About the Project

My intentions going into this project were to sharpen my skills in linear sound design, to get more comfortable mixing library sounds with original recorded foley, and in general work on a more mystical, high fantasy project. This cutscene immediately spoke to me as I am an avid player of Elden Ring, and the scene itself is just packed full of great, high intensity moments, while at the same time allowing enough contrast for subtleties.

For this project, I gave myself a timeframe of one week. The first step was getting rid of the original audio, and I did not want to create a 1:1 replica of the original. That being the case, I find it surprising how similar some of the sections ended up being. My goal was to create a clear contrast between the nimble Malenia and the heavyweight Radahn. I looked into their lore, when this fight happened and what the consequences of it were. I then began sketching out ideas and looking through Audiokinetics Strata libraries, editing the sounds as needed. For this project, I took a top down approach, starting with the big stand-out sounds like the swords clashing and the scarlet rot explosion in the end, and worked my way down to the minute details from there.

I also recorded original Foleys, specifically the movement of the characters, footsteps and Radahns Swords grinding against each other. 

I took some creative liberties with the sound. For example, Malenias Scarlet Rot explosion features the sounds of all kinds of insects, worms, bugs and beetles. I wanted to give an organic feeling to her powers, really emphasizing the decomposition of the land that follows this battle.

The line "you will witness true horror" is actually spoken by Malenia in-game when the player fights her, and does indeed invoke true horror in anyone that has done so.  As such I found it fitting to put it in here, especially since her lips are actually moving but there is no dialogue in the original audio of this cutscene.

The hardest part to get right in this project was actually the ambience. Conveying the sounds of a huge battle in the Caelid desert where everyone died except the two demigods was definitely an interesting challenge.

All in all I learned a lot from this project, and I am already looking forward to my next Sound Design challenge.