task 5

ByTask 5 – Recording live dialogue on location          Amara Senior

Task 5 was based around spoken word for moving image soundtrack. Spoken word for moving image soundtrack is recorded live on location in many contexts, such as news broadcasts, live television debates, interviews and dialogue for television drama and film.  In this task we had to create a 30 second movie clip from the recording we had done on location. This included vox pops, a TV interview and a film clip, this was also done in pairs.

The first one I had completed was the film dialogue. For this task I had used the ‘Where’s my door, Mum?’ scene from Freaky Friday. Firstly, I had to research and download the following clip from YouTube using www.clipconverter.cc, which allowed us to insert the clip into Garage band.  Once the clip was in Garage band, I had saved the file in the soundtrack production folder in my user area, which allows me to access my work from any computer.  

Following this I had then started to record the dialogue for the movie clip using the most suitable microphones and locations that match the original recording as closely as possible, with my two partners Christal and charlotte.  Each step mentioned above was then applied to the other two tasks, which was the vox pop and the TV interview. The recording of the dialogue for freaky Friday was not as straightforward as we intended it to be as Christal was struggling to record the main dialogue, which meant we had to switch to charlotte recording. As a result of this, we had to start the recording process

Again, which took a lot of time as the voiceover recordings did not sync with the movie clip. In terms of the location we used to record, we had done this in an empty office, which insured that the recording of the voiceover was done to the best quality and issues such as reverberation and sound surfaces were eliminated. When recording we made sure the voice recorder was approximately 13 inches away from us to ensure the sound quality was the best it could be.

The recording for the TV interview was a lot less complicated than the film clip, as we only had to do this two times before we got it to sync exactly in time with the clip. Issues such as reverberation and sound surfaces were avoided as we recorded in a closed environment, which meant that there was no background noise. The recordings came out very clear which meant minimal editing was done in reaper. Also, to ensure that the recordings came out to the best possible sound quality we left the recorder approximately 13 inches away from us whilst recording.

The recording for the Vox-pop was also very easy to do, as we had the clip in front of us and copied the voiceovers as we went along. This ensured that we made no mistakes the first time round. We also recorded into Garage band, just to have a backup copy of the recordings. This is an advantage as it means we would not have to upload the clips to Garage band and place them in the correct order, as this was already done. The sound quality of the voiceovers was good as we recorded in the courtyard, which meant we got the background atmosphere and crowd noises we needed to make the vox pop seem more realistic. Due to the fact that we had recorded in this location purposely, we did not have to edit the clips.

 

                                                                         

After this stage I had uploaded the different voiceover clips to the mac and edited them in reaper. This included normalising, equalising and compressing the clips to minimise the amount of background noise and to increase the volume of the original clips before inserting them into Garage band. The freaky Friday clips had to most editing to do as we needed to make the original clips louder and clearer. Also whilst doing the editing in reaper, I had to be careful not to distort the sound when increasing the volume.  Editing the TV interview clips in reaper was quite minimal as the sound quality was already quite good, although we still increased the volume to ensure it was a lot easier to hear. Editing the vox-pop was also very minimal as it had background atmosphere and crowd noises, which meant we did not need to edit these out and only had to increase the volume of the entire clip.

Once the voiceovers and movie clips was in Garage band for each task, I added additional sound effects such as, footsteps, screaming, and crowd noises. This added an extra effect the movie clip as it made it seem more realistic.  I had to ensure that everything was in sync with the original movie clip. I also added music in garage band, which was similar to the original music to make it sound as good as possible.

Overall, I feel the freaky Friday task went quite well minus the complications, and sounded quite well at the end. Although, if I were to do this task again I would make sure that we recorded the voiceovers correctly the first time around so that I did not have to re-record it so many times. Also, I would have made sure that I used a different music bed to ensure that it sounded more professional.  In terms of the vox-pop, i feel that it turnt out really well as the voiceover sync directly to the actions shown on screen, also the music and crowd noises really tie the whole vox-pop together. What could have went better is my time management as it took a while to get things started and also i could make it abit longer in the future. Finally, the TV interview turnt out well as the sound quality was good and everything was in sync. What could have went better is using a different scene that had more audience noises. In conclusion, i feel this assignment as a whole turnt out alot better than i had thought it would have and i enjoyed making each one of these moving soundtracks productions.