In todays lesson with Caroline we looked at the opening scene from Watchmen.

Foley sound

There was a lot of foley sound in this scene. Some that i wrote down were:

• China Smashing
• Punching
• Glass smashing
• Liquid pouring
• Leather gloves
• Rolling on the floor
• Knifes
• Blood dripping onto badge
• Badge falling and rolling on concrete
• Footsteps
• Door kicked down

All of these sounds were amplified which gives it a comic book feel.

Ambient sound

The only ambient sound in the Watchmen scene was rain.

Contrapuntal sound

At the begining of the scene, there is a love song playing, which then carries on throughout the fight scene. This creates conflict within the audience.

Diegetic sound

• Tv
• Glass and china smashing
• Music was non-diegetic at the start because it was coming from the TV, but then the tv breaks and the music carries on, so it becomes diegetic.

Non-diegetic

• Music

Dialogue

• TV
• Men talking to eachother

We also learned some new terms.

External Diagetic Sound – Comes along the same lines of non-diegetic, as it is put into the scene from outside the shot but can be heard by the characters and audience. An example can be foley sound.

Studio Sound Recording – Were sounds are recorded in a recording studio or radio station. They can be used to capture voice overs. Recording in a studio is often more optimal for TV shows as the sound is more clearer and distinct.

Location Sound Recording – Recording on location means exactly as it sounds, it tends to be a location that isn’t specialised for sound optimisation so there are certain things you can use to get the best out of the audio.

Stationary Sound Sources – Come from a person or an object that is not moving. The sound of a stationary object has a constant quality, the pitch and volume stay the same because the microphone is picking up the sound from the same spot.

A Moving Sound Source – comes from a source that is moving in any direction from the point where sound is being recorded.

Presence – In filmmaking and television production presence (or room tone) is “silence” recorded at a location or space when no dialogue is spoken. This sound can be mixed so the audience can feel where the sound is coming from.

Drama Dialogue – The dialogue between characters on set. This can be to capture without obvious tie mics. This is where boom mics are used, there are normally on or more boom operators in order to capture the dialogue of each character.

 

 

Today we were given a task in class to create the sound of a dinosaur using different sounds on final cut pro. We were not allowed to use the actual dinosaur sound. We then had to add our dinosaur to a surrounding, e.g. Forrest, City…

For this task we had to work in pairs and i worked with Magda. To create our dinosaur we used “Bear roar” and “Alligator growl”. We added the Monster effect to each sound also. For the ambience, we decided to use a beach sound called “Beach with children”. We then took some children screaming noises from “Playground” and added loads of them and layered them.

We are quite pleased with the way it turned out, but we could have improved the dinosaur roar.020

The smiling man is a short horror film about a young man who is walking on his own in the streets at 2’oclock in the morning, when he realises he is bring followed by a man who cant seem to stop smiling…in a very creepy way.

If you watch the film without sound, it seems as though it may be a comedy, so by adding different sound, it has helped the audience understand the real genre which is horror/thriller.

The scene starts off with no sound but footsteps. These footsteps are very loud which normally wouldn’t be, so all the sounds have been amplified. This is to show that the streets he are walking are very isolated as it is so early in the morning. This gives the audience clues that it may be a horror film because he is on his own in the dark and there is an eerie silence. The idea that the audience can tell what genre the film is before it has really properly started means that the film uses contrapuntal sound.

When the creepy man first appears in the scene, there is a sudden change in the audio. This makes the audience confused and wondering what is happening. The audio then completely stops and it is just the footsteps of the creepy man coming towards the young man. In a way, because the creepy man is doing a funny dance, it draws the audiences attention away from the fact that it is a horror for a short while. Because of this, when the sound suddenly comes back (a quick, low, gun sound) makes the audience jump out of their skin because they were not expecting it.

In one part of the film, the creepy man is suddenly behind the young man and he is crouched on the floor. As he slowly rises, the music gets higher in pitch and louder. This helps to build tension because the sound is getting louder which makes the audience feel as if the man is getting closer, and therefore another jump scare is likely to happen.

The young mans heart beat can also be heard when he is running away near the end. This has obviously been amplified and makes the audience feel as if they are in the situation which gets their heart rate going.

Foley sounds play a huge part in this short film, as all of the sounds have been created and added into it in the post-production stage, apart from the very small amount of dialogue.

There is a little bit of ambient sound. Near the start and the middle of the film, there is the sound of distant cars and slight wind, which creates the atmosphere of streets at night.

The audio in the film is incidental, as it builds a mood and emotions. Apart from the dialogue and footsteps, the sound is also non-diegetic.

The sound has been recorded in a studio and the dialogue has been recorded on location.

And finally it uses off screen sound, apart from again, the dialogue and the footsteps.

 

Studio sound recording – This is when audio is recorded in a studio, for example, foley sound.

Location sound recording – This is when sound is recorded on a location, for example, many TV-series which use dialogue, the actors voices are recorded there and then.

Stationary sound  – Stationary sound sources come from a person or an object that is not moving. The sound of a stationary object has a constant quality, the pitch and volume stay the same because the microphone is picking up the sound from the same spot.

Moving sound – A moving sound source comes from a source that is moving in any direction from the point where sound is being recorded, for example, vehicles. The volume changes as the sound source moves towards or away from the microphone.

Foley sound – Foley sounds are sounds that are created in a studio to use in post production. For example, foley artists may record some boxes falling down some stairs and this may be used over a clip of someone falling down some stairs. Folioing is an excellent means of supplying the subtle sounds that production miss often miss. It gives a scene a touch of realism that is difficult to provide using other effects methods.

Ambient sound – Ambient sound is background noises, sounds and atmosphere. For example, if you had to create ambient sound for a scene that is set in a restaurant, you would create ambient sound by having multiple people talking, cutlery on plates, music, glasses clinking etc.

