1. Computer Audio/fmod
CGDD 4603

2. Why fmod? Sound you might have in a game:
Background music
Sound effects
Dialog
How do you currently use these in your games?
fmod is very popular
Powerful – both 2D and 3D sound, DSP/effects…
Cross platform (PS3, Wii, PC…)
Has a designer, sandbox and API

3. Partial List of Games that use fmod
Plants vs Zombies
Pure
Rise of Flight: The First Great Air War
Second Life
Shatter
Shattered Horizon[4]
Silent Hill: Shattered Memories
StarCraft II: Wings of Liberty
Stargate Worlds
Stranglehold
TimeShift
TNA iMPACT!
Tom Clancy's Ghost Recon
Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six Vegas 2
Tomb Raider: Underworld
Torchlight
Tropico 3
vSide
World of Tanks
World of WarCraft
You Don't Know Jack
Zuma
Allods Online
Audition Online
Battlestations: Pacific
BioShock
BioShock2
Brutal Legend
Clive Barker's Jericho
Cortex Command
Crysis
Darkfall
DJ Hero
Batman: Arkham Asylum
De Blob
Dragon Age: Origins
Dogfighter
Far Cry
Forza Motorsport 2
Forza Motorsport 3
Guild Wars
Guitar Hero III
Guitar Hero: Aerosmith
Guitar Hero: World Tour
Heavenly Sword
Heroes of Newerth
Hellgate: London
Jurassic Park: Operation Genesis
Just Cause 2
League of Legends
Lego Universe
LittleBigPlanet/LBP2
Metroid Prime 3
Natural Selection 2
Need for Speed: Shift
Nicktoons Unite!
Nicktoons: Across the Second Dimension

4. Things You Should Know…
ADC/DAC – Audio to Digital Conversion
Sampling rate
# of times per second the computer “listens”
44.1 KHz is CD
22 KHz is good
Bits per sample
Computers have to approximate
4 bits = 16 levels of approximation
8 bits = 256 levels of approximation

5. Original Sound

6. Low Sampling Rate
TIME

7. Low Sampling Rate What the computer hears
TIME

8. High Sampling Rate
TIME

9. High Sampling Rate
TIME

10. 2 bits per sample 4 Approximations
TIME

11. StairStep Effect
TIME

12. 3 bits per sample 8 Approximations
TIME

13. Less StairStep
TIME

14. Capturing Sounds Usually done with: Computer has sound card
a microphone (such as voice)
Line in CD
Hollywood Edge®
Computer has sound card
Input types (RCA, MIDI, mini, ¼”, XLR)
Card has quality (plays 16-bit sound)
Need some kind of software
SoundForge/Audacity
Windows SoundRecorder (gag)
                                                                          
                                                                          
                                                                          

15. 3D Sound Sounds have position and velocity
There is a listener component
Relationship between the two
Attenuation (with distance)
Occlusion (low-pass filter)
Doppler (relative velocities)
Lots of “psycho-acoustic” options

16. Back to fmod There are three primary components: We’ll use all three
The Sound Designer
The Sandbox
The API
We’ll use all three
Start with Sound Designer

17. Setting up a Project Take the advice of the video tutorials
Have a separate folder
Copy sounds into a “sounds” directory
Keeps the safe
Can have sub-directories
Create an “output” directory

18. Designer Interface Can delete this if you want, but need to have at
least one group

19. Events Used to define sound properties for an event
Can be comprised of
One sound
Several sounds randomly chosen
Monophonic vs Polyphonic
Can randomize pitch and attenuation
Events can be
Simple
Multi-track

20. A Simple Event

21. Granular Sounds These sounds aren’t looping
Allows for a sounds to occur between time ranges
Allows for polyphony

22. Event Options Can vary attenuation (dropoff with distance)
Can vary pitch
Creates a sound considerably smaller than a “soundtrack”
Plays forever and is always random!

23. Sound Definitions
Required for multi-track events

24. Multi-track Events
Comprised of sound defs in layers

25. Multi-track Events Careful when adding sounds Have parameters
Choose sound def
Ambient noise is looping
Other sounds are granular, so choose “Oneshot”
Have parameters
Not based on time!

