Audio in Titanic VR Story.
Background Music.
My idea was to have several sound effects in the experience. The main soundtrack is the instrumental version of the Titanic (1997) movie, called My Heart Will Go On. I implemented this melody as a background music within the whole experience, so in all three scenes. By default the song would start from the beginning after each scene is loaded. I, therefore, had to use the right code to prevent that and to have a continuously playing theme song throughout the whole experience.
Recorded audio. Instructions and the story.
The second type of audio effects in my projects are objects that when triggered – touched or grabbed by the player – tell parts of the story or give instructions. In the Opening Scene there is an audio clip attached to the big book on the left side of the table. When the book is touched by the player, the sound is activated – the player receives instructions of how to move around within the VR world one has been immersed in.
Other elements with audio clips activated are placed on the table in the Story Scene. There are: a compass, binoculars, black cat and an ice-cream cone. They all have parts of the Titanic story attached.
File conversion.
I recorded my two children reading information about the Titanic catastrophe, based on the children’s book called “The Story of the Titanic for Children: Astonishing little-known facts and details about the most famous ship in the world” by Joe Fullman. The audio file my phone app created, ADTS Audio, was not recognisable by Unity. I had to convert all the recorded files. I used a straightforward online, open source tool https://online-audio-converter.com/. Next, downloaded all the converted to a mp3 type files and placed them in an Audio folder inside Unity. They were ready to be implemented in the Titanic project.
Interactions and audio activation.
Interactable objects mentioned above, have audio clips attached. What tha means in practice, when the player, that is tagged as the “player” collides with a box collider of the object, some certain action or sound effect would be activated. For example, in the scene number two, the Story Scene, when the player grabs the bottle and smashes it against the the side of the Titanic (as a good luck sign for a ship departures for its maiden voyage), the sound of the breaking glass is activated, the bottle is gone (destroyed thanks to the right code) and the ships sails away (again, due to the right code assigned).
I added a video of this interaction being played in VR, on Quest 2 here.
I decided to use audio elements with my children’s voices to add an extra personal touch to my VR experience. Also, as they have been watching me working on this project for a while and often asked questions about it, I thought that it would make them feel connected to what I do in my professional role, when I am not just a mum but an aspiring developer and VR Creator.