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To everyone in the Flight Simulation Community, I would like to say a personal thank you to all who supported us through a 25 year span. We met so many good people here and abroad, this was one of the best things to ever happen in my life. Skysong Soundworks endured much longer than I thought it ever would. It has been sold to a new owner in Australia, he is an aircraft developer who is developing aircraft for MSFS 2020. I left the website with 265 sound products so the new owner has a trove of source files to work with. It's interesting that the first group I worked with back in 1995 was also from Australia, Steve Small of FSD! Great guy and fun to work with. I am going to continue working in the commercial electrical industry for another 5-6 years and retire. For now, some road trips on the Harley, and some peaceful fishing around Virginia Beach. If you want any sound packages from the FlightSim.Com Store you need to get them before June 1st of this year, my little store there has to close also. I want to wish the simulation community good days ahead, and whatever your endeavors may be, I hope they are exciting and prosperous for you. Blue Skies Pilots, Aaron Swindle Former Owner/Skysong Soundworks Purchase Skysong Soundworks products at the FlightSim.Com Store
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/images/notams/notams20/skys1206.jpgInterior & exterior audio samples were recorded from their respective positions. Fine tuned so each stage of the RPM power band is accurately represented. No cross channel phasing. Audio Features IncludePowerplant: 2 × Pratt & Whitney R-1830-90C Twin Wasp14-cylinder radial engines, 1,200 hp (895 kW) each VERSION 3.0Long coughing start upShut-downRollWindProp trillProp fluttersFuel pumpStall/air-frame stressFlapsExit/open/closeGear/up/downTouch-downHeavy bass flyby/distance Doppler--> (drone heard miles from the airport) The Douglas C-47 Sky-train or Dakota (RAF designation) is amilitary transport aircraft developed from the civilian Douglas DC-3airliner. It was used extensively by the Allies during World War IIand remains in front line service with various military operators. The C-47 differed from the civilian DC-3 in numerous modifications,including being fitted with a cargo door, hoist attachment, andstrengthened floor, along with a shortened tail cone for glider-towingshackles, and an astrodome in the cabin roof. Purchase Skysong Soundworks - Douglas Dakota Real World Audio Browse other Skysong Soundworks packages
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Skysong Soundworks: A NOTAM About Audio/Legacy Audio In MSFS 2020
Nels_Anderson posted an article in HN
/images/notams/notams20/skys1028.jpgHello Pilots, I've had quite a few sim pilots writing in asking about purchasingand using my audio packages in MSFS 2020. This is what little I knowright now. I spent a few weeks digging through the file system of thenew sim. It was my original thinking that Asobo would use either FMODor WWISE with this new software....they chose WWISE. It is morecomplex to work in but can produce really cool audio if donecorrectly. I'm an old dog now, we'll see if I can learn some newtricks...I'm not sure about it yet. I've spent some time in the otherforums talking to a few other developers about how we are going toapproach the add-on audio side of things. What I can gather for now is when an add-on aircraft is producedthe (Legacy Audio) .wav files have to be added to a (json) file inorder for them to work. I purchased IndiaFoxtEcho's two recentreleases and did some experimentation with the audio in thoseaircraft. I learned you cannot just add the old legacy sounds andsound cfg to an add-on aircraft and expect it to work...it won't. Itsa bit like the audio work I did in Aerofly FS 2....I had to create thesounds then run them through a converter that was provided to me inthe SDK. It works fairly well, but you do lose some of the high enddefinition by using this process. That is one of the things I've soloved about the original FS sound engine...the less you edited thesounds the more pure they were for the end user. Okay....so what is my main point here? I, like many others arefrustrated with the current state of the simulator. We are used togetting a new buggy and want to start taking it apart right away tosee how the little bits inside work. Well we can't do that yet! Wewill have to wait until it is more stable and the SDK is ready fortinkering. The other drawback is (LOAD TIMES) O.M.G. it would take me all dayto do what used to take a few hours per work session. Very inhibitiveat this point. I do hear some very good audio happening in thissimulator...I feel I can still produce some great stuff and stay inthe game a while longer which I would love to do. Even 24 years laterI still have some fascination with simulators and the enjoyment theybring to us all. In closing...no do not purchase my sound work to use in MSFS2020...it won't work. For now we continue to produce audio for P3D,FSX SE, FS2004 and a bit for X-Plane 11. Thanks for reading and please stay clear of COVID-19! Cheers, Aaron Swindle Skysong Soundworks Browse Skysong Soundworks products -
