The first thing the foley artist does is watch the film, talk to directors and note down the timings of when a sound needs to be added and what it needs to be. This is done so they know the sound effects they need and equipment. Then they go back to the studio where they have 'AB' tapes that have the footage on that needs sound on it. In the studio they set up what they need, including a high sensitive directional microphone, big screen and recording equipment on a computer. Within recording the screen shows a stationary line and a moving line. The stationary line is where the director wants the audio added. The moving line helps the recorder get ready to add the effects. When done perfect the sound is added to the audio track of the film to make it more realistic and intriguing for the audience.
Wild Tracks
The wild track is the audio of the atmosphere around the characters. For instance, if a scene was shot at Hyde Park then the sound team would record the general atmosphere of the Park minus the dialogue. This is done so there is a ambient sound in the background to make it sound more realistic. The wild track can give the audience more immersion into the film so they can feel like they are actually there.
Recording Music for Film and TV (The Hobbit) Scores and Soundtracks
A video of the London Philharmonic Orchestra working with Howard Shore to create the sound track and music for The Hobbit.
What equipment is needed to record music for The Hobbit or any score/soundtrack for a Film or TV Show?
Microphones - The mics are used to record the audio from the orchestra and send that to the sound recording device which would be a programme like Logic Pro. The mics used are normally directional so that when recording is done a group like Violins can be edited by itself, for example fading down or up. Non-directional mics tend to collect a lot of unnecessary sound resulting in other instruments getting recorded on the same mic. Sound desk/Sound Mixer - A desk or mixer is needed to gather all the sound elements made in the studio. Here the audio levels can be adjusted so the recorded tracks sound the best they can.
Recording software (Logic Pro/Audition) - This is needed to take the audio from the mics and store it in a safe place where is can be played again and edited. Software like Logic can also be used to adjust sound elements like, pitch, tone, compression and volume.
Computer - This is where the above software will be stored as well as a place to actually save the audio onto and have for editing purposes later.
Music sheets - This is what the musicians read to know what they are playing. They have all the cues and notes on them for the musicians to play.
Recording Studio - This is a place for the orchestra to be and make the music. Here there will be musicians, stands, microphones and instruments for the piece to be recorded. Seats/Mics Stands, Music Stands, Conductor Podium, Instruments - All of these are required to make the musicians and the conductor comfortable to give them the best opportunity to make the best soundtrack they can.
What people are needed?
Composer - The composer is the person who actually creates the music. Sometimes, each different instrument has a different music sheet because you get first cello, second cello, third and so on.
Conductor - The conductor leads the musicians by bringing them in and making sure they stay on time. Sometimes, the composer also acts as the conductor so that they can make sure that the players are playing the right notes otherwise the the conductor can stop and help the player.
Musicians - Musicians are needed to play the instruments, stay on time and work together to create what the composer intends. The musicians are normally all in one orchestra like the "London Philharmonic Orchestra" made up of high quality musicians that know what they are doing.
Sound Mixers - To adjust volumes and make sure the microphones are recording properly. They have the ability to read music sheets and know when the composer wants one set of instruments to be louder or faded out.
The pieces of equipment I will be using to record my sound elements:
To record my sound elements, I will be using directional microphones in the recording studio to record dialogue and sound effects. For recording software, I will use LogicPro, this is because I know how to record on this software and think its easy to use and get recording off as well. To edit I will be using audacity because I have used audacity to edit audio before and find it easy to use and simple.
Compression
To create sound elements professionally, compression is a very important part of the production process. It is needed to reduce loud sounds while keeping the quieter sounds the same. This is very important in orchestra recording because all the different instruments are at different volumes within the sound track and so the compression helps make the louder instruments in the music still loud but not too loud for distortion. If part of the sound is too loud like a loud bang, then it has to be dampened and smoothed out. And if some parts of the audio is too quiet, then it must be made louder depending on the dynamic range. The dynamic range is the average signal levels between the quietest sound element and the loudest.
The key compression terms are:
Downward Compression - This is when the louder sounds are changed and moved down while the quieter sounds stay the same. For example if the lowest sound decibel hit is 6 and the highest 12. the downward compression works on making the decibels at a similar range bringing it lower to 6.
Upward Compression - This is the opposite of Downward compressions as it works with the quieter sound elements where they are changed to make them louder and the loud elements the same.
Lossless - This is compression when the data from the original recording stays the same, this results in a higher quality like a wav format because it is uncompressed.
Lossy - This is compression where the quality is reduced because some elements of the recording have been taken away. This results in a lower quality format like a mp3 file however, it means the file is smaller making storage easier.
Sound Formats and File Types
WAV - A wav file is an uncompressed, lossless format so is very high quality. It is used for video and music production purposes because it offers the highest quality and is the most common, when it comes to recordings. However the down fall of a WAV file is that it is uncompressed and lossless which means that it takes up a lot of file space so is sometimes difficult to distribute because the transfer time is longer.
AIFF - Is another high quality format because it is lossless so directly copies the original audio source. AIFF is however, a Apple format so only plays on their products unless it is converted into a different format that is compatible.
FLAC - This format is compressed but also lossless so has the quality but lacks the huge file sizes so download and distribution is made easier than WAV and AIFF. FLAC is also a 'open source' which means it can be altered by individuals or companies.
MP3 - This is the most common lossy format, with its small file sizes and mediocre sound quality. It is also common on the internet for downloading and uploading of files, this is because it takes a very short amount of time because of the small file size. Mp3 however, is a lot lower quality than WAV or AIFF files so would not be used in films or music videos because the quality is not good enough for the big screen
For my piece I will be exporting my piece is WAV because it is high quality and the clients wants a high quality piece of audio for the advert.
Storing Audio Files
There are many ways to store audio files on digital drives. For example:
- USB/flash hard drive - Hard drive - Cloud (Microsoft one drive, Google drive, Apple iCloud, Cloud 9, Dropbox
For my audio files, I will be keeping them backed up on my computer hard drive, hard drives are the best method of storage because they tend to be large is size of gb.The hard drive 1m using is 1TB. This means I can export my piece as a WAV file because I have enough space for it on my drive.
USBs and flash hard drives usually don't have the space to hold big file size of WAV, and cloud services have a limit on file size so they wont have enough space for my file.