Recently re-watched Star Wars IV for the millionth time, and was shocked how virtually undated the whole movie is, ESPECIALLY the sounds. Ben Burtt is one of the most unsung geniouses of audio: how could he think of the sounds and even yet find the way to produce them is beyond me. The sounds of Star Wars revolutionized everything.
This man is a God. He made the Darth Vader breathing noises, R2D2 noises( most of which he did), Chewie's scream, lightsaber noises and the Wilhelm scream!
I like how generally Jedi and Sith sabers sound subtly different too. Like jedi sabers usually (not always though) ignite with the standard bsshuu sorta noise, but red blades (and I think Windu's purple saber too) more often ignite with a harsher kssh sound. It's a subtle way of distinguishing between good and evil aurally =)
Another one of the production crew who just happened to hit pure gold on the same movie. Your music, sfx, model-makers, casting, and actors all do the same and you have yourself a timeless classic
Awesome! I am an aspiring sound designer/producer and the clip at the end where he is swinging the microphone around was an awesome way of showing me and helping me with different ways of recording sound! 5 Stars!
wow, all this amazing new technology in the last 35+ years and we haven't had any movies that can match the original star wars trilogy in its excellence. Have any of these people seriously considered the philosophy of technology in art. I mean why do people have to believe there is such a thing as an obsolete tool in film making? Sure one method might be painstaking but could not the very nature of its painstaking operation help to yield better art?
Awesome video - thanks Dave - loved hearing the backstory on some of the technical aspects of this incredible Sci-Fi series. Well done! And to you as well Ben - may the force.....be with you! :)
Sound design is the least appreciated group in movie production. (Unless if you're into sound design like me) look up any movie scene and turn your speakers off, you'll then realize how important sounds are to a film.
+Joshua Brown Indeed. Pretty much the same deal for any form of entertainment involving multiple senses. Beloved video games, along with movies can attribute a lot of their success to quality sound design, which as you rightly state, goes almost totally unappreciated by the masses or even the producers. Sadly.
+Joey Baseball If the sound design and overall supervision is good, you'll leave the theatre saying "it was a good movie". If it's bad, you'll say "the movie was bad". Sound has enormous effect on the overall sense of quality. Good sound can save poor photography and maybe even poor story or acting, but bad sound can ruin everything.
Dude.. this is a discussion. He's not saying that everyone is an idiot for not appreciating the production of sound or "ambiance". He's just saying that 90% of people don't appreciate or care to know how many people it takes to put together these multi-million dollar movies. Because most people will simply throw it under the bus just because they anticipated it to be something completely different than how the finished product was presented.
Here's the thing: ask any movie goer to describe the sound of any inanimate object from any movie and chances are very good that they will not be able to. Except the light saber. Ben is a god.
He's up there with the Shigeru Miyamotos of videogame design :) He's both a very clever and creative guy with a passion for his field of art. Inspirational.
You can hear when the lightsabers are clashing that it is the same sort of sound as the laser pistols in the film. To create that he hits a tight, thick steel wire.
I heard that the clashing sound was made by hitting a big spring. My friend had a garage door spring that made a very similar sound when you tapped it with a wrench.
Can anyone explain? I'm into sound design being a musician and filmmaker. I did an experiment and played the lightsaber hum through my pc, and waved my phone around in front of it whilst it was recording, to see if the Doppler effect would kick in, and make it sound like a lightsaber being swung around. When I listened back to the recording, it sounded the same all the way through. Why is this?
you'll need a proper speaker, a proper microphone and make very wide albeit harmonious movement, like they achieved by placing the mic on the tip of a "wand" as seen on the video
so many sounds from New hope are great. Another is when the death star laser gets fired up by the guys in the black samurai helmets. med-low pitch to low low pitch in 3.5 seconds.
Wellll... not quite... Stereo had been dabbled with before. And in large-format-cinema multichannel-audio was pretty much the norm since the ginormous screens where introduced. What Lucas and his pals did was to device a way to get stereo-sound that would play as stereo on a normal sound-pickup and for those theaters with the decoders, that same signal would be decoded to 4channel-surround-sound. And I think that the same track could also be played on a mono-theatre.
Is it just me, or was this guy like a teenager when he worked on Ep. 4? When was this recorded? It doesn't seem grainy enough for the late 70's/early 80's, lol.
Hey, i wanna try that out, the microphone television signal cross thing. And a projectors motor, lol. I wonder if you could do that with a radio signal and with an electric guitars speaker on microphone, to call myself on another phone and produce multiple sounds of the dopler shift. I WANNA TRY THAT OUT. I'm gonna make a lightsaber sound from scratch, like him. Very interesting. THANK YOU BEN BURTT, YOURE MY SOUND HERO!!