Flight Simulation Audio By Aaron Swindle/Skysong Soundworks I would like to start off by naming some of the people that have pioneered and contributed to simulation audio through the years: Vance Dylan (Sonic Solutions), Mike Hambly (BASF), Christoffer Peterson (TSS), Ted Tufun Wolfgang, Benoit Plamondon and myself. Let's talk a bit about hearing. For the most part people have a normal measurable base-line of hearing sound. As we age our hearing changes, depending on how much we've been exposed to elongated periods of loud noises; high pitched noise can be especially hard on our inner ear. I myself have suffered from tinnitus for most of my life. Tinnitus comes in many forms--high pitched ringing, cricket noises, low diesel engine rumble sounds, and other odd hearing anomalies. Mine was mostly caused by damge I sustained as an infant from two bouts of meningitis. Tinnitus is a condition caused by damage to the tiny hair cells in the inner ear. Once these cells are damaged the sound is not processed as it should be, and the brain is constantly looking for a signal that is not there. It's like the feedback from a hot amplifier. I wear a hearing aid in my left ear with a built in tone generator, it provides feedback to the brain and eases the symptoms. No matter your age I sincerely caution you to wear ear protection around loud noise; once you incur hearing damage it can not be regained. I include a Sound Warning in all of my sound sets to alert people about protecting their hearing. Sound Memory We all have sound memory. When we pick up the phone we know who it is by the sound of the person's voice. Those of us that work on cars, trucks, aircraft, farm equipment, can recognize when an engine is not hitting on all the cylinders. Engine sound has a particular rhythm and lope. We know when a lifter is not properly adjusted, it ticks to let us now it needs attention. The same applies to electric motors, we instinctively know when the brushes are worn or the main shaft bearings have had it. We use our sound memory to intuit and diagnose these type of issues. What Makes Sound Interesting? Why does a particular song make it to number one, and others stay farther down on the charts? The content of the lyrics, guitar riffs, the bass line? Yes, it's all of these combined. Music has the ability to evoke emotions, life memories, good feelings in most of us. Aircraft sounds have this same essence. Almost all us aviation enthusiasts know the sound of a Pratt & Whitney radial engine. Nothing else in the world of sound comes close to the rumble of all those cylinders firing in a timed sequence. There are so many recognizable layers as you listen to those enormous aircraft engines. The twill and whispering of the prop tips, the rich bass of the exhaust, the whine of the turbo-chargers, the chest rumbling bass as she flies by at 250 knots. That cacophony of sounds does something to me that I can't quite explain to the people standing around watching with me. To the people reading this article I don't have to try and explain it to you...it's an unspoken shared experience, and you know what I am talking about here. Flight Simulator Sound Engine Beginnings I first encountered Microsoft Flight Simulation back in 1986. I went to my brother's house before I deployed in the military. He pulled up a wire frame Flight Simulator that really caught my attention. Somewhere around 1994 I enrolled in a community college here in Virginia, and one day that same old 486 computer showed up Fedex on my door step. Back then it was all Prompt and DOS commands, 12 megs of RAM! Between bouts of studying I would pull up the simulator and fiddle around with it. In a few years a newer version of Flight Simulator hit the market. I immediately noticed a vast improvement in the sound of the aircraft and enviornment. Somehow I found FlightSim.Com and began trading e-mails with Mike Hambly. He was already editing and making improvements to the sounds in the simulator. He told me where to download a freebie sound editor, we were off to the races from there. Mike and I traded tips and sound files for many years. Making It All Come Together As far as I can intuit there are three parts to the sound engine in Microsoft Flight Simulator: The Edlin Language (Sound Config) Sound Source (Wav files) and the Base Code that knits these elements together to create the looping audio we hear when we fire up the program. As the simulator evolved the sound configuration became more complex and added more tools to work with. The sound engine now has the ability to produce a morphed (stereo effect) for multi-engine aircraft and other simulation vehicles. Producing sound packages with rich realistic character is not just a matter of slapping a bunch of sound files together and calling it good. Due to the nature of the sound engine you have to learn to create actual work arounds to produce work that is accurate and pleasing to the end user. The advent of sound cones is a good example of this process. To employ this tool you have to create a volume and sound type differential. As you rotate around the aircraft the sound engine has to be able to read and identify the differential you created with the sound files. It can be a daunting task. Chris of TSS came along and really perfected this with his vast catalogue of jet aircraft sound packages. He has an impeccable ear, and the editing skills to make it all work together in a seamless fashion. Chris did teach this old sound dog some new tricks! Sound Cards And Polish There are many different sound cards on the market to choose from. I have always used Sound Blaster. Their cards have a built in amplifier plus crisp accurate sound reproduction. It used to be we sound guys were always fighting with the looping pop issue. It was a fly in the ointment for a very long time. Most of this issue was caused by deep bass sounds that would make a popping sound as they cycled from the beginning of the file to the end. The newer sound cards eventually solved this editing anomaly for us. Before I release an audio package I spend many hours beta testing it and listening for anything undesireable. Since there are many complex layers in aircraft sounds I check them in