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Whether you’re an Audio Director at a game studio, a Manager at a post-production house, or a Supervising Sound Editor working in film, your team can always benefit from a better workflow – especially when it comes to sound libraries. This blog will cover why workflow is important for teams, what to consider when planning your sound library workflow, and how to set your team up for success.
Why You Need a Better Sound Library Workflow
If you’re reading this, you and your team probably spend a significant amount of time working with sound effects. And if that’s the case, we don’t need to tell you how important it is to find the right sounds – you already know that the perfect sound effect or background ambience can elevate any scene, podcast, game level, or whatever you happen to be working on.
But finding the right sounds takes time, and time is money. Every minute you and your team members spend searching through sound effects, organizing field recordings, or copying audio files into your project is one less minute you could be spending on creative tasks like sound design and mixing.
This is where the concept of workflow comes into play. In the context of sound libraries, workflow refers to how you organize your sound effects collection, search for the sounds you need, and bring them into your software for editing, processing, and mixing. Think of your sound library workflow as your pipeline from inspiration to final product.
Pool Your Resources
If you’re using multiple sound libraries from different sources, or even your own original recordings, you’re probably spending unnecessary time hopping back and forth between folders to find the sounds you need. The first step in a good workflow is to bring all of your assets together in one place using a dedicated sound library software.
Library management apps like SoundQ act like a search engine for your entire collection, allowing you to search all of your libraries at once. This way, you can use keywords like “door,” “car,” or “howler monkey” to bring up all relevant results, no matter where they’re stored. You can then sort, filter, and refine your search results until you find exactly what you’re looking for.
Work Faster
Another major aspect of sound library workflow is how you bring sound effects and music into your projects. Most audio and video editing software contains some kind of media browser for importing assets, but the features can vary wildly, and none of them excel in all ways. You may be able to import a sound quickly, but will it copy the file to the right place, convert it to the right format, put it on the right track, and drop it precisely where you need it on the timeline?
To minimize the time you spend clicking, copying, converting, and time-aligning sounds, your workflow should include a tool that does all of this for you. For example, SoundQ integrates directly with Pro Tools, Adobe Premiere, and Reaper, allowing you to instantly spot any sound to your timeline. There’s also a convenient Drag and Drop function for all other software, and more integrations are on the way.
Master Your Metadata
Metadata is one of the less obvious but still very important parts of your sound library workflow. If you’re using sounds from multiple sources, they most likely have different standards for metadata. Established companies like Pro Sound Effects typically include robust metadata, but the assorted sound effects you’ve downloaded from various sources over the years probably aren’t as organized.
To keep your workflow organized, you need a way to edit metadata (and lots of it). SoundQ and other apps like it allow you to edit metadata for individual files or perform batch edits on many files at once. This makes it easy to implement consistent file naming conventions, tag your sounds with keywords that make sense to you, and add details like date, location, and microphone. With the right tools, an hour or two of metadata editing in your downtime will save you innumerable hours searching for sounds when you’re facing a deadline.
A better sound library workflow can help your team work faster and more creatively.
Implementing a Sound Library Workflow with Your Team
Make a Plan
First, think about what’s missing from your current workflow and how it could be improved. Do you have an especially large library to manage and find yourself spending a lot of time searching through files? Do you need a better way to manage library access for a large team? Or do you record a lot of your own sounds and want to get faster at importing and cataloging your work? Ask your team for input too, as they might be facing their own challenges or have ideas that wouldn’t have occurred to you.
Once you’ve identified the problems you need to solve, you can start finding ways to improve your workflow. It may be that you just need to consolidate various libraries into one place or find a tool for editing metadata quickly. But more likely, you’ll need to solve multiple problems at once. In that case, switching to an all-in-one library management platform is the way to go. For example, the Pro Sound Effects Platform, which includes SoundQ and the PSE Web App, is designed to solve common workflow problems and allow teams to work more efficiently and creatively.
In addition to a library management system, you may need to implement new systems and processes with your team. This is arguably the more difficult part, because you can’t just rely on software to solve every problem – the people using it also need to agree on how to use it. Depending on your team and the type of work you do, this could mean designating one person to manage library organization or agreeing on standard operating procedures for everyone to follow. Whatever system you come up with, make sure everyone’s on board and knows what to do.
Get Set Up
Once you’ve gotten your priorities straight and made a plan to improve your workflow, it’s time to get the process started. If you’re using Pro Sound Effects, the first step will be to contact our Licensing Specialists to find the right plan for your team. After you’re in the system, you’ll need to create user accounts and set access permissions for your team. This can be done in the Admin section of your account.
The next step is to get your tools set up. As a PSE user, you can use the SoundQ desktop app or the PSE Web App to access your libraries. SoundQ is best for editors and sound designers who use sound effects daily and need the most robust search features and software integrations. The PSE Web App is great for producers, animators, and anyone who needs occasional access to sound effects but doesn't require the full suite of tools. It’s also a great way to access your collection on the go.
After that, you’ll need to organize your collection in a way that makes sense for your team workflow. In the PSE Platform, you can do this by creating custom groups of sounds called Collections, which can be used to save your favorite sounds, curate a palette of sounds for a particular project, or access your existing libraries within SoundQ. Collections are flexible, easy to set up, and easy to share, so any team can benefit from better organization.
PSE customers can contact our support team for guidance throughout the process, from getting your account set up to learning the tools, adding team members, and organizing your assets.
Never Stop Improving
Once you’re up and running with your new workflow, don’t forget to check in once in a while and re-evaluate. Has your solution solved the challenges you wanted it to? Have any new workflow challenges come up? Check in with your team, too – how is the system working for everyone else? Is anything still slowing them down or holding them back? Ask for feedback and suggestions with an open mind.
If any issues do come up, address them immediately. Don’t wait until a minor hassle becomes a major bottleneck in the middle of a project; use those minor snags as opportunities to fine-tune your workflow. Small changes are easier to make and less disruptive than big overhauls, such as the one you may have just done by revamping your workflow.
Most importantly, keep learning and finding opportunities to improve your workflow. Check out our blog for SoundQ tips, interviews, and more.
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