He did make the sound, shit ass. He combined hums and that's what made the sound. If you go all sceptic like this, you can also conclude that music is no music and no one ever 'created' sound. Have some respect for this guy man... jeez
Recently re-watched Star Wars IV for the millionth time, and was shocked how virtually undated the whole movie is, ESPECIALLY the sounds. Ben Burtt is one of the most unsung geniouses of audio: how could he think of the sounds and even yet find the way to produce them is beyond me. The sounds of Star Wars revolutionized everything.
This man is a God. He made the Darth Vader breathing noises, R2D2 noises( most of which he did), Chewie's scream, lightsaber noises and the Wilhelm scream!
I like how generally Jedi and Sith sabers sound subtly different too. Like jedi sabers usually (not always though) ignite with the standard bsshuu sorta noise, but red blades (and I think Windu's purple saber too) more often ignite with a harsher kssh sound. It's a subtle way of distinguishing between good and evil aurally =)
3:10 ua-cam.com/video/v2AC41dglnM/v-deo.html good or evil?
3:16 ua-cam.com/video/gEPmA3USJdI/v-deo.html I think we know the answer
Thanks, Mr. Burtt, many have created devices children play with, you certainly created the first sound children play with
Still with Darth Vader's breathing one of cinemas most iconic sounds ever.
Fucking hell this is awesome. So glad we had this guy working on the sound for Star Wars.
Another one of the production crew who just happened to hit pure gold on the same movie. Your music, sfx, model-makers, casting, and actors all do the same and you have yourself a timeless classic
Awesome! I am an aspiring sound designer/producer and the clip at the end where he is swinging the microphone around was an awesome way of showing me and helping me with different ways of recording sound!
5 Stars!
The lightsaber sound effect is timeless the coolest weapon in cinema history
love the humming sounds of the lightsabres
wow, all this amazing new technology in the last 35+ years and we haven't had any movies that can match the original star wars trilogy in its excellence. Have any of these people seriously considered the philosophy of technology in art. I mean why do people have to believe there is such a thing as an obsolete tool in film making? Sure one method might be painstaking but could not the very nature of its painstaking operation help to yield better art?
Awesome video - thanks Dave - loved hearing the backstory on some of the technical aspects of this incredible Sci-Fi series. Well done! And to you as well Ben - may the force.....be with you! :)
first like you got in 11 years
Sound design is the least appreciated group in movie production. (Unless if you're into sound design like me) look up any movie scene and turn your speakers off, you'll then realize how important sounds are to a film.
+Joshua Brown Indeed. Pretty much the same deal for any form of entertainment involving multiple senses. Beloved video games, along with movies can attribute a lot of their success to quality sound design, which as you rightly state, goes almost totally unappreciated by the masses or even the producers. Sadly.
+Joey Baseball If the sound design and overall supervision is good, you'll leave the theatre saying "it was a good movie". If it's bad, you'll say "the movie was bad".
Sound has enormous effect on the overall sense of quality. Good sound can save poor photography and maybe even poor story or acting, but bad sound can ruin everything.
Dude.. this is a discussion. He's not saying that everyone is an idiot for not appreciating the production of sound or "ambiance". He's just saying that 90% of people don't appreciate or care to know how many people it takes to put together these multi-million dollar movies. Because most people will simply throw it under the bus just because they anticipated it to be something completely different than how the finished product was presented.
Yup, but that also secures our demand for work.
The humming of the light sabers sound very similar to hummingbirds.
i love how the microphone thing was a total accident but it worked perfectly.
GENIUS
I love the shot of him swinging the shotgun mic around like a lightsaber. Pure awesome. Man's a genius.
Great technique for sound recording / sampling. Thanks for sharing
Here's the thing: ask any movie goer to describe the sound of any inanimate object from any movie and chances are very good that they will not be able to. Except the light saber. Ben is a god.
You described that very well!
Absolutely Brilliant!!!
This is really inspiring to watch.
Wonderfully informative. Thanks for posting this.
👍
He's up there with the Shigeru Miyamotos of videogame design :) He's both a very clever and creative guy with a passion for his field of art. Inspirational.
More than a genius. He is a legend in the sound biz.
Ben Burtt is pretty much the most amazing sound person on the planet
Yeah, Ben Burrt also did the Sound Design on Wall-E, which is of course excellent.
You can hear when the lightsabers are clashing that it is the same sort of sound as the laser pistols in the film. To create that he hits a tight, thick steel wire.
I heard that the clashing sound was made by hitting a big spring. My friend had a garage door spring that made a very similar sound when you tapped it with a wrench.
It was dry ice on metal.
i wish he would had talk about more about how to use the shot gun mic for the lightsaber sund fx
Ben Burt is a genious of sound. He is the best of the best.
Ben Burtt is my hero.
the sound of a wrench hitting a metal cable you refer to is the basis for the blaster guns sound...
Nice. I've always wondered how they came up with the sound for them.
Really!
Sometimes I really wonder how the world of geniuses like him is like. He must look at things so differently from everyone else. *_*
Can anyone explain?
