago and I think it will continue to improve for game sound. 5) What tools (software, hardware) are you using in your studio ? I use nuendo as my prime multitrack system, Sound Forge as my primary editor and batch processor, I use plug-ins from Waves, TC Works, Timeworks and of course soft synths like Tassman. For hardware I have a Mackie board, RME I/O card and rack, Roland JV-2080 and Event Audio monitors. All this runs on an Athlon system under Windows 2000. 6) How has your experience been of Tassman thus far ? What sort of applications does it fit into in your work ? It's a lot of fun, I have been playing with preset synths and noodling around for a while and feel like I haven't even scratched the surface. I am using it to create some organic percussive sounds that I will be using for button clicks and other interface items. Later on I hope to use it to make some wild spell sounds. 7) If you had a developer who was willing to make you your dream tool for sound design, regardless of time and budget constraints : ) ,what sort of features would you ask for ? Well, I would love a Swiss Army knife audio program. I keep having to switch between applications for multitrack, batch, single track, synthesis, and post-production. If I could do it all in one application it would streamline my job quite a bit. 8) Do you do music as well, professionally or for fun ? I dabble in music, but not anything I would let the public hear (well, they could but they'd have to sign a waiver first). I like playing with loop editors and groove creators. I've always thought of myself as more a production person than a musician. 9) Finally, what's coming up next for you ? Well, after Neverwinter ships I'll be taking a much needed break. After that it's back to work on our Star Wars project. I am also getting involved in game audio advocacy through G.A.N.G.(Game Audio Network Guild). It's an organization that hopes to raise the level of awareness and quality for game audio. Anyone interested should check out Thanks a bunch David !
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