Project 1: Fusion

Delve from Karen Vertierra on Vimeo.

For my short film, I decided to convey the surreal experiences from my audio essay through natural subject matter. I felt that it would allow audiences to imagine their own interpretation of the images, emotions and sensations of the boy navigating his way through the fantasy world. In choosing a medium, I decided that filming nature and abstract shots would be appropriate to capture the depth and realism of my narrative. I spent a great deal of time working on storyboards and planning what objects and people I would shoot to express each sound from my essay. For the opening sequence, I shot several takes of a first-person view running through a forest. After piecing it together with some of my opening footage, I realized that the choppy image quality did not match with the rest of my shots. For the final, I cut through several different shots of the

forest using the same frame to convey the action of running, tripping, and lapsing into another world. In visualizing the plunging and gurgling noises of the fantasy world, I focused manipulating water in different ways. I utilized close-ups, reverse speed, and rate stretch to emphasize the movement and rhythm of water imagery. I also experimented with layering videos in Premiere; especially in the spinning trees and wind sequences. I played with this technique because I felt that the rich texture, movement, and depth of the final product resonated with the overlapping wind and vocal sounds in these parts of my audio essay.

To express the rush of frantic voices and train sounds in the last half of my essay, I used a combination of portrait and abstract imagery; signalling the darker rush of memories my character encountered. The first segment of shots feature human subjects, an alarm clock ringing, and a Kitchen Aid mixer (reflected in Premiere). I felt that the movement in these images expressed the chaos and onrush of the fast, loud sounds. To transition back into the natural world, I shot ink in water; allowing the dissolving image to capture the way the audio settles back into its natural rhythm. I also decided to make this segment of the film monochrome to signal a change in mood. It allowed me to distinguish between the character’s blissful and regretful emotional states.

Because I planned my shots in advance, my main challenge with this project was getting the technical details of each shot right. I spent lots of energy playing with lighting and depth of field to get the details of each natural environment. I felt like after this project I became more confident in shooting in manual, and controlling aperture and shutter speeds. I also learned more about Premiere’s effect controls, and manipulated many of the shots’ colour curves and levels to boost the visual quality of the imagery.

Overall, I had a blast seeing all my recorded footage come together to express the sounds in my last project. This project definitely allowed me to extend my love for photography by capture moving images.

View the inspiration for this project over here!

Visual inspiration for Fusion

I’ve just spent the entire weekend pondering over the concept for my first short film project, and I finally have two working storyboards that I think will capture the dream world of Delve. I also have a working idea of the visual quality that my video might take on. Since my sounds and imagery are primarily derived from nature, I want to shoot a lot of closeups of trees, dust/pollen, flowers/weeds and water. I also hope I can get my hands on a lens with a big aperture so I can get some rich detail on my subjects, and achieve nice depth of field. I am planning to shoot during the mid-afternoon or during the golden hour to get sufficient lighting. The following are so beautiful examples of detail-rich shots of nature and people.

ISLANDS from Diego Contreras on Vimeo.

The Sun (feat. Nili) – Villeneuve from duriez jérémie on Vimeo.

And look! I found this nifty website that calculates when the golden hour is (according to geography). It can be found here. I also want to do more research on getting rich DoF, and adding additional colour filters on the final video if needed.

Sound design in “The Lean Forward Moment” and “Apocalypse Now”

As the focus of the next few classes will be on sound, I thought it would be a good idea to read through The Lean Forward Moment: Create Compelling Stories for Film, TV, and the Web’s chapter on sound in film. Many of the ideas discussed are also applicable to film editor and sound designer Water Murch’s work with Apocalypse Now. The segment Hollywood Sound Design dissects a climatic battle scene in the film so audiences can understand the layering and depth achieved by mixing location and post-production sounds to create a dynamic and convincing environment.

From the reading and the segment, I began to understand that relying on location sound can be difficult and expensive for filmmakers; with some scenes requiring “six or seven microphones that would each feed the dialogue back to the sound mixer’s board where he or she would mix it and record it” (257-258). Resultantly, location recordists make important decisions deciding which characters to give emphasis in a scene, and which characters’ dialogues will be supplemented off-mic. In Apocalypse Now, the only location sounds are the young solider’s line: “I’m not going!” and the Robert Duvall’s line at the end of the scene. These characters were framed as close-ups and drawn to the foreground by their panicked situation, making their on-set recording appropriate. Throughout the scene, however, the hysterical cries of the soldiers running on land, the perspectival dialogue in the helicopter, and even the commotion of the wounded victim on the ground are part of post-production sound editing. The decision of framing these characters off in the distance as long shots coincides with the obstacle of having to sync their dialogue with their lip movement; which can be complex when there are multiple people in a frame.

As an aside, the reading discusses how sound design is also a form of storytelling through discussing the symbolic nature of sounds in the short film Coons. As the story takes place on a desolate plain, the sound of wind, traffic, birds, and insects were necessary in creating the ambience of the environment. However, sound designer David Lankton worked to transform wind as a mnemonic device; signaling the protagonist’s decision to finally stand up to his brother. He achieved this by “establishing the wind from the beginning of the film so that he could change it when it mattered” (263). In this case, the absence of wind worked to indicate a shift in the plotline.

There are several sound editing terms outlined in the reading that can also be used to describe the sound sphere in Apocalypse Now. The scene demonstrates equalization; the process of changing the frequencies of sounds to give the environment a convincing sense of perspective and depth. In the final scene, the opera track is the most prominent, establishing the horrific, dramatic mood of the battle. Next, the helicopter propellers and bomb sounds have competing volumes. The helicopter is prominent at the beginning, signaling the arrival of the troops. As the scene progresses, it is the bombs that are the loudest, entailing the destruction and causalities. When the on-location dialogue takes place, they are the most prominent sounds in the foreground as they contribute to the narrative and story of the film scene. Finally, the surrounding group of soldiers throughout the entire scene have the lowest frequencies in the background. As the camera pans through the destruction, some voices in the field grow louder than the rest, contributing to dynamic movement and space of the battlefield. Also, most of the sounds in the scene (with the exception of the music) are diagetic, meaning that their source is visible on scene. The helicopter and bomb sounds are recognized as foley sound effects, which are recorded in post-production by an artist who performs them in sync with the picture.

The art of sound in film is a complex process that works with “atmosphere, specific sounds, silence, or any sound…to shape the audience’s reaction to the story” (277). Sound editing goes beyond the selection of sounds, but also considers the placement, equalization, repetition, and interaction with the overall competition to create dynamic environments and tell convincing stories.

Sources:

Hollyn, Norman (2009). The Lean Forward Moment: Create Compelling Stories for Film, TV, and the Web. New Riders. 
Heard Any Good Movies Lately?: The Sound Design of Apocalypse Now (Video 2006)