Editing for Sound Project

My partner Kayla and I were trying to find a poetic sound pattern for our title Simotaneously Towards the Sound of this Old Woman's Voice. We first picked up the recording of Thomasina singing hush little baby to give what we felt old women were like for our experiences. It than began to become difficult as we couldn't fully agree on what sounds reminded us of an old woman and how it could fit into the edit to make it sound like it fits much like a puzzle. We both agreed on the leaves and stepping sounds like the sound itself is going towards an old woman's voice. We than decided to make it a repetitive motif for the hush little baby lullaby to play and the foot steps to come in as the sounds kept going. We decided on water dropping to give a very natural sound to the piece. We also had to figure out if frying an egg would work, as I believed that fit, while Kayla wasn't so sure about the length of the frying and how long it should last. I also wanted the snoring to represent sleep and old people's sleeping habits, while she felt that it was too distracting for the piece, but we ended up agreeing that it would work at the end. A major problem was length, as we couldn't make it long enough and finding sounds to fit into the piece without it becoming too distracting. It seemed like it took forever to reach two minutes for the sound. But we finished and it was amazing to see how sound can create a picture.

Sound Recording Experience

The experience for sound recording was hard at first when I thought about it. What sounds could I make? I thought about sounds that could be made through different objects and ourselves. Our group was split into two days to record sound and I was the only one who could help out for both days and help the group keep track of what was recorded on the first day and the second day. Making sounds was interesting and hard. Some things you record sound nothing like you expect at all, and some things sound exactly like you expect them to sound. At first it was difficult to record sound as we had found out that both the boom and our sound recording device was almost out of battery. We had to record sound using only our sound recording device instead of using a boom, which actually worked to our advantage because the areas we used to record sound would have not permitted us to have a big boom in the area and would have been too distracting. We also had a little trouble finding how many seconds we recorded sound on the sound recording device. I learned about open areas vs. closed areas of recording and what sounds the device can record and what it doesn't pick up.

Master Shot Edit

The editing for the master shot was a good experience. When we were editing we could easily see where to cut, shot/reverse shot, and the master shot. The harder parts dealt with sound and yet was also easier in a way. Because of the use of hospital masks, we could actually put the best take of dialogue recorded for the speaking parts and primarily use those instead. The brushing sounds reverberated in the bathroom we were in, so it was louder than most sounds and we didn't want it sound like the two criminals were actually yelling to get there voices. We also wanted to make the brushing rhythmic and making sure to match the brush strokes we filmed in the shots. We figured that we could soften the level of the brushing to make the conversation more apparent. Also deciding what b-rolls to use for some of the shots was a little difficult to do as we had to figure out when to put it and to not just have the camera on Bran and Park.

Pre visualization materials

The making of the pre visualization material for the master shot was very difficult at first. The idea of two men in a car, in master shot format without breaking the 180 degree format was a very hard thing to accomplish with the story boards and to keep the two criminals in full profile if we could shoot from the back of the car. If we shot in front from outside the car, lighting, and sound would have been a huge issue for this project. It was helpful in figuring out how to shoot it though, instead of just deciding the shots on location, we would be able to have shots listed for us and shown visually on a storyboard. Another hard thing to do was the drawing of the shots and having to put the only good drawer in the group as the drawer.

Producer for the Master Shot

For the Master Shot I plan to be organized and make sure that we have all the equipment we need for shooting. I will have make sure to get permission papers for actors we use in the master shot. I also plan to make calls and have the papers ready for certain areas that we shoot the film. I will pay for gas for the master shot. I will help the sound editor for editing the sound during the edits we make towards the film. I will also help with any other things that the film crew may need help with during the shoot. I will also may also get some food for the crew during the shoot. I will also help the director in organizing each shot and location for the shoot.

Vox Pops and Expert interview

The vox pops were at first very daunting at first but getting all the necessary paperwork and everything was not bad. Most people in downtown Wilmington were very amenable to us for the most part and were supportive of the Documentary.

The expert interview took about two hours to finish and was very insightful. The filming took about 30 minutes. It was awesome to have a person who was very knowledgeable about the subject to talk to us.  It was more difficult for us to film though because of lighting and having to cut out many parts to have it fit into the allotted time space of two minutes. 

Peer Review

Peer Review

Audra: Audra made her directions very clear for us to comprehend. She would help with group suggestions and allowing for her ideas and the groups ideas to come out during the production. Even though she had the final say in what she wanted the documentary to look like, she allowed us to give our own ideas of how it would look into the final project. She also helped with editing and did the interviews. 

Kateland: Kateland helped with ideas for the final documentary and even came up with the idea to have the documentary be about sandwiches based on her own employment at Subway. She helped with the questions and in editing with charting the markers for the video. She also helped in how the video would be structured.

Jonathan: Jonathan had done very well with sound and holding equipment during shooting such as the mike and the umbrella during a sunny day of shooting. Jonathan helped with editing the final cut by giving his opinions of what he felt made the film better. I feel that Jonathan wasn’t given enough to do but he made up for it by doing extra stuff.

Ryne: Ryne did a very good job in a position that he wasn’t particularly comfortable in. He got all paperwork made up for us to have the people we were interviewing sign. He also helped a lot in how he felt the film should look like during the editing process. He also found the expert interviewer and was able to call him on short notice.

Molly: I felt that I did a fairly good job with being Director of Photography. I was comfortable with the film process, since I had done it before but I wasn’t fully comfortable with the editing process. The rest of the group was able to help me and to make sure I was editing it the way Audra wanted it. I still spent the longest time editing, but at least I had the group to help me with the editing of the final film.