Sound Projects

 

What Did I Learn?

While learning about sound, I found that it can add a new dimension to the scene that contributes to the visuals. Some techniques that stuck out to me were sound motifs, stings, and sound bridges. These techniques have always been present in the movies I've watched, but I've never been conscious enough of them to appreciate them. What I was surprised to learn about sound is that when filming a scene, only dialogue is recorded, while the rest is done in post on a foley stage or editing. 

What were my projects?

For my first sound project, I had to make a 1-2 minute story that was told purely with sound editing and foley sounds. 

My second project had me add sound to my One Word Film Project I spoke about in a previous blog. 

Project #1 Elaboration

When planning for my first sound project, my partner and I brainstormed on many different scenarios that were noisy. We landed on a dog walk that ended in a fight with another dog. To organize our thoughts for this scenario we made an outline that looked like this:

Scene: Walking dog 

1. I. Going outside 

• -Dog panting/whining 

• -Leash sounds (jingling, clicking) *foley 

• -Opening & closing/locking door 

• -Keys jingling 

• -Muffled air sounds in background 

• 
  

This was a good guide to follow and go back to while editing, reminding of us of the linear story and layering of sounds. The editing software we used- Clipchamp- was very convenient and easy to use for beginners. Reflecting on the project now, I think our foley sounds could have been better as they weren't very clear in the audio and didn't contribute to the story as much as I would've liked. But, I do think we had a good ambiance for our environment as we layered many background noises together to make the outdoors setting sound realistic.

Here is the Project: BurrTadaiyon_Soundscape_per2.m4a 

Project #2 Elaboration

To brainstorm for this project, we rewatched our original One Word Film Project and made another outline based on the visuals. Here's a little part of what that looked like: 

1. I. Walking through the hallway 

• -Sound of feet shuffling in the hallway  

• -Girls laughing and walking  

• -Sound of camera clicking for photo  

• -Notification from phone  

• -Phone clicking on  

• -Phone clicking off  

• -Walking away  

This outline helped us in a different way than it did for the first as now we had to sync up the sound with what was happening visually. So this outline was a clear cut list of each sound that needed to happen based on what was being seen. We once again used Clipchamp but this time it was more challenging that the first because we were working with visual and audio. What could've been done better in this project is the ending. The ending was hard to do as there was talking and we couldn't recreate the dialogue, so we put a song that matched the tone of it instead. We shouldn't have included dialogue in the scene. But what we did do well was building up the end with the dramatic music and making the scene more meaningful with it. So, in a way it worked out.

Here is the project: OWF_Dominguez_Burr 1 (1).mp4 

Thank you for reading my blog!