It's not a secret I'm a big fan of Tim who's creating sounds for us roleplayers at Tabletopaudio(link is external). I've been supporter of him at Patreon(link is external) for quite a while. You probably know TTA already, but if you don't, I highly recommend you to check it out, and if you like and can spare a bit, support him.

I've been using soundpads, mainly custom ones, in my games for some time. And while I like pads more, you can find a great collection of 10min tracks there too. I might talk about these ambients and sounds more later, but this is actually just a setup for the second topic of this post – using lights.

Special light effects combined with sounds can create really immersive environment. If you're playing a modern crime -campaign, think about playing TTA's "Noir Procedural" with a scene like this:

The effect has been made with "Led Magic Blue" programmable bulb, which seems to be getting more rare – here's a link to it at GearBest(link is external). While this Bulb is not perfect, it allows a lot of fun effects, examples of which I'm trying to show you in this and the next post I'm trying to publish soon.

So, do you want a sinister red light in a scene where evil Imperials are trying to apprehend your Rebel heroes while dark threatening music plays on the background? Or perhaps alien green light, playing alienish sounds and some jungle sounds? Or warm yellowish light with sound of plentiful wildlife?

Years ago, I bought a set of colored light bulbs to allow me to create special effects for games. I used some of them, most impressive being setting red sun in an Iron Heroes game, lamp being placed near table surface, and trees used as props creating long shadows. But now, these bulbs are pretty much unnecessary as I can create any of these effects, and many more, with just one light bulb.

Here another example of animated effects – designed as volcanic world or a world under war or intense combat going on all around:

That's it for now; I'll continue with the topic, more examples and information about the bulb and other stuff in another post.