A couple is traveling through the world of sound.

(CNN) — Seven years ago, American Libby Green was traveling with her mother in Italy and France, before returning to the United States with a visit to the southern French Mediterranean resort city of Nice.

Meanwhile, German-born Marcel Gnuck and his friend were also in Nice, attending the Christopher Festival, a special music party.

Walking along the Promenade des Anglais on the city’s beachfront, Marcel saw Libby Hasselblad holding a traditional medium format film camera and couldn’t resist approaching her.

“I love old cameras, Hasselblad, it’s amazing,” he remembers telling her.

The couple talked about the camera and traveled, and that night he invited her to go to a music festival. The next day, Libby flew back to America, but they continued their relationship.

Less than a month later, Libby traveled to Italy and she and Marcel, who was working in Switzerland, were reunited.

“I thought we knew, OK, this is something special, something serious,” Libby says.

She then visited Marcel Libby in Los Angeles, where she was working in the film industry while studying cinematography, and they traveled together around California for a few weeks.

At that time they knew that they wanted to be together and travel the world.

So, Marcel went back to Switzerland, Libby stayed in LA, worked another five months to save money.

They bought a campervan and in January 2015, Marcel met Libby at Zurich airport.

“In less than a year, we went out of business and sold everything we owned,” says Libby. They then spent four months traveling around Europe. A campervan trip in Japan and then in Bali, Taiwan, Cambodia and Malaysia.

Over the years their love has grown not only for each other, but for the world of sound, recorded by their super microphones and shared on their social media.

The couple turned a practical matter of recording audio for a travel video they were making in Cambodia into a full-time business that continues the life of a digital nomad. But it took some time before they found their calling.

“Everything came alive.”

In the early years of their relationship, sharing their travel experiences online became part of their daily life.

Libby is adept at using a camera. But they struggled to find attention.

“Libby and Marcel were trying to become food bloggers,” Libby recalls.

“It was an accident,” said Marcel. “But it was a good learning experience,” Libby says.

Then in the Cambodian capital of Phnom Penh, Libby filmed some pigeons taking flight that she wanted to use in a film. But she couldn’t pick up the sound of their wingbeats.

They scoured the internet, searching for audio libraries, but couldn’t find anything suitable. So, Marcel grabs a $100 voice recorder, and goes on a quest to record the missing voice.

He did not find any pigeons – but he managed to change the future direction of the couple.

Marcel turned on the recorder in a small construction zone where women were digging gravel, listening to cheap headphones.

He was surprised not only by the sound of the construction, but also by the motorbikes passing behind him, chanting and honking.

“It was like the sound was pounding into my head from all sides,” says Marcel. “Everything came alive and I haven’t stopped recording since that day.”

Desire for sound

In the six years since the first recording, Libby and Marcel have spent months at a time in over 25 countries, mostly in Asia, Europe and North America.

They have developed a more sophisticated recording setup to include stereo, Abyssonic and binaural techniques – but still suit their traveling lifestyle.

This means investing in high-quality microphones and recorders to meet their need to share accurate sound images from any location.

“We’re documenting the world with sound,” says Libby. “We’re also trying to be a source of inspiration for other voices to look at differently.”

It can be an expensive desire. Typically, high-fidelity recording equipment runs into the thousands of dollars for personal microphones and voice recorders. For example, one of their stereo recording devices that includes German-made microphones costs around $8,000.

But for Libby and Marcel, this is not the only tool. Their aim is to spice up space with sound.

For example, they took two days to visit Iceland’s now-famous black sand beach at Solheimasander. They spent up to 10 hours each day recording in the wind and snow, carrying their equipment on two-hour hikes.

In 1973, the wreckage of a US Navy Douglas aircraft that landed on the beach recorded a very popular memory.

“It was amazing, how it looked, how the metal cracked in the wind,” says Marcel.

Two hundred meters from the abandoned aircraft, the waves crashed on the black sand beach.

“The terror of the water. This is something you have to experience,” Marcel added. “If you just go there and take pictures, you’re missing a lot.”

Free to use sounds

Through their website, they offer 145 royalty-free sound libraries with over 140,000 sound effects and ambient sounds to support creators.

In addition, they offer a variety of premium audio libraries for purchase aimed at business users such as post-production, gaming and sound design creatives.

Interest becomes business.

Marcel He said their “a-ha” moment came while sitting in front of a computer in 2017.

Libby added a donation button to their website, and Hollywood Post-Production Creative donated a few dollars.

“I was like, ‘Oh! We made three dollars!'” recalls Marcel of their first gift.

It was then that he realized others were passionate about sound — and willing to pay for it.

“We want to be an affordable source for all kinds of people to download the sounds,” says Libby.

Since this launch, Libby and Marcel have developed a premium sound library that is free for purchase and download of sounds.

And they are still eager to travel to new places and create new sounds.

“We love what we do so it doesn’t feel like work,” says Marcel.

“I know we’re still going to be voting in five years,” Libby added.

The challenges of nomadic life

As for the disadvantages of the nomadic lifestyle? Libby and Marcel have no home base and travel constantly. They almost lost their money and fought hard times.

“When you have a home, you have a more realistic routine,” says Libby. “For us, it’s always changing, so sometimes it takes more effort and more money.”

“And we have a huge archive of vocals,” adds Marcel, referring to their unedited recordings. “It’s more fun to be in the moment recording than sitting down with studio headphones.”

But the couple prefers to work on their own without outside help.

“There’s no one else but us, it’s just the two of us,” says Libby. “Maybe it’s confidence issues, but for us we know what we can do.”

Where next

Libby and Marcel recently left South Korea and continued their journey in Malaysia. Their next big plan is to travel the Pan American Highway from Alaska to Ushuaia, the southern tip of South America.

“I think it would be a dream to go to Antarctica to record the sounds of ‘Wish Ice Breaks,'” says a smiling Marcel.

But whether it’s a cross-continental road trip or the frozen wastes of the Earth’s southern continent, Libby and Marcel’s love for each other and the sounds they record will always be there.

And as Marcel said, “It takes us 45 minutes to pack our things and get to the next airport.”