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Scenes & images

Narration and ambient sound

Two separate audio tracks per scene, and when each is worth adding.

A scene can carry two independent audio tracks.

Narration

A spoken introduction to the scene. Record it in the browser or upload a file. It plays once when the learner arrives and can be replayed from the scene's controls.

Narration is the single most effective addition to a scene that is otherwise a wall of pins: thirty seconds of "here is what you are looking at, and what I want you to notice" orients someone far better than a paragraph they have to find first.

Ambient sound

A looping background bed — kitchen noise, a busy lobby, birdsong. It sets the scene's atmosphere and is deliberately quieter than narration.

Use it sparingly. Ambient audio that plays under an assessment is a distraction, and learners on shared devices may not be able to turn it down.

Accessibility

Anything said only in audio is unavailable to some of your learners. Write the narration a transcript: a learner can then open it from the scene and turn the sound off, which is what makes it a real alternative rather than a note to yourself. See Recording narration, and writing its transcript.

If the narration carries instructions, it is still worth repeating them in a pin, where they can be found without playing anything.

Plain Markdown: scene-audio-narration-and-ambience.md

Last updated Sep 7, 2026.