My Film - A Summary of Sound

Initially I had intended to use mixture of prerecorded and post-production edited sound to create the diegetic sound heard within my opening; but due to issues I've detailed in my production diary, this was not possible.
For this reason, all sound heard within my film opening has been added in post-production, using the Logic Pro sound software to do so.


Ambience/Sound Effects (Diegetic Sound)

Using Logic Pro I was able to find (almost) every sound I could ever want, allowing me to place them in order to create the general diegetic noise of my film world, and letting me adjust their volume levels and 'positioning' (where you would hear them in the film world.) 

To be as diegetically realistic as possible, I used separate background noise types for indoors and outdoors, and found sound bites that would fit with things like the jacket being zipped, the door locking, the running etc. A lot of the time the easiest way to make them seem realistic was to simply adjust the volume levels, but sometimes I also adjusted their positioning (e.g. to sound as if the door was being locked on the left side of the screen etc.)  

My favourite use of sound within this was the heartbeat sound effect during the monster P.O.V shots. While I initially tried to edit this to gradually speed up, as if it was the girl's racing heartbeat we could hear, I realized that it was a lot more ominous when it stayed at the same pace, because it was coupled with a drone sound effect to help things seem distorted, and this connotes that it was the 'monster's' steady heartbeat we were listening too.

I later added a breathing sound effect to the monster P.O.V shots helped anchor down the signifier that someone/something was 'watching' the protagonist.

The only sound I needed to record myself was the dialogue, and I did this using the iPhone app 'Music Memos'. To make sure the timing was right Rose and I watched the scene over again, but the process was simple and worked well, giving us clearly recorded dialogue. 

Soundtrack (Non-diegetic Sound)

Theoretically this should have been a lot easier than the fiddly process of creating the detailed and accurate ambient sound, but of course it was not. 

In the first rough cut of my film I decided to place the song "Run" by AWOLNATION over the top for a bit of fun; I knew that I couldn't use the song for my final product (due to copy right) and I never intended to keep it, but it did fit surprising well with the timing and mood of my opening.

For my film's second rough cut I didn't use 'proper' music, but instead layered synth sound effects to create an eerie alien-like feeling. While I actually liked the unusual, sheer quietness of this, the 'chase' scene was still missing the sound necessary to build the appropriate tension. 

For my third rough cut I spent ages combing through Logic Pro's various pre-recorded sound loops, even dabbling in recording some of my own original content using Alchemy, but I found great difficulty in getting the correct timing to create the tension and buildup I was looking for. While I was slowly improving I still hadn't quite found what I was looking for.

In the end I went to my teacher for help, which lead to the creation of my fourth rough cut. This time, the chase scene was changed to a much faster, more techno beat. I was happy with the timing (as it fit perfectly with the short chase scene,) but just couldn't help feeling it had the wrong atmosphere for what I'd spent the first minute building up to, despite the positive feedback I received from my audience. 

I was considering trying to strip back the techno and add some more synth to give it a grungier, more natural sound, when Mr. Van Zomerplaag found a piece of copy-right free music. I made a brief tester video (rough cut 5) to see if this music would work, and was satisfied with the potential it had.

The sound in my final cut is my own, recreated version of the 'copyright free' (that turned out to be copyrighted after all) music I sampled in my 5th rough cut.

I used Logic Pro to recreate a similar sound, and I'm very happy with how it's turned out. The timing now works perfectly and there's a nice balance between the synth sounds and the beat.

Overall I'm proud of all the hard work I put into creating the sound for my opening, especially as I learnt so much about using Logic Pro and Alchemy along the way. 

While it was an undeniably difficult task, (one that I dreaded even starting as the possibilities seemed to have no end in sight,) I did have some fun creating the diegetic/non-diegetic sound, and I look forward to using the skills I have learned in my next project.