Sound editors help - word searches

[Dumb-Ask]

Hey everyone,

I'm slowly discovering certain words that help my SFX search work-flow.
English is not my first language and I often find it very difficult to find certain recordings.

Can you please recommend common words or abbreviation that you use to search:

For example
foots steps =FTS, feet
Atmo = ATM
crowd = walla

Maybe someone should make a dictionary for this stuff :P
Also, a bit off topic but what are the words that you search the most for when editing atmo and FX

Peace

Edo

[charles maynes]

Originally Posted by Dumb-Ask

Hey everyone,

I'm slowly discovering certain words that help my SFX search work-flow.
English is not my first language and I often find it very difficult to find certain recordings.

Can you please recommend common words or abbreviation that you use to search:

For example
foots steps =FTS, feet
Atmo = ATM
crowd = walla

Maybe someone should make a dictionary for this stuff :P
Also, a bit off topic but what are the words that you search the most for when editing atmo and FX

Peace

Edo

footsteps, FS, F/S, feet
Atmo, BG, Amb
crowd, walla, voices, vox, people

walla is generally a term used to describe Group ADR though.

[soundfx]

A lot of this depends on which libraries you have and which search software you are using.

[airbornesound]

Here's a list I've made over the years while mastering FX libraries. Mostly these originate from feature libraries:

Perspective
- int - interior perspective
- ext - exterior perspective
- dist - distant
- cu - close up perspective
- mcu - major close up perspective
- med dist - medium distant perspective
- POV - point of view i.e. perspective

Vehicles
- onboard = recording of a vehicle with the mic placed on the frame or engine (as opposed to inside)
- ride/drive - recording of a vehicle with mic in cockpit/cabin, etc
- accel/decel - accelerate/decelerate
- up - car approaching, sometimes "in" is also used
- away - car departing, sometimes "out" is also used

- moves - minor foley activity, like shifting or shuffling or handling
- const - constant, sound doesn't change much over time
- PZM - a type of mic

And of course all the other great terms others have mentioned so far.

[JSt0rm]

its a crazy thing. Sometimes when doing design I just do these long searches of my library. Like do a search for "cold" and you find lots of gusty winds. So even though cold isnt really a audio term (well in 1998 protools it was hahahaha) you can use it to find something useful. All of my custom stuff in the file names I put odd keywords that denote a feeling along with the practical something that it is. so that these things will pop up in my searches. Good luck.

[Dumb-Ask]

Thank you very much for this, it's very helpful. This is very kind of you

[eoats]

somewhere there's an Army MoPic manual for this (84c20), believe it or not.

ecu was extreme close up & mcu was medium close up...

Originally Posted by airbornesound

Here's a list I've made over the years while mastering FX libraries. Mostly these originate from feature libraries:

Perspective
- int - interior perspective
- ext - exterior perspective
- dist - distant
- cu - close up perspective
- mcu - major close up perspective
- med dist - medium distant perspective
- POV - point of view i.e. perspective

Vehicles
- onboard = recording of a vehicle with the mic placed on the frame or engine (as opposed to inside)
- ride/drive - recording of a vehicle with mic in cockpit/cabin, etc
- accel/decel - accelerate/decelerate
- up - car approaching, sometimes "in" is also used
- away - car departing, sometimes "out" is also used

- moves - minor foley activity, like shifting or shuffling or handling
- const - constant, sound doesn't change much over time
- PZM - a type of mic

And of course all the other great terms others have mentioned so far.

[breaktheory]

You'll certainly need to know the conventions but to really get to your sounds quickly you should start adding metadata to your files.

AMB_STORM_WINDY.wav is going to be a stormy windy ambience - once you listen to it you can start adding words like - aggressive, cold, waves crashing, thunder, pouring, rain and so on without changing the name of the file.

I also find it helpful to add the names of shows that I've used fx in so if there's a particular sound I really liked from a show but can't remember the file name, I type in the name of the show along with a general category and I can find the file in seconds.

If you aim to get serious with recording and collecting you should look into Soundminer or Audiofinder...both programs are designed as database search engines for your fx library - the advantage of Soundminer is that it actually adds these descriptor tags to the file itself (so wherever your library goes, the metadata goes with it) the disadvantage is that the LE version won't let you edit metadata - it's $599 for the least expensive option with this feature.

Audiofinder is a great inexpensive option at $70 but it seems to crash fairly often and doesn't write the added info to the file itself - it has its own database that stores the info so the tags are only visible inside of Audiofinder (i.e. if you want your enhanced files, you'll need to bring Audiofinder to any studio you plan to use them in.) I don't think studio owners are all that thrilled when you want to start installing programs on their studio computers.