A design agency like any other

Every now and then, I find myself trying to explain what it is we actually do at Plan8. “We make sound” is true, but it also leaves quite a lot out. Because making something sound good is rarely the whole job. Sometimes it’s about creating a feeling or building a brand. Sometimes it’s about solving a problem. And sometimes the best thing we can do is suggest not making a sound at all.

This article is my attempt to get a little closer to the way we think about our work, the questions we ask, the things we care about, and why sound, design, and technology have become so closely connected for us. I’m not sure there’s one perfect definition of what Plan8 is. But I do think this is a good place to start.

Sound

Sound is the foundation of our practice, and the thing we care about perhaps unreasonably deeply. We care about the art, the quality, the detail, and the integrity of the craft. We love sound in all its forms. But more than that, we believe sound is one of the fastest ways to make people feel something. Before you have time to explain yourself, sound has already said something. It can carry personality. It can communicate meaning. It can create recognition. It can make something feel calm, exciting, trustworthy, strange, expensive, familiar, urgent or completely wrong - all in a fraction of a second.

And, by the way, caring about sound means caring about silence too.

Design

For us design means using sound deliberately. Not simply making something that sounds good, but making sound that does something, that solves problems and creates meaningful experiences for our clients.

Sound is a powerful design tool and powerful tools, naturally, come with plenty of opportunities to make a mess. I believe we’ve found most of them over the years. A sound can be beautiful and still be wrong. It can be technically impressive and still be pointless. It can win an award and still annoy the person who has to hear it ten times a day. The best sound design tends to sit somewhere between the artful and the thoughtful, between instinct and intention. That’s why good sound design benefits from more than good ears and needs a strategic approach that considers both the rational and the emotional. Therefore, we’ve come to root our design in four fundamental questions.

Why?

Why is sound necessary? What is the reason behind the necessity and what job should it do? Answering these questions helps us define its role - for the brand and its audience, and for the product, film, or experience it belongs to. The answers usually involve a mix of brand, functional, and storytelling objectives. Those objectives need to be prioritised, tested, and sometimes challenged.

The world is already full of noise. It doesn’t need more sound for the sake of sound. Sometimes our job is to help clients hear something they hadn’t initially asked for. Other times to help them hear the value of not adding anything at all. By putting purpose first, we try to open our clients’ ears a little wider - not always to what they initially want, but to what they actually need. (quote)

Where?

Where is this sound going to live? Context changes sound. The exact same audio can feel completely different depending on where and alongside what it is experienced. Is the environment quiet or busy? Indoors or outdoors? Is this a fleeting moment or something people will encounter every day? What kind of speakers are involved? Are there other sounds competing for attention? What expectations, habits, or cultural conventions come with the touchpoint? A great sound that’s not fit for context will be the wrong sound. Understanding the where helps us understand what the sound needs to be.

When?

When should it happen? This is partly about identifying moments where sound has an opportunity to add value. But it’s equally about understanding how sound fits together with everything else.

Timing matters - a lot! Sound can be perfect and still arrive at the wrong moment. So we look at how it works alongside visuals, interaction, movement, information, and behaviour. We make sure it supports the experience rather than interrupting it. Sound shouldn’t feel like an afterthought. Ideally, it shouldn’t feel like a separate thing at all. It should simply belong. And, again, sometimes the most useful answer to when? is …not now.

How?

How should the sound be shaped to carry the intended meaning and personality? This is where we direct the expression: positioning, stylistic concepts, timbres, semantic systems, and all the other decisions that give sound its particular character. 

We imagine what people might feel, think, or say when they hear it. And throughout the process, we keep circling back to the first question: Why? Does this sound actually do what it’s here to do?

Again, there’s a reason we put effort into why-where-when-how. Sound without well-considered answers to these questions tend to become disturbing noise or generic clutter, feel misplaced or mistaken to come from something else.

Tech

Tech is our third leg because technology creates possibilities. And, at heart, we’re innovators. Our team brings together a diverse range of skills, including in-house developers. As our work increasingly spans UX, products, and interactive audio, designing with code is an integral part of what we do. Because success doesn’t depend solely on the sound asset itself. It also depends on how that sound is implemented - How does it perform? How does it behave? How does it respond to interaction? What happens when the context changes? What happens when a person uses the product differently than we expected them to? These questions are part of the design too.

By working with code, interactive technology, we unlock new possibilities for what sound can do, where it can exist, and how people can experience it. Ultimately, pushing the boundaries of audio serves two purposes: our clients’ ambitions and our own desire to keep learning. Because technology gives us new tools, obviously, but more interestingly, it gives us new questions.

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Being a design agency for sound, what we strive for is to move from noise to signal. From chaos to clarity. Whether it’s a complete identity system or a delightful little ding, we believe great sound design carries informed emotion. It comes from a place where insight meets craft, and where the thoughtful converges with the artful.

We imagine a world where a little more attention moves from the eyes to the ears. From how things look to how they sound. A less cluttered world where sound has a clear purpose and silence has one too. A world where brands and products sound every bit as good as they look. I guess, ultimately, we imagine a world where sound design is just… design. And that would indeed make Plan8 a design agency. Like any other.