Connecting sound design communities

计算机生成图像（CGI）在过去的几十年里有了很大的发展，但遗憾的是声音设计技术并没有经历这样的创新。在游戏，播客，电影和VR中，声音设计师仍然依赖于巨大的样本库来获取声音效果。与每个对象的每次交互都需要分配一个预先录制的声音，并且适应仅限于对这些声音的后期处理。这种缺乏可信的、生成的声音限制了听觉场景的丰富性、真实感和沉浸感。我们的创新是程序音频技术，该技术使用软件算法创建原始声音。我们的技术允许所有的声音效果实时创建，并具有直观的控制，无需使用记录的样本，从而创建完整的听觉世界。Nemisindo（祖鲁语中“声音”的意思）是一家由InnovateUK项目成功衍生而来的初创公司，专注于程序音频。我们的主要产品之一是在线服务，用户可以创建几乎任何声音效果，准备在他们的创意内容中使用。这代表了声音设计的一个步骤变化，用户创造他们想要的声音，而不是寻找和编辑录音。但我们如何才能让音效设计师接受这种新模式呢？要做到这一点，我们需要更好地了解客户对技术的看法，他们使用技术的动机以及他们可能的行为。什么会鼓励他们定期使用这项服务？是什么限制了它的使用？标准的网站分析是不够的，因为它们不能告诉我们用户的动机。“连接健全设计社群”计划将运用以人为本的设计原则，促进健全设计社群的发展。我们建议在我们的在线系统中建立一些功能，让人们不仅仅是简单地评论和讨论，不仅仅是简单地分享内容。相反，设置是共享的，类似于共享允许生成内容的指令。这将使我们能够生成、验证和执行既能提高程序音频意识又能满足声音设计社区需求的想法。该项目还将深入了解客户，他们的动机和需求，而不仅仅是社区建设功能所需的。这些见解将使我们能够专注并增强我们的商业产品，并更准确地提供满足客户需求的利益。这些见解和我们的方法也将在行业活动中分享，提高我们的新方法的认识，并支持在其他领域更广泛地使用社区建设和以人为本的设计。

Computer Generated Imagery (CGI) has greatly developed over the past decades but unfortunately sound design technology has not undergone such innovation. In games, podcasts, film and VR, sound designers still rely on huge sample libraries to source sound effects. Each interaction with each object needs to be assigned a pre-recorded sound, and adaptation is limited to post-processing on those sounds. This lack of plausible, generative sound limits the richness, realism and immersive quality of the auditory sceneOur innovation is Procedural Audio technology that creates original sound using software algorithms. Our technology allows all sound effects to be created in real-time and with intuitive controls, without use of recorded samples, thus creating complete auditory worlds.Nemisindo (the Zulu word for 'sounds') is a start-up arising from successful InnovateUK projects, focused around procedural audio. One of our key offerings is an online service where users can create almost any sound effect, ready for use in their creative content. This represents a step change in sound design, where users create sounds they want rather than finding and editing recordings. But how can we get sound designers to embrace this new paradigm?To do this, we need to better understand our customers' perceptions of the technology, their motivations in using the technology and their likely behaviours. What would encourage them to use the service on a regular basis? What limits its use? Standard website analytics are not sufficient because they don't tell us the users' motivations.The Connecting Sound Design Communities (CSDC) project will apply human-centred design principles to foster the growth of sound design communities. We propose to build features in our online system where one does more than simply comment and discuss, more than simply share content. Instead, settings are shared, akin to sharing the instructions that allow content to be generated. This will allow us to generate, validate and implement ideas that both raise awareness of procedural audio and address the needs of the sound design community.The project will also gather deep insights into customers, their motivations and needs, beyond those needed for community building features. These insights will allow us to focus and enhance our commercial offerings and more accurately provide benefits that meet customer needs. These insights and our approach will also be shared at industry events, raising awareness of our novel approach and supporting wider use of community building and human-centred design in other domains.