Finding copyright free music and sound effects online
Sound is an essential part of all films and it’s particularly important in animated films. In animation the visual world is created by artists which means that it can feel a bit synthetic. The sound design adds enormously to the feeling that the world and the characters are real. Music can help guide the viewer’s emotional journey through the story which is essential to the success of the overall story.
Music
You could compose and record your own music, or get your friends to sing or play instruments that you can record on your device. This will often be a great solution for having music that has lots of personality and is customised to be the right length for your film. The best recording locations for this will have lots of padded surfaces (like a room with carpet, couches and curtains) because this stops the sound bouncing around on hard flat surfaces.
You could also use stock music, which means that a composer has written it and published it online for large numbers of people to reuse (Google “Buy Royalty Free Music”). The highest quality stock music must be purchased and can cost large amounts of money.
Free music
Royalty free music that is also available for free is fairly unusual, because it’s a skilled and highly valued job to create and record music. There is one composer who has a website featuring lots of his music for free and you could search his catalogue, his name is Kevin MacLeod. Read the Music FAQs section of his site, he requires you to write his name in the credits because his music is license is “Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0”.
Music that doesn’t require a credit is also hard to find. But you can try this site here which has music in the Public Domain
Sound Effects
We are all very knowledgeable about sound. If we are watching a film with a person walking we know that the sound of footsteps will change depending on the environment and emotion of the character. If the person walking is big or small, is on the footpath or walking through leaves, or is trying to relax or trying to hurry these things will change the sound we expect.
If you can find just the right sound for your story, it will improve the quality of your story and your film overall.
Sound effects libraries
There are many sound effects libraries online, but Freesound.org might be one that you would like to explore. You could even start recording and adding your own sounds for other people to use.
Tip: Please remember that this is an open public resource like YouTube and the same guidelines for maintaining online safety and well being should be used here.
Formats
Although there are lots of formats that will work, you can filter the sounds you search for to be in the most straightforward to use.
1) Limit the file type to .wav
2) Limit the Channels to 2.
Copyright
Who owns a sound is very important. You should filter your search by “Creative Commons 0” (this means there is no copyright on the sound, and that the creator wanted to make the sound free for public use).
Changing the format of sounds
Sometimes you might have trouble finding just the right sound and there will be a listing that is just right but it’s not in a good format. It’s an extra step but you can convert your sound into a .wav using an online converter: