Adding Sound

Sound is one of the most important parts to a film. For this task we had to use our silent film but we had to add sound too. As a group we decided what sounds we wanted and how we would record them. When it comes to creating sounds you can really use anything as you are just recording the sound. You have to two types of sound in films these are called non-diegetic and diegetic. For some parts of the film we had people walking on wooden boards in the studio then added these later, to create the sound of people walking in the corridors; this would be an example of diegetic and this effect was specifically Foley sound. We did run into problems earlier when recording the sounds because it was too windy outside to record people running on the ground. Therefore we went back to the studio to also get a sample of someone walking on gravel.

Once we had all of the sounds you had to split up and edit the film on your own. When adding the sounds in you had to make sure you were syncing the movements up with the sounds so it looked like real. I started off by adding by adding the easier sounds i.e the vending machine. I had sounds for the buttons and when you pull the food out. The harder sounds to add were the foot steps. When I was adding the foot steps I noticed they weren't that loud so I had to increase the volume but they still weren't loud enough. We were told we can add a piece of music to the film. This really helped because I had bits were there wasn't any sound so having the music helped fill the film and bring it all together. For my non-diegetic sound I choose to use a classical piano piece from silent films.

Once I had added the sound and watched it back I noticed that sound does really affect a film. It helps to create atmosphere and depth to the film, but it also indicates what is happening in the scenes. One thing I would of liked to do is add more wild sounds in. I didn't really like how there was blank moments with no sounds.