How To Create A Cannon Shot Fire Sound Effect
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It would be terrifying to encounter a cannon in real life, but creating a realistic cannon shot sound effect is easier than you’d think. Continue reading to learn how to create your own cannon shot sound effect using a sampler and some plug-ins.
WHAT SOURCE RECORDINGS DO YOU NEED?
To create your cannonball sound, you need one main ingredient: an audio sample of some impact. I live in Canada, so I recorded a few samples of snowballs hitting the ground and imported them into my synth of choice: Phase Plant by Kilohearts.
How To Design a Cannon Shot Sound Effect?
Using my snowball recordings, I imported the sounds into the software Phase Plant by Kilohearts, and from there I adjusted my sounds.
I added an envelope to control the gain of each sample, retaining the pop and transience of the impact while avoiding the residual crackling sound.
To create more of a punch, I altered the transient shaper, raising the attack and pump settings to give a sharper sound to the hit.
Next, I added a pitch shifter. While this doesn’t affect much alone, I added an LFO to lower the pitch, creating more of a click at the start of the sound. This is a subtle change that refines the sharpness of the impact.
 Using Snap Heap outside of phaseplant, I created a preset that creates the core of the cannon sound. Immediately this feature gives the sound depth and power, but we can break down the components further.
Within Snap Heap, each lane matches a different frequency. The first lane is used for the lower base frequency, so I wanted to keep the sound distorted. I lowered the pitch, added distortion, added disperser to boost the lower end, and infatuator which is another distortion plug-in.
The second lane adds a tail to the sound. The third lane has some reverb and delay, but overall is a subtle addition to the sound. The fourth lane adds more transient, shaping the sound format to be more distorted.
Next, I added a distortion that brings the sound forward, balancing the frequencies and making the sound a lot more present. At this point, your sample should sound like a cannon, but it’s missing body and power. To accommodate for this, I inserted some plugins from outside of phaseplant.
WHAT PLUG-INS OR EFFECTS DO YOU NEED?
I added ReCenter by Boom to ensure the shot sounds centered rather than panned awkwardly to the side.
Next, I added Trash by iZotope to add some distortion, utilizing the default setting and modifying the dry wet to 50%.
Next, I used bx_subsynth which adds subharmonics to the already existing sound. I brought the 56 to 80 harmonics up to 73% and then I put it at 49% of the wet knob for this frequency. I added some tight punch and changed the mode to harsh to add more distortion to the sound. I then put the mix of the entire plugin down to 86% to balance it out. This step gives the low bass rumble that makes it sound more realistic.
I wanted to add some reverb so it didn’t sound so dry because, in the real world, cannons would always have some type of reflection. I put in a preset that was exterior Wasatch Forest Edge, which makes it sound outdoors. I then added another iZotope Trash preset which makes the sound even more distorted.
Try it for yourself!
Now that you have a basic concept on how to create a cannon shot sound effect, go and experiment creating your own!
You can watch the full video tutorial of how I made a cannon shot sound effect on my YouTube Channel.
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