Years ago the only way to sell your own sound effects was to hook up with a publisher. As faster Internet connections became available the option to self publish large libraries became an alternative. This seems to be a fast growing trend and we can most probably look forward to more people selling their sound effects on their own. Here’s a list of sound designers that’s already taken the step to share their work.
Arrowhead Audio
Fred Pearson and Matt Meachem joined forces to create Arrowhead Audio with the aim to “produce high-quality, royalty-free, small sample packs, at an affordable price.”
To collect sounds they smashed groceries, scraped pieces of metal, swung various objects through the air and went to a river. Each sound pack available to you for the price of £2-£6. If that is not enough they even rubbed balloons to give away for free.
Benoit Tigeot sound
Benoit Tigeot only have one sound library so far but it’s very useful. If you’re in need of glass squeak sounds, head over to his blog and get yourself 89 glass rubbings.
Boom Library
The people behind Boom Library are hardly begginers. Founded by audio guys from Dynamedion they record and create sound effect libraries.
Echo Collective
Echo Collective is a creation of people from Dallas Audio Post. If you’re looking for ready made sounds to pop into your project, look somewhere else. But if you want high quality abstract building blocks and the ability to use it with Kontakt, look no further.
Hiss and a Roar
Tim Prebble is a man with 48 hour days. Besides his activities as a sound designer, field recorder, blogger and mentor he finds the time to build a sound design library. At very reasonable prices you can get springs, fireworks, swishes, water foley and much more. He’s even kind enough to share free sound effects if you join the mailing list.
ImmersiveFX
ImmersiveFX is run by John Leonard who’s been working with sound design for over 30 years. On his site you’ll find water sounds and recordings of various airplanes.
New Sound Lab
Tor Johnson is the name of the man behind New Sound Lab. Several libraries are already available and more is on the way. He offers water sounds in the form of creaks and oceans, aircraft flyovers recorded at LAX, rock slides and more.
Rabbit Ears Audio
Recorder and editor Michael Raphael likes to record things. He also likes to make some of those recordings available to the public via libraries. Go grab yourself some underwater sounds, rocket launches, small motors, bells or other goodies at Rabbit Ears Audio.
Sonic Salute
Danish sound effect recordist Mikkel Nielsen started Sonic Salute to “get sound designers, and editors, hard to get quality sound effects, and ambiences for their projects.” Go get yourself some metal scrap crashes, pig effects, snow footsteps or perhaps some shipyard sounds.
Sonokinetic
Sonokinetic’s main focus is sample libraries for music. They also might be too big to be called independent. Nevertheless they have a few interesting sound effect libraries. For instance trailer voices and cinematic booms, crashes and swooshes.
The Soundcatcher
Andreas Usenbenz is the Soundcatcher, a German audio engineer for film and TV. With his first libraries offered you can find wood breaks, string bows, and even an abandoned school building.
Surround Sound Library
Surround Sound Library is a German company founded by Olaf Bartsch selling surround sound libraries.
Takoma Media
Richard Humphries used to work as a senior mixer and sound designer for Discovery Channel. Now he has his own studio where he offers custom audio and sound effects for sale. At Takoma Media you’ll find machine guns, whooshes, antique cameras and more.
The Recordist
The Recordist is possibly the largest independent sound effects library you’ll find. Owned and run by Frank Bry for more than 10 years, this is the place for basically everything. From rockslides to fires to planes to guns, you name it.
Tonsturm
Tilman Hahn and Emil Klotzsch work as sound designers and sound editors in Cologne, Germany. They are also the founders of Tonsturm where they provide sound effects and live out their passion while doing that. At Tonsturm you’ll find breaking glass sounds, electricity recordings, whooshes and air sounds.
