Sound Effects By Hand Tutorial

**Bruce Lee** · 03-19-2009, 06:57 PM

Thanks for the support, guys. I should have some more SFX examples to put up soon. If you have questions about the process or anything else that relates to this SFX tutorial, feel free to ask away.

Loston

**Bruce Lee** · 03-22-2009, 08:23 PM

Here are a couple of sound effects I created over the weekend for Harmonix (minus some of the bg elements).

"CRASH!" was done in the block lettered style similar to the style I used on the Klyde splash page at the client's request. I had more fun coming up with the "ZOOM!" and "ZAP!" sfx. I might have enjoyed it more to have done that a little differently than block letters, but I thought the jumbling of the individual letters added a little impact chaos to the mix.

I resisted the urge to turn "ZAP!" into a lightning bolt type font as that seemed all too easy. How many times have you seen a "ZAP!" done as an electric or lightning bolt? I've seen that too often, and I thought that might be a bit dull, so I instead strived for a more spontaneous approach to the letters themselves to convey some energy, and opted to make the edge of the letters pointy and sharp to project a sharp sting or bite element to emphasize a jolt of electricity. I also make an effort to get a little jagged lightning bolt shape to the overall layout of the word. It's subtle, but it's there. Something different, anyway.

The "ZOOM!" isn't anything new, but I wanted to give the motion lines thing a try. I tilted the letters a little in an effort to try to convey some speed, but if I had to do that one over again, I might have gone for a more dramatic tilt angle.

I might do a step-by-step of each of these later in the week:

Loston

**Bruce Lee** · 03-22-2009, 10:49 PM

And here's a great Kirby/Sinnott FANTASTIC FOUR page that has several great hand-drawn sound effects:

**Bathill8** · 03-23-2009, 08:18 AM

Great stuff on the lost art of sound effects Loston..... I see some pencil marks on that Kirby and Sinnott page...do you own the original? I love seeing the classic stuff with pencil lines all over the art!

**Ugga Bugga** · 03-23-2009, 08:21 AM

I endorse this thread

**harmonix** · 03-23-2009, 01:40 PM

Loston, you know how I feel about these.

PERFECT!

**TheMayor** · 03-23-2009, 02:53 PM

I also endorse this thread.

**Bruce Lee** · 03-23-2009, 04:14 PM

Originally Posted by Bathill8

Great stuff on the lost art of sound effects Loston..... I see some pencil marks on that Kirby and Sinnott page...do you own the original? I love seeing the classic stuff with pencil lines all over the art!

I don't own the original--how I wish I did though! I actually am a friend of the guy who once owned the original. He has since traded the page for an awesome Kirby THOR cover. At my request he was kind enough to make me a nice print copy of the artwork at full size. This page is from issue #55, which was done in 1965. Back then the image area for pages was at 12.5" X 18.25". There were notes in the margins in pencil where Kirby was laying out the story plot details to. Although he never was credited for plotting the story, Kirby did plot most of the FF stuff, with Kirby providing some plot ideas and writing out the dialogue. Unfortunately the print copy has cropped most off most of the plotting notes Kirby wrote, but the notes for panels one and two made it thru intact. For those curious as to what the notes were;

Above panel one, Kirby wrote:

Surfer says you cannot damage what isn't matter as you know it.

Above panel two, Kirby wrote:

Thing is mad as hell. He says now you'll see the kind of power that might do the job.

As you can see, the sound effects on this page were pretty brilliant. Kirby would loosely lay them out on the page, often with simple lettering. If you notice in the right hand margin of the last panel, Kirby also left notes about what style of sfx might look good in the panels (Notice the jagged outline of an "R" there). Back in the day the letterer was usually the guy in charge of finishing off the sfx--making them into something that worked with the artwork. On these, Kirby decided the placement, and the letterer, Sam Rosen, most likely finished things off. "Swingin' Sammy" Rosen was one of the best letterers in comics. He and Artie Simek (equally great) were the two main letterers who worked on the FANTASTIC FOUR in its initial Lee/Kirby run. If you really want to learn how to do great sound effects, I recommend looking thru some '60s FFs. Issue #55 is chocked full of great sfx! The battle between Thing and the Surfer alone has 21 awesome examples of great sfx usage, and there are other sfx throughout the issue besides those. All done by hand, all awesome and contributing to the visual storytelling in grand fashion.

Loston