Role
Audio Designer
Timeline
4 weeks
Tools
Ableton
Type
Class Project
Robbery
Soundscape
This audio piece tells a story using only sound effects and recordings made by myself. The listener takes on the perspective of someone who is asleep, half awake, half asleep listening to someone breaking into their home. What starts as subtle, distant sounds gradually builds into footsteps moving through the house, searching through rooms and getting closer. The tension increases until the intruder enters the bedroom, ending with close, heavy breathing right beside the listener, before the burglar quickly runs away after breaking something. The piece plays with fear, proximity, and uncertainty, using sound alone to create a sense of vulnerability and making the listener feel physically present in the situation.
Technically, it was difficult to make distance and space feel realistic without visuals. Things like footsteps, room ambience, and breathing needed to feel like they were moving through an actual house, but it was hard to control levels, reverb, and timing so everything stayed readable instead of becoming messy.
I focused a lot on sound layering and spatial effects. I used volume automation, panning, and different reverb settings to simulate movement through rooms and distance between the listener and the source of the sound. Closer moments, like the breathing at the end, were kept very dry and loud to make them feel immediate and uncomfortable, while distant footsteps had more reverb and lower frequencies to push them further away.
Received Feedback
Most of the feedback I got was about volume balance. Some sounds were way too loud while others were too quiet, which made it hard to follow the story properly. It also felt too long for what it was trying to do, and not engaging enough across the whole duration.
Changes Made
I went back into the project and reworked the mix so the volume levels were more consistent. I balanced the loud and quiet sounds better so the listener can follow the story without sudden jumps or parts getting lost. I also tightened the timeline by cutting some sections and reducing repetition, so the piece feels more focused and holds attention better over its full length.
Script
I started by writing a simple script based on the idea of someone sleeping while a break-in slowly happens. I planned the key moments first, like sleeping, footsteps entering the house, moving through rooms, and ending in the bedroom. This helped me structure the sound before I started recording anything.
Finding/recording sounds
After that, I recorded most of the sounds myself in real life. I walked around different spaces to get footsteps, opened doors, and used small objects to create realistic effects. The goal was to keep everything as natural as possible so it feels believable instead of synthetic. Some sounds, like something breaking, I downloaded from the internet. I selected them based on if they sound realistic and wouldnt feel out of place.
Sound design
Once I had all the recordings, I imported them and started shaping them with EQ and reverb. I used EQ to clean up unwanted frequencies and make certain sounds stand out or sit further back in the mix. Reverb was used to create space, so footsteps felt like they were moving through different rooms, while closer sounds like breathing stayed dry and intense.
In the final stage, I layered everything together and adjusted timing so the story flows properly. I focused a lot on distance and pacing, making the tension slowly build until the final moment in the bedroom.