multiple situations, views, and at many different volume levels. Once I've done all that I adjust the final release volume to accomodate the average PC sound system. If you do run a Bass Kicker on your sound system you will find that I've left in plenty of wall rattling sound for you. As for sound systems I recommend any of the Logitech surround systems. They generally run less than $75.00 and produce excellent sound. If you run your simulator for hours on end you might begin to notice some audio degredation is occurring. Even with a high end system this can occur after lenghthy sessions. A system reboot almost always cures this as it replenishes the available memory and system resources. Closing Can you make a bunch of money producing audio packages? No! Back when I was working with multiple development groups we sometimes could make some decent profits. Those days have long since passed and a lot of the folks I worked with have closed their development companies. These days the expenses of production actually outpace any profit I might make on the end. We all have jobs, most pay us by the hour. When you buy one of my sound packages you are really just paying an expense for web-space or a new piece of editing software. I spend more on add-on aircraft than I'll ever make back. That is okay by me, I still enjoy what I do and plan to keep producing work for as long as possible. I hope this article sheds a little light on some murky corners. It's been many years since I've written about my little peice of the FS world. I hope you enjoyed reading it. Blue Skies To My Fellow Pilots. And thank you Nels for the space you provide to all of us here at FlightSim.Com. Sincerely, Aaron Swindle Skysong Soundworks Editor's Note: For nearly twenty years now Aaron has been supplying the flightsim community with improved sounds, as part of larger design teams and on his own, both as freeware and payware. View Aaron's Freeware Sounds
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Skysong Soundworks Releases Lockheed L-049 Constellation Sound Pack
Nels_Anderson posted an article in FS2004
/images/notams/notams18/skys1214.jpgCompiled from real world recordings for a truly immersive soundexperience inside and outside the aircraft. Suitable forpayware/freeware models. Audio Features Include:Powerplant: 4 × Wright R-3350-745C18BA-1 radial, 2,200 hp (1,640 kW) eachAttention To Detail On Every Aspect Of The Connie's Audio EnvironmentCockpit AmbianceAvionicsCabin-BellExitStart-UpShut-DownFuel-PumpRoll With RattlesGear WarningGearTouch-DownWindFlapsAutopilotStallGear WarningFlyby Ambiance/Distance Doppler (Sound You Hear From Adjacent Airports)History: The Lockheed L-049 Constellation was the first model ofthe Lockheed Constellation aircraft line. It entered service as theC-69 military transport aircraft during World War II for the UnitedStates Army Air Forces and was the first civilian version after thewar. When production ended in 1946 it was replaced by the improvedL-649 and L-749 Constellation. Purchase Skysong Soundworks Releases Lockheed L-049 Constellation Sound Pack -
/images/notams/notams18/skys1206.jpgToday we would like to welcome Skysong Soundworks as the latestdeveloper to offer their full product line at our new FlightSim.Com Store.HD audio brings your simulator to life, and Aaron Swindle has been creatingsuch flight simulator audio since 1996. His current line includes over 70 different sound packages, mostlyfor FS2004 and FSX, and covering planes from the small, like the Cessna172, to the large, like Boeing and Airbus jetliners, to the old like theB-17 and other warbirds. Quality audio like this adds a whole newdimension to your flight simulator experience! Visit the FlightSim.Com Store today and check out the full like ofSkysong Soundworks products. Shop Skysong Soundworks Products
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/images/notams/notams18/skys1024.jpgSkysong Soundworks has begun working in Lockheed MartinPrepar3D as of this last summer. We've been working on the audio sideof the simulation world for some 23 years. We plan to continue thatlong standing tradition as we move forward into Prepar3D. What we'vediscovered so far is that most of our sound packages will interlacewith the Prepar3D software without any major changes. As Prepar3D wasborn of FSX it makes sense that most of our audio software willmigrate without any major headaches. Yes, we are a commercial entity...but still enjoy putting outfreeware when time allows. Currently we create audio packages forFSX/SE, Aerofly 2, and X-Plane, and still reach back to keep FS2004 inthe mix. It can be challenging to keep up with the vast amount of workrequests we receive each month. We do our best. I use the word "we"but mainly its a one man operation, my wife helps me beta test beforerelease, she has a good ear also. She only rolls her eyes (once in awhile)! She knows I'm a 56 year old kid that will never grow up allthe way. Thank goodness for patient wives! I need to mention that we no longer use the Flight1 wrappersoftware for commercial sales. Back in 2014 I finally decided to buildmy own web site and provide direct product support to my customers. Alittle more expensive and time consuming but I like having a one onone relationship with people. As a general contractor in the realworld I pride myself on satisfied customers. Same goes for thesimulation world. It usually takes less than five minutes tostraighten out an issue. When people are paying money for products, Iowe it to them to resolve any issue in a timely and friendlymanner. Thank you to the community for your support and encouragementthrough the many years. Aaron R.Swindle Skysong Soundworks skysongsoundworks.com