Sound Projects

Hello!  

Our next projects in class were both related to sound and how it adds emotion, depth, and context to a film. 

In Sound Project #1, my partner and I had to create a soundscape for a roughly 1–2-minute story. We were not allowed to use any video. We had to pull audio from online sources and create our own foley sounds to layer and create our soundscape and storyline.  

My partner and I wanted to make a fun, creative story for this project. Since we were required to record only 4 foley sounds, we were able to consider abstract ideas that we normally would not have been able to recreate well. We decided to tell the story of an alien invasion through sound, where a dog is abducted by a UFO and disappears without a trace. We also utilized silence as a sound effect itself to build tension and suspense. We decided on a farm-like, countryside atmosphere because we figured a cityscape would sound too chaotic and become unclear, rather than the mysterious sci-fi tone we wanted to create.  

To brainstorm, we filled out a sheet of sounds we needed to complete our soundscape and make it the most realistic to get our message across. Our outline helped us to form a vision for how we wanted the project to be and served as a checklist for when we gathered our audio so that we didn’t leave out an important element of our soundscape.

For this project, my partner and I used Clipchamp. I got much better results this way. There were no glitches, no limits on imported files, and we were able to work on the project on two different devices simultaneously, which is actually a very unique quality for a free editing tool to have. This was very helpful and also encouraged teamwork with me and my partner.

I really enjoyed this project. I thought my partner and I did a good job with communication while gathering our foley sounds, and I think we also did a good job with our creativity and overall efficiency time-management wise. I would have liked to exercise an even more bizarre concept for our soundscape or had more time to experiment with different ideas regarding our storyline, but overall, I had a good time making it and I think my partner and I did a very good job while working together. Here is the link to our project!

RamsayStark_soundscape_per1 

 

In Sound Project #2, we had to go back to our One Word film project, when we were told to record scenes to convey a specific word and delete its sound. For this sound project, our job was to add it in back! We had to create a soundscape that matched the scenes and the speed of our previous project and include realistic sounds to complete the story.  

We decided to keep our sounds relatively realistic to those in the courtyard at our school during lunchtime- birds chirping, people talking, and the footsteps of students walking to their lunch tables. That kind of low chatter in the background really helped to emphasize the loneliness of our main character and served as a reminder of her argument with her best friend. We recorded many sounds that are normally overlooked, like walking on different surfaces and setting down different items to mimic the way it looks on screen. On top of our normal schoolyard sounds, we added the sounds of both a phone call and a phone call declining. This made that part of our One Word project a lot clearer, since it was more obvious to the viewer that our character was attempting to reach out. Finally, we added music to make a more emotional story and to contrast the happiness of the first flashbacks to the sting of the regret in the later ones. 

To brainstorm, my partner and I made two lists. One was for sounds we needed to find online, and another was for sounds we had to record. This helped us to remain on task and keep track of what we still needed to record after finding our sound effects.  

My partner and I both utilized Clipchamp for each of our projects. The application of sounds in that app was seamless and neither of us had any trouble with importing our video and audio together.  

I think that our sounds recorded were done well since we had filmed in that same place. We were very efficient with our time and even had extra time to strategize our individual approaches after importing. Next time I would have liked to start my project a little earlier and record my foley sounds ahead of time so I could just import all of my audio at the same time from a single day. Here is the link to our project. I hope you enjoy!

OWFSound_Stark.mp4