A Quick Method for Obtaining Audio Assets for UE4

Luke Marsden
Aug 24, 2017 · 3 min read

Audio production can be a pain, especially for those of us who aren't trained or experienced in that particular field. So while developing a game environment in the Unreal Engine I had to come up with a quick way of sampling sound effects to be used in my scene to hear exactly how well they work in context.

First

Find a video on YouTube with the sound effect your interested in.

Screenshot — Edited (YouTube, 2017)

Then we just go into the address bar at the top of the screen and type ‘ss’ before youtube in the web address.

Screenshot — Edited (YouTube, 2017)

Hit Enter and this will take you to the magical land that is “Free Online Youtube Downloader” with the video you’re interested in set to be downloaded.

Screenshot — Edited (En.savefrom.net, 2017)
Screenshot — Edited (En.savefrom.net, 2017)

Once we have the file downloaded and on our computer it’s time to go to media.io to convert the file from a video file to an audio file.

Screenshot — Edited (Media.io, 2017)
Screenshot — Edited (Media.io, 2017)

In my experience working in the Unreal Engine I’ve found that it responds best to the WAV formatted files.

If you edit an audio file in a program like Audacity or Adobe Audition then you might find that the resulting file will no longer import into Unreal, repeating this step (converting your WAV into WAV again) will remove all the information that prevents a successful import.

Screenshot — Edited (Media.io, 2017)
Screenshot — Edited (Unreal Engine, 2017)

Finally we simply drag the converted file into the Content Browser and Wola! We have a functioning audio file that we can use in the scene or Audio Cue, to your hearts content.

Enjoy!

Screenshot — Edited (Unreal Engine, 2017)

References

En.savefrom.net. (2017). Free Online YouTube Downloader. [online] Available at: [Accessed 24 Aug. 2017].

Media.io. (2017). Online Audio Converter. [online] Available at: [Accessed 24 Aug. 2017].

Unreal Engine. (2017). Epic Games.

YouTube. (2017). Door Open and Close Sound Effect. [online] Available at: [Accessed 24 Aug. 2017].

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Luke Marsden

Written by

Studying Animation at SAE Qantm, Perth.

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