Project 2: Interview

Museum of the Moving Image

       Our guide did a sound demo for us which pulled apart the various sounds you hear while watching a film. He reminded us that the three main types of sound in a film are: sound effects, dialogue and music. He explained that almost all sound effects you hear are added in during post production. We discussed one type of sound effect which are foley sounds. These are sounds created by a person who stands off to the side breaking celery to create the sound of bones breaking, or even clomping shoes on the ground to imitate the footsteps of the actor.
       In this demo, we also had the chance to analyze a scene from Titanic and carefully unpack all the different layers of sound. We discovered that when you cut out all other sounds and listen to just the dialogue which was recorded in the studio in post production, it doesn't sound anywhere near as dramatic as in the scene. When we separated the sound effects from all the other sounds and the image and listened to it alone, we found it didn't sound anything like the action it was coupled with. For example, there is a loud thud when Rose jumps off the balcony of the ship onto the deck, standing alone that sound is very obscure and is actually the sound of a chair falling with a bag of potatoes tied to it. Another example is when one of the massive smoke stacks unhinges and plummets into the ocean; the sound that they used is the slowed down call of an elephant. For the sound of the cables on the smokestack breaking they used a high pitched gun shot. These sounds heighten the drama and suspense; they also give the ship a living breathing quality by having it make animal sounds (subconsciously of course...) which allows the audience to connect with the ship just as much as the people.