26. Multi-track Events
Can cross-fade and set fade out time

27. Effects

28. Parameter Properties
Can define range and velocity (to simulate time)

29. Engine Designer fmod can specifically work with engine sounds
Need for Speed 2
Based on the “load” of the engine
Right-click on a sound instance->properties
Auto-pitch
Window->fmod Engine Designer

30. The Build Process Know which platform you’re targeting
Changes are applied only to that platform
Project->Clean, Project->Build

31. Interactive Music Comprised of several short segments of music
Intro music
Darkening or discovery
Fighting/intense fighting
Release
Before you begin, you must know
Tempo of music (beats per minute – bpm)
Beats per measure (time signature)

32. Cues

33. Themes and Auditioning

34. Transitioning via Parameters

35. Other Things Supports deployment of multiple languages
Can deploy different builds based on
Platform
Language

36. A Look at the API Basic API Designer API Written for C/C++
Built on basic API
Can read .fev files
Written for C/C++
#include <fmod.h> // C
#include <fmod.hpp> // C++
Read the documentation fmodex.chm

37. API Parts A System is the fmod engine A Sound is the raw resource
2D uses FMOD_2D
3D uses FMOD_3D
result = system->createSound(“music.wav", FMOD_2D, 0, &sound);

38. API Parts A Channel is an instance of a Sound
Each time you play a sound, you get a new channel
Channels can start out paused
You can set the
Volume (0.0f – 1.0f)
Pan (-1.0f – 1.0f)
Frequency (in Hz as a float)
Always use FMOD_CHANNEL_FREE to pick for you

39. #include <iostream> #include <fmod
#include <iostream> #include <fmod.hpp> #include <fmod_errors.h> using namespace std; using namespace FMOD; void main () { FMOD_RESULT result; System* system; // Create the fmod system. We only need one of these result = System_Create(&system); // Specify a max number of simultaneous channels result = system->init(100, FMOD_INIT_NORMAL, 0); Sound* sound; // Decompress the entire mp3 into 16-bit PCM in memory result = system->createSound("winning.mp3", FMOD_DEFAULT, 0, &sound); if (result != FMOD_OK) { cout << "Couldn't open it! " << FMOD_ErrorString(result) << endl; } Channel* channel; // Used for setting volume, pan, pausing... // You have the option of passing that channel as the last parameter result = system->playSound(FMOD_CHANNEL_FREE, sound, false, &channel); channel->setFrequency ( f); cout << "Couldn't play it! " << FMOD_ErrorString(result) << endl; while (true) { cout << "1"; system->update(); // Now required in fmod

40. Virtual Voices Supports “virtual voices” when hardware is limited
Set from System::init()
System::getCPUUsage()
Try to keep < 1000
May need to set the priority of a channel if it’s important
channel->isVirtual()

41. 3D Sound in fmod Sound attenuation
Logarithmic
Set the mindistance of a sound channel to start attenuation
Bee = 0.1f
Jet = 50.0f
Leave max distance alone (default is 10,000)
Set 3D settings with System::set3DSettings()
Doppler
Distance factor (in cm, m, feet)
Rolloff scale (attenuation models)

42. 3D Sound fmod uses a left-handed coordinate system
result=system->init(100,
(FMOD_MODE)(FMOD_INIT_3D_RIGHTHANDED|FMOD_3D), 0);
With velocity, you must pass it as meters per second
velx = (posx-lastposx) * 1000 / timedelta;
vel = 0.1 * 1000 / = 6 meters per second
vel = 0.2 * 1000 / = 6 meters per second

43. void main () { FMOD_RESULT result; FMOD_VECTOR soundPos, soundVel; FMOD_VECTOR listenerPos, listenerVel, listenerForward, listenerUp; System* system; result = System_Create(&system); result = system->init(100, (FMOD_MODE)(FMOD_3D), 0); int numHC = 0; result = system->getHardwareChannels(&numHC); cout << "Hardware channels: " << numHC << endl; Sound* sound; result = system->createSound(“train.mp3", FMOD_3D, 0, &sound); if (result != FMOD_OK) { cout << "Couldn't open it! " << FMOD_ErrorString(result) << endl; } Channel* channel; result = system->playSound(FMOD_CHANNEL_FREE, sound, false, &channel); channel->setFrequency( f); cout << "Couldn't play it! " << FMOD_ErrorString(result) << endl; float dsp, stream, geometry, update, total; soundPos.y = soundVel.x = soundVel.y = 0.0f; soundPos.z = f; soundPos.x = 5.0f; soundVel.z = 6.0f; channel->set3DMinMaxDistance(10, 10000); listenerPos.x = listenerPos.y = listenerPos.z = 0.0f; listenerVel.x = listenerVel.y = listenerVel.z = 0.0f; listenerForward.x = listenerForward.y = listenerUp.x = listenerUp.z = 0.0f; listenerForward.z = listenerUp.y = 1.0f; system->set3DListenerAttributes(0, &listenerPos, &listenerVel, &listenerForward, &listenerUp); while (true) { system->update(); system->getCPUUsage(&dsp, &stream, &geometry, &update, &total); cout << total << endl; soundPos.z+=0.01f; channel->set3DAttributes(&soundPos, &soundVel);