I'm into sound design being a musician and filmmaker. I did an experiment and played the lightsaber hum through my pc, and waved my phone around in front of it whilst it was recording, to see if the Doppler effect would kick in, and make it sound like a lightsaber being swung around. When I listened back to the recording, it sounded the same all the way through. Why is this?
You would most likely need a directional mic to get the full effect. The phone mics are usually meant to set down and record the space around you.
you'll need a proper speaker, a proper microphone and make very wide albeit harmonious movement, like they achieved by placing the mic on the tip of a "wand" as seen on the video
so many sounds from New hope are great. Another is when the death star laser gets fired up by the guys in the black samurai helmets. med-low pitch to low low pitch in 3.5 seconds.
His a freakin genius
This is really interesting how he did all of this.
Ben Burtt rules, i'd love to do what he does
So the moving saber sounds were Ben shadow-duelling with a microphone in sync with the screen?
And here's me thinking it couldn't get any cooler.
Sound design genius.
Gotta thank Doppler for those lightsaber thrust sounds.
Pure rock star!!
I wish there was an easier way to find these Laser-disc extras.
wouldn't putting a mic in front a speaker produce feedback??
One of those sound effects every kid makes :)
Quite a few adults too 😎👍🏻
Sound rules!
Watching this with the google.com/starwars setup... awesome!
Give that man a cookie!
@birthnight Quote! Amazing video, thanks!
it was a tension spring from a radio tower, i think
Cool stuff!
Wellll... not quite... Stereo had been dabbled with before. And in large-format-cinema multichannel-audio was pretty much the norm since the ginormous screens where introduced.
What Lucas and his pals did was to device a way to get stereo-sound that would play as stereo on a normal sound-pickup and for those theaters with the decoders, that same signal would be decoded to 4channel-surround-sound. And I think that the same track could also be played on a mono-theatre.
Super interesting.
Yes, indeed!
Is it just me, or was this guy like a teenager when he worked on Ep. 4? When was this recorded? It doesn't seem grainy enough for the late 70's/early 80's, lol.
rotorcraft68 He was in college I think
Hey, i wanna try that out, the microphone television signal cross thing. And a projectors motor, lol. I wonder if you could do that with a radio signal and with an electric guitars speaker on microphone, to call myself on another phone and produce multiple sounds of the dopler shift. I WANNA TRY THAT OUT. I'm gonna make a lightsaber sound from scratch, like him. Very interesting. THANK YOU BEN BURTT, YOURE MY SOUND HERO!!
Legend
@LEGO171 whos cupqauke?
This interview is from the laser disc version of the trilogy.
Damn....
Well done :)
SWEET!
A stormtrooper with a lightsaber? HERESY!
So.. I was listening to "Hendersin - Lonely Road" And somehow made my way here...
very interesting!!
The only way this could more perfectly encapsulate the 20th Century is if he blew up a transistor or something...
That's very interesting.
Cool!
He is my uncle!
Sean Burtt For some reason I don't believe you
Sean Burtt he is somehow related to me🤔
we dont really care to be honest with you.
That's a pretty good trick, considering he's an only child...
@UltimteLifeForm yeah, we all read the article, buddy.
Bass clarinets also sound like a lightsabers if you play low notes.
wall-e's voice isnt human exactly, but with instruments that he uses, he makes beeping and buzzing sounds
The only man in the universe who can accurately portray this face: :/
Now, I just need an old projector motor, and I can make the lightsabre sounds!
Wow this comment is OLD
Microphone = Lightsaber. :)
Question then is. Mircosaber or Lightphone :P
So what they did was quite revolutionary even though they didn't quite "invent Stereophonic sound in cinemas"
This mas is a Genius
GameGrumps brought me here.
that is so interesting
He did make the sound, shit ass. He combined hums and that's what made the sound. If you go all sceptic like this, you can also conclude that music is no music and no one ever 'created' sound. Have some respect for this guy man... jeez
Sometimes, the most practical things are genius.
That is do COOL !!!!
He's talking about Burtt not going "wwwwoooomm" himself at any point during the interview, duh.
Ive heard that its from taking a hammer to the metal cables that hold telephone poles in place. I have no proof of this.
genius
What a genius. Who else but this man deserves 72 virgins and paradise.
"Genius..." XD
his mouth is diagonal. I know that's superficial but i can't stop looking at it o___o
cool
@M46h1n3
Cracked
Cupqaukes new terraria video brought me here
? what are you talking about ...this line of work is still at work... so is ben burtt
@sumbuddyx
A Star Trek fan. :D
For the moving sound they could have used a humming bird wizzing by, sounds a lot alike......
mine too. =o)
WHO THE FUCK WOULD DISLIKE THIS?????????
sorry for the caps.
I though he was going to show how he did it, not just tell
UntitledxBeyond they did show it...
@Cinemasins brought me here...
got so sleepy listening to him.....
Boss.