Sound effects – A sound other than speech or music made artificially for use in a play, film, or other broadcast production.

Music – An art of sound in time that expresses ideas and emotions in significant forms through the elements of rhythm, melody, harmony and colour.

Drama dialogue – Conversation between characters in a drama or narrative.

Contrapuntal sound – This is where the audience is positioned before there are any clues on screen. This is often used within action and horror films. It builds tension and gives the audience an idea on whats to come in the narrative.

Incidental sound – Music that builds mood or emotion within a scene.

Non-diegectic – Sound that the actors cant hear, it isn’t generated from the world of the film. It is added in post production, for example; Sound track, voiceover, sound effects and canned laughter in a situational comedy.

Diegetic – Sound that is generated within the world of the film, for example; dialogue between characters, sound from a stereo or the explosion of a gun being fired.

On screen sound – The source of sound is visible within the frame.

Off screen sound – The source of sound is outside the frame.

Sound bridge – Continuity technique to create smooth transitions between scenes using audio. Sound from next scene is heard before the imagery appears.

 

 

The target audience for our problem would probably be the younger population. This is because we are going to try and make the dialogue funny. Although all ages enjoy comedy, the idea that a giant monster is chasing a load of people around is quite silly and would require a certain sense of humour that I feel younger people are more likely to have.

Regarding the ABC1 system, i think that C1-E are the appropriate audience for this problem. This is because E is students which are a younger audience, and the others are people which have basic jobs. I personally think that people that have a very important and highly paid jobs have a different sense of humour which is not suited to what we are going to do.

The first problem was that the BBC had lost 3-4 minutes of sound from a animal documentary called “Earth”. If i did this one, i would have used a documentary from David Attenborough and recored someone or myself using the same script from the original documentary, but adding sounds in, E.g. wind, rain, animal noises. I would do this by using audio from online libraries or foley sound.

The second problem was that Film Four have lost the sound and dialogue from a foreign language film. This is the one that Shauna, Magda and I have decided to work on. We are creating the sound and dialogue for a scene from “The Host” which is an Asian film. We are going to create sounds ourselves (foley sounds) using certain microphones, depending what we are recording the sound of.

The third problem is that Radio 1’s show is 5 minutes too short and there is nothing to put in the gap. The task is to fill the gap with an entertaining segment about a current topic that would interest the Radio 1 target audience. If i chose this problem i would have done a segment on the latest celebrity gossip or something like that because radio 1 usually has a younger audience compared to radio stations such as Heart. Younger audiences are more interested in social media and whats going on in the celeb world and that is why i would do a segment on this topic.

The fourth and final problem is that Radio four is looking for a brand new radio drama. For this i would have maybe done a horror story because i feel as if horror films are more scary due to the sounds included in them. For this reason, because they would only be able to hear the story and not see it, the audience would hopefully find it more intriguing rather than a serious drama or romantic story. The other option would be comedy. But i don’t feel confident on coming up with a funny story as i would worry people wouldn’t find it funny.

For this unit i am working with Shauna Church and Magda Gaik. After a lot of decision making, we have decided that we are going to work on problem number 2. This is the dubbing of a foreign film. For a while we didn’t know what sort of film we wanted to do, but we have finally found one. The scene we are dubbing is from the asian film “The Host”. It is a scene in which members of the public (and what looks like a main character) get chased and attacked by a huge sea monster that comes onto land. There are many different sounds in this scene and it will be slightly difficult, but because there is three of us, we have decided to try something a little complicated. We are going to create most of the sounds by ourselves and use some from libraries.

Here is a link to the scene we are dubbing. We are starting from 1:38 and ending it at 4:38

This scene includes a very large amount of foley sound. From all the noises that the monster makes, and all the banging and crashing of metal, to water splashing and peoples footsteps. To build tension in this scene, the creators of this film have used tense music as the main character stops and has a shocked expression on his face as he has just seen the huge monster running towards the crowd of people he is stood with. Because we haven’t seen the monster coming towards them yet, the tense music helps the audience to realise that a problem is about to occur.

Sound types that appear in this scene:

• Foley sound
• Ambient sound (on train)
• Incidental sound (music builds tension)
• Diegetic (e.g. speech)
• Non-diegetic (music)
• Dialogue
• Music
• On screen sound
• Off screen sound

We have been introduced to our new unit this term, Sound Investigation.

The first task we were given was to research into microphones and complete the table in the pictures below.

 

After researching the affects on children and teenagers from playing violent video games, it is clear that their is some scientific connection between aggressive behaviour and video games.

Personally i found the secondary research the most useful type of research because it provided me with the most useful information. With my primary research, i asked teenagers if they feel like violent video games can have an affect on their behaviour and in a way this is slightly bias, as they are unlikely to say they are bad for them if they enjoy playing them. On the other hand, if they don’t play them, they may think they are bad for them but they have no evidence of showing aggression from playing these games if they don’t play them. So all though its their own opinions, they may not have any truth behind them.

Secondary research provided me with scientific knowledge and case studies which help to really understand the negative effects of violent video games.

I also found that Qualitative research wasn’t very useful as i couldn’t find much information.

So overall, i found that secondary research was the most useful and qualitative research was the least.

The only real problems i had to overcome was that it was a little tricky finding information, especially for Qualitative research. I found it hard to find opinions from people from the video gaming industry on wether they think violent video games can cause aggression in teenagers and children.

To answer the question “Would you like a job as a media researcher? why?” no, i would not like a job as a researcher in media. I prefer editing and more practical work. Although i found it quite interesting reading case studies from this topic, i feel as if i would not be very good at collecting much information, especially Primary research.