44. Interfacing with Sound Designer
You should have received
.fev file (Designer file – event data)
.fsb file (raw audio data)
.txt file (describes the events and parameters)
May want to start by creating a helper function
void checkErrors(FMOD_RESULT result) {
if (result != FMOD_OK) {
cout << "fmod error: " << FMOD_ErrorString(result) << endl;
exit(1); }

45. Imagine That This is our Project

46. #include <iostream> #include <fmod
#include <iostream> #include <fmod.hpp> #include <fmod_event.hpp> #include <fmod_errors.h> using namespace std; using namespace FMOD; void main () { EventSystem* eventSystem = NULL; EventGroup* eventGroup = NULL; Event* myEvent = NULL; EventParameter* eventPar; FMOD_RESULT result = EventSystem_Create(&eventSystem); checkErrors(result); result = eventSystem->init(64, FMOD_INIT_NORMAL, 0, FMOD_EVENT_INIT_NORMAL); eventSystem->setMediaPath("..//"); result = eventSystem->load("fmodTest.fev", 0, 0); result = eventSystem->getGroup("fmodTest/beeps", false, &eventGroup); result = eventGroup->getEvent("PossessedComputer", FMOD_EVENT_DEFAULT, &myEvent); result = myEvent->getParameter("proximityToComputer", &eventPar); myEvent->start(); float dir = f; float currentParVal = -1.0f; eventPar->setValue(0.1f); while (true){ cout << currentParVal << endl; eventPar->getValue(&currentParVal); currentParVal+=dir; eventPar->setValue(currentParVal); if ((currentParVal >= 1.0)||(currentParVal <= 0.0)) { dir = -dir; }

47. Interactive Music

48. void main () { EventSystem. eventSystem = NULL; MusicSystem
void main () { EventSystem* eventSystem = NULL; MusicSystem* musicSystem = NULL; MusicPrompt* introPrompt, *fightPrompt, *fight2Prompt, *releasePrompt; FMOD_MUSIC_ITERATOR cueIter; FMOD_MUSIC_ITERATOR paramIter; FMOD_MUSIC_ID intensityParID = -1.0f; FMOD_RESULT result = EventSystem_Create(&eventSystem); result = eventSystem->init(64, FMOD_INIT_NORMAL, 0, FMOD_EVENT_INIT_NORMAL); result = eventSystem->load("acid_test.fev", 0, 0); result = eventSystem->getMusicSystem(&musicSystem); musicSystem->setVolume(1.0f); result = musicSystem->getCues(&cueIter); cout << "Iter ID: " << cueIter.value->id << endl; result = musicSystem->prepareCue(cueIter.value->id, &fightPrompt); result = musicSystem->getNextCue(&cueIter); result = musicSystem->prepareCue(cueIter.value->id, &fight2Prompt); result = musicSystem->prepareCue(cueIter.value->id, &introPrompt); result = musicSystem->prepareCue(cueIter.value->id, &releasePrompt); musicSystem->getParameters(&paramIter); intensityParID = paramIter.value->id; cout << "paramIter.value->name is " << paramIter.value->name << endl; musicSystem->setParameterValue(intensityParID, 7.5f); result = introPrompt->begin(); while (true){ eventSystem->update(); }

49. Other Things You Should Look Into…
The 3D Reverb API
Asynchronously loading data (by default)
Memory management for non-PC platforms
FMOD::Memory_Initialize() // fix size of fmod
Using compressed samples
Built-in DSP

50. Configuration Notes You’ll be working with
Header files
C/C++ -> General->Additional Include Directories
Lib files
Linker->General->Additional Library Directories
Linker->General->Additional Dependencies
DLLs (which you should put into Windows/System32)
There’s also a FMOD.NET site…

51. Configuration Notes You have the option of 64-bit and 32-bit libraries
You might have to create a new platform