soundscape assignment

For this assignment we have been asked create a soundscape 3 - 4 minutes in duration which demonstrates an understanding of the use of audio to evoke an atmosphere.

I have decided to record the process of cooking dinner for two, which will involve a trip to the supermarket as well as cooking dinner.

I have begun recording the sounds for my soundscape using the Edriol mp3 recorder.

I had to experiment at first to try to get the sound levels right and have found that it is better to break a sound affect down into sections if there are various sound levels. For example with opening the door the first part the door handle going down is much louder than the actual squeak of the door opening so I recorded them separately at the correct level and will put them back together in the edit.

Having collected most of the sounds I want to use I have been going through the lengthy process of editing each sound using Sony Sound Forge audio editing software. I have given each sound a relevant name and normalized the levels, with some sounds I have managed to edit out unwanted peaks and noises and have experimented with the noise gate to reduce buzzing sounds in the background.

Sound Forge

Once I have processed and named all the sounds I will then use logic to assemble them and create the soundscape.

Final stages

I have now completed naming and processing my sound recordings and have begun to assemble the sounds in logic using mulitracks, one track is for enviromental back ground noises and another two tracks for the individual sounds.It now seems my sound scape is begining to take shape.

I reckon I have another three hours or so to finish assembling the sounds and making any final adjustments, but I am going to give myself a whole day in the gate house in case of any unforseen problems that might occur.

Famous Last words...

Today I learned the very valuable lesson in the importance of saving your project as you progress, I managed to loose a few hours work whilst working on my project in Logic, which resulted in my having to stop two thirds of the way through, bounce out the project and bring home the files to finish off. I saved what I had of the project as a wav file knowing Sony Vegas was compatible with the format, and was able to import it along with the other sounds and finally complete it just in the nick of time.



Although I gave myself a little extra time thinking I might run over by a few hours, after todays experience in future I will give more time for unforeseen problems and think at least a day would be a much better time scale to give myself.

Montage.

I had to think long and hard about this one I checked out magnum in motion to glean some insperation and ideas. I finnally came up with idea as using glastonbury festival as my topic.

As I Live in the village that hosts the festival I am well aware of the controversy that surrounds the event and the impact that 250'000 weekend visitors have on both people and the environment, I aim to illustrate through montage the side that you do not see and the reality behind the festival.

Photos taken on saturday.

I already have some footage and photos from previous years at the festival which I intend to use, but with this montage I want to draw a comparison between the land whilst the festival is in full swing and the site how it is when there are just the cows, the rabbits and the birds. Saturday was beautiful autumn day, so I took the opportunity to go out and photograph and film the festival site as it is when peaceful and quiet.

Lengthy Process

I have began editing film and choosing photographs for my montage, trawling through old footage was a lengthy process but I managed to narrow down the clips I want use. The editing software I am using is sony vegas,

It works in a different way to final cut pro, but the principles are the same, and I have gained a better understanding of the program by doing the tutorials on Final Cut Pro. I am now able to organize all the media into bins and understand the setup process more clearly.

In the lesson today I finished off my montage, although I had worked on it at home I still needed to tweak it a little.

The music I used was from a band called Back of Beyond and the album is called meeting pool, all the imagery was taken by myself.

In the Name of Fun

In the name of fun from mandybriggs on Vimeo.