This is something I never really considered. For the last 20 years I’ve been playing racing games here and there, but when they started becoming realistic (i.e. the cars weren’t square and the engine noises weren’t square waves), the enormity of the sound challenge never really struck me. Engine, road, and tire noise, plus accurate doppler effects, different crunches and thunks for impacts… the list goes on. As if that wasn’t enough, you have to worry about engine noise contaminating your samples.
What if someone hits the clutch while their tires are squealing? Less engine, more squeal. But if you recorded the tires squealing in the real world, chances are that the engine noise is inseparable from the squeal. Even if you can deconstruct the sound, it’s a lot of work and the end result isn’t as good as the real thing.
So it’s no wonder that some game designers from Microsoft jumped at the chance to use a Tesla for recording game audio. No engine noise and careful mic placement means you can get tire squeal, or any other audio component of driving, almost completely isolated. Now, I know you guys aren’t really that hot for the details of audio production, but I know you like fast cars. And it actually is pretty entertaining to see a Tesla with so many big hairy mics on it that it looks like a pussy willow.
The audio guys are working on the new Forza and Project Gotham Racing titles, and I wouldn’t be surprised if those games will be praised for their audio. A few good samples and they can tweak them to their hearts’ content. I don’t know whether the Tesla will be in either of the games, but adding the sound should be easy if they decide it should be.
The details of this Roadster’s little adventure are at the Tesla blog, where you will be regaled with all the tidbits about mic placement, clapboards, and that sort of thing. Sounds like it was a lot of fun. Thanks to Tom Burt for offering up his Tesla.
Just HAD to get that “Pussy Willow” reference in there, didn’t you????
yeah, good thing the article profile didn’t get cutoff by 6 characters
pgr and forza are both good, im glad to see them using all the resources they can to acquire high quality sound
as for the tesla roadster, only an idiot would pay $100,000 for a rebadged lotus elise with crappy powerpacks and limited range. the interior looks worse than a chevy cobalt which costs about 1/10th its price.
Crappy power? limited range? lotus? HUH?!
okie dokie!
Those sound guys know their stuff. I got to meet a few of them recording audio for PGR2 at a dyno in Palo Alto, they had a serious setup to get a few cars under load.
Hits the clutch while the tires are squeeling and “more sqeel, less engine”?
Um, I don’t see that one. (Unless your clutch is accompanied by a reduced throttle. Even then, only more squeel if it’s a cornering-induced squeel, not an acceleration-induced one or a brake-induced one.)
Please do explain….
heh, i guess I meant he’d let off the gas as well so the engine sound would go down. good catch.
they’re only recording the rear wheels?
Yes, because the Tesla is the only electric car that has enough power to push it into power oversteer. As somebody else already noted above, if you only wanted to record any kind of tire squeel it would suffice to hit the clutch (or even turn off the engine altogether) on a normal car and then brake or corner hard enough.
He said “pussy” He-he-he-he
Is that a 3rd mic trying to record an exhaust there??
this car looks absolutely awful. I’ve owned an F430, a GT Continental and an R8 so I know what a high-end sports car needs to look like, and this one looks like the bastard child of a Mazda and a Lotus
how anyone would pay $100K for this is beyond me. But I suppose it is the same group that buys Priuses and keeps telling you about how great they are because they drive something with low emissions
It IS a lotus…
BTW, it’s spelled: Squeal, not “squeel”… morons! :)
You just couldn’t resist saying pussy willow could you?
“the cars weren’t square and the engine noises weren’t square waves”
Is it bad that I found that absolutely hilarious? heh
Funny thing is Tesla suspension geometry is set up to minimize rolling resistance at the expense of handling. Basically zero toe-in. They accelerate great in a straight line but get their heads handed to them on the curves. Also look at that body roll in the pictures. This is most definitely not a sports car.