Written Sound effects help

[beta1042]

Often times I need the written SFX for my comic and I have a really hard time coming up with one. So I figured I'd make a thread about it where we can help each other come up with written SFX.

Feel free to ask for suggestions or to just offer some of your favs.

Currently I'm struggling for sound effects for someone crying, and also would the tears that fall on the ground make a noise?

Also any thoughts for sounds of feet slowly walking?

[GamerPrincessXI]

Make your own sounds. Have your children help. Record the sound and listen to it over and over again. Hope that helps.

[Birbmagadon]

I think it all depends on the kind of mood you're going for regarding the scene.

Example, if tears are heavy they can make a sound (e.g., tip or tap), but they could be silenced, muffled sounds too. If they are supposed to be seen as ridiculous, the sobs could be a bunch of boo hooo hooooo!
Same goes for the feet. Spooky footsteps could go clank clank clank! and more melancholic ones could go tap tap tap depending on the intensity or mood.

Nothing is set in stone imo and it all depends on the aspect of the scene you want to enhance.

Additionally, I think breaking the codes and going "boohoohoo" when the crying is supposed to be dramatic can create some more complex yet interesting effects if you want to experience stuff. Perhaps another thing to consider is writing a bunch of sfx for a specific scene and showing them to your friends/family to know what they get from them, what sort of feel. If that makes sense

P.S. yep my written demonstrations are probably a bit cheesy but they're just examples haha

[punkarsenic]

I'm struggling for sound effects for someone crying

i usually go for 'hooo hoo hoo' and get really expressionist with the calligraphy

but it depends on the kind of crying, dont it?

also would the tears that fall on the ground make a noise?

like, not naturalistically, but if ur doing a panel focused on the tears a 'plink' wouldnt go amiss

[Iris-Grimoire]

For crying, honestly I think I feel the scenes a little more if they have no SFX, at the most a snif if it's not onscreen and the character just noticed it, and a dry tap if it's tears hitting something on a silent room. Heavy crying is inelegant by default, so adding sound effects might just push it towards the goofy or overdramatic, while keeping it silent might sell that everything just shut down around the character.

As for making sound effects in general, I also recommend watching modern mime shows. I watched a bit of Snooze by François-Guillaume Leblanc thinking nothing of it, and it's crazy how the actor can translate uninteligible sounds into real mouth noises to create an object where there's none. Bsshmm in particular is what the actor used for a UFO and I took that for some magic sounds in the comic I just couldn't put on paper.

[beta1042]

Yeah I'm not really asking for methods to create my own. Maybe I should have been more clear about that. I'm looking for a list of suggestions so I can stew over those suggestions, look at the panel, and make a decision.

[Birbmagadon]

I thought you wanted to create your own, my bad ^^;

So, I've never actually used it and I don't know what it's truly worth, but if it can help a little bit here is a website gathering a lot of them and arranging them into "objects" and "themes". Perhaps you'll find what you need?

Onomatopoeia dictionary

[Joker12]

I just make the sound with my mouth or play it on my laptop over and over and try to spell it lol, Sounds easier than what it actually is, but you know how it is.

But as an example: "BUDDAH" Is commonly used as a sound for a machine gun.
Tapping your foot on the ground might make a "dump" sound but since "dump" is an actual word you might use, "thump" or "doomp" w.e you want

[GesuGesu]

Do it like "Let's Play" style, but worse.

sad sounds

plup plip

S A D

Girl crying uncontrollably