How to calculate collision sounds?

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Discussion Overview

The discussion revolves around calculating collision sound levels in a game simulating Newton's Cradle. Participants explore various methods for determining how sound is produced during collisions, considering both theoretical and practical aspects of sound generation in such a system.

Discussion Character

  • Exploratory
  • Technical explanation
  • Debate/contested
  • Mathematical reasoning

Main Points Raised

  • One participant describes their initial approach of using impact force to calculate sound levels, which resulted in unrealistic loudness from stationary balls.
  • Another method involved calculating the force of individual balls and subtracting their vectors, but this also led to similar issues with sound levels.
  • A later approach utilized simple displacement values of collision pairs to determine collision loudness.
  • Participants question whether stationary balls produce sound in reality or if the sound is perceived as a single sound due to the nature of the collisions.
  • One participant suggests recording the sound directly and playing it back as a potential solution.
  • Another proposes making the loudness proportional to the energy lost from one ball to the next as a method for calculating sound levels.

Areas of Agreement / Disagreement

Participants express differing opinions on the best method to calculate collision sounds, with no consensus reached on a single approach. Multiple competing views and methods remain under consideration.

Contextual Notes

Participants have not resolved the assumptions regarding how sound is generated in collisions, and there are unresolved mathematical steps in the proposed methods.

JohnIsaac
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Hi,

This is my first post here. My company recently developed a game simulating Newton's Cradle for the iPhone. I've got the visual physics portions working well. Everything reacts as it should. My problem is the calculation of the collision sound levels.

Originally I was basing it off of impact force, the result was the balls in the middle that were not moving were each producing a loud sound. As opposed to the single sound heard when using a real Newton's cradle and releasing only one ball.

I then switched to using only force of the individual balls and subtracting the vectors from each other. This had similar results.

I finally just used simple displacement values of collision pairs to determine the collision loudness.

My question is... What is the correct way to calculate a collisions sound? In real life... do the balls not moving actually make a sound and it's just perceived as one sound?

I have a video of it here. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VH50emxBJ3w
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VH50emxBJ3w"
Sorry for the music, hopefully the collisions can be heard well enough. I hope this is not perceived as an advertisement. I'm seriously trying to figure this out as I want my product to be the best possible.

Thanks for your time.
 
Last edited by a moderator:
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Still working on this, does anyone have a clue for me? I've tried about 20 methods, all have different results.
 
JohnIsaac said:
Hi,

This is my first post here. My company recently developed a game simulating Newton's Cradle for the iPhone. I've got the visual physics portions working well. Everything reacts as it should. My problem is the calculation of the collision sound levels.

Originally I was basing it off of impact force, the result was the balls in the middle that were not moving were each producing a loud sound. As opposed to the single sound heard when using a real Newton's cradle and releasing only one ball.

I then switched to using only force of the individual balls and subtracting the vectors from each other. This had similar results.

I finally just used simple displacement values of collision pairs to determine the collision loudness.

My question is... What is the correct way to calculate a collisions sound? In real life... do the balls not moving actually make a sound and it's just perceived as one sound?

I have a video of it here. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VH50emxBJ3w
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VH50emxBJ3w"
Sorry for the music, hopefully the collisions can be heard well enough. I hope this is not perceived as an advertisement. I'm seriously trying to figure this out as I want my product to be the best possible.

Thanks for your time.

Can't you just record the sound and play it back?
 
Last edited by a moderator:
Couldn't you just make the loudness proportional to the amount of energy lost from one ball to the next?
 

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