What does each cue require? Is it made up of a single sound, a layer, or a number of sounds and layers mixed together? For instance, if your show needs a night ambiance, what does it sound like? You could find a selection in a commercial sound effects library that is called "night ambiance," but it might not be the proper atmosphere for your production. A night ambiance cue could be a single cricket, a field of crickets, or a blend of crickets, cicadas, and owls, with an occasional lonely dog barking in the distance. Once you've determined the specifics of the cue, then you can plan how to create it. Do you gather it yourself with a portable field recorder? Do you set up a session and use the theatre's equipment to record your source material? Do you transfer the sounds from exist- ing commercial recordings? As you look at your sound plot, you may want to make a separate list of where you'll be getting each sound. If you keep a list of effects and their sources, then you can plan your approach methodically. Treat the whole endeavor like a shopping trip. If you develop your design using a cue database, one of your fields could be "source," detailing where you will get that sound. Remember that the sound plot is a list of all the aural ideas you are considering for use in the show, in the order of their occurrence. It's supposed to offer an easy reference to the flow of the show, but 97