Creature Voice Sound Design: Building the Sound of the Unknown

Creating creature voices is one of the most creative and experimental parts of sound design for games and film. In this video, I explore how to design the voice of an alien creature by layering, processing, and shaping sounds from a wide range of real-world animals.

To achieve a unique, otherworldly result, I combined recordings from elephants, crocodiles, alpacas, cats, pigs, snakes, and other animals. Each sound was carefully edited and timed with slight delays so they wouldn’t trigger simultaneously, giving the vocalisations a natural, organic rhythm and movement, with an alien twist.

The final sound is built from multiple grouped layers, each processed with a blend of creative effects such as:

• Kilohearts Multipass and Snap Heap for complex modulation chains.

• Valhalla Supermassive for slap delay and spatial depth.

• Time stretching to create obscure sounds.

• Detailed EQing and filtering to carve space for each tonal element.

These tools help transform recognizable animal sounds into a believable alien presence, one that feels alive, emotional, and integrated within its world. By blending natural sources with heavy processing, creature sound design bridges the gap between realism and imagination.