Over the decades, much has been said about the fantastic contributions of Ben Burtt to the Star Wars films. Let’s face it: without his sound effects, it’s much less likely that any of us would have “bought in” to the whole atmosphere Lucas was trying to sell us on. Burtt even won a special Academy Award for his sound effects, so you know he was doing something right.
One thing that’s always made Ben Burtt an ideal mentor is the fact that he generally made no secrets about how he achieved his special sound effects. Sure, he usually waited for the movies to come out first, but eventually most of his secrets were revealed. I recall walking to school after seeing “The Making of The Empire Strikes Back” and being delighted with the fact that I could perfectly replicate the blaster sound effects from Star Wars by tapping a steel guy-wire holding up a telephone pole near my bus stop.
Be that as it may, there’s one sound effect that Ben has been notoriously tight-lipped about: the Seismic Charges from Episode II: Attack of the Clones. It’s a great effect. Not only does the explosion itself sound great, but there’s this “silence” immediately preceding which seems to suggest that the explosion is so powerful that it literally “sucks up” all the sounds around it. (irrelevant in space, of course, but this is the Star Wars universe, after all) The sound of the explosion itself is extremely cool, and Burtt has gone on record as being unwilling to divulge the secret:
“I prefer not to discuss in detail this sound at this time. After all, can’t I keep a few secrets?”
Feel free, Ben. Lord knows you’ve earned the right. But in the interest of fandom, I’ve taken it upon myself to figure out just how he did it. Here’s a short video explaining.
As related in the video, I took a normal “explosion” sound (or a gunshot, or a depth charge) and applied a digital delay with approximately a 1/100th second delay, with a VERY slow decay. (meaning: the effect lasts a long time before wearing off) I couldn’t exactly match the same “pitch” that he got in his sound, but I think the overall effect is VERY similar. (the only effect I replaced was the seismic charge itself, all of the spaceships, rocks, etc. are as in the original)
Take a listen, and let me know how close I got!