A sound FX library inspired by banana cake?
The first full lockdown in NZ triggered panic buying. First was toilet paper. (WTF? Covid is respiratory, not the other end) Second was yeast and flour. It seems people were going to bake their way out of the pandemic. But by week 4 of lockdown, I was starting to go stir crazy and the bananas were going off. A quick recipe search & those bananas became cake, but it was my second cake attempt that motivated me to try using a baking tray and I caught myself ‘playing’ baking trays at the supermarket – the light aluminium has interesting pitch, which changed as I slowly dented the trays.
The banana cake led me to explore other related materials, including two grades of tin foil which when tensioned reminded me of synth snare drums, but with gain cranked was also capable of a surprising range of crumpled crinkles, shrieks, and guttural scrapes. Next I explored mylar, and slowly a library formed, of very quiet sounds – TINY DETAILS – amplified to become uniquely useful.
Check out the MAKING OF Video to get a quick idea of the range of sounds. It was frustrating but rewarding to rig a sheet of heavy duty tin foil across the room, with contact mics attached. Tiny sounds were captured 24bit 192kHz dual mono (MKH8050 close and MKH8020 wider) while full sheets were captured with a pair of MKH8020s. FOIL contains some great new sounds with huge potential for creative sound design.
A free update released today, 20210311: FOIL Sub Rattlers!
FOIL owners please check your mail, a download link has been now been sent.