Colin Hart over at Colin Hart’s Sound Kitchen has an excellent, in-depth interview up with Bruce Tanis, sound designer on Fringe.

CH: “Fringe” has a unique library of effects, often dealing with subjects that we would have no knowledge of how they sound, yet the show remains very organic sounding. What is your approach to designing sound for these things?

BT: I usually try to use ordinary sounds and work on them through plugins and other devices to make them sound interesting. I use a lot of animals and natural events like wind and water to build different effects. Dry ice is my friend! At least as a starting point anyway but they don’t stay there long! Some of the effects, like the weapons or devices usually start from various machines but however big or small they start out, I try to keep their final scale appropriate to what we see on the screen so hopefully that makes them sound a bit more organic as well.

Read the full interview with Fringe sound designer Bruce Tanis here.