The Experiment Has Begun

Twelve student prodigies...
One national science fair...
No chance of survival...

Wednesday, November 19, 2008

Sound Effects

I've always taken a very conservative stance on sound effects. I prefer to stick to the simple tried and true sounds, "Ka-boom" "Thud" "Clang" "Blam" "Vroom" rather than try to reinvent the wheel. Comics that create strange looking sound effects often look silly and leave me unclear how they are intended to sound (although generally there's no wrong answer when it comes to interpreting the noise an explosion makes)

The first volume of Preacher is interesting in that it completely forgoes sound effects except when they are essential to telling the story.. There are only 3 instances of sound effects in the 200 page book. Preacher isn't a comic that's associated with showing restraint so I found this choice to be really interesting.

One section of the Scientists where I was forced to really work hard to think of an appropriate sound effect was the scene where Stuart wakes up in the bio suit.
page 32
I wanted to convey that breathing respirator sound effect while it was in the first person viewpoint. My first idea was to check out some Star Wars comics and see how they handled Darth Vader. Unfortunately in all the comics I could get my hands on, they didn't bother to represent Vader's trademark breathing. I consulted with Trent, and the sound on page 32 is what we ultimately came up with.