Basic Sound Design

As Arturo has made clear, successful sound design can make or break a student film. With our limited financial resources, taking the time to really nail the sound of a project can enhance the visuals and create production value almost out of thin air. Think about the student film about astronauts that we watched earlier in the semester; the sound of the film created a great sense of scale and offscreen space that is really difficult to achieve in student film. However, if you're like me, you might only have the (very basic) ProTools knowledge that you acquired in CP1, which might not be enough to take your sound to the next level. Luckily, NoFilmSchool just posted a nice little introduction to basic sound design and foley: sound-design.



The blog post links to a 15-minute introduction of foley and sound effects, emphasizing that very little of the sound that makes it into a completed film was captured on location during shooting. Take a look at some basic techniques for creating sound effects, and try to nail the sound of your film. But hurry!

The Wilhelm Scream

Like many of us in this class I am a huge movie buff. I enjoy watching movies almost to a fault, and one thing that I am very good at is remembering lines and scenes. Mainly because I watch films again and again. This is why I wanted to clue some of you in on arguably the most famous sound effect in movie history. The Wilhelm Scream. This sound effect is a stock sound effect that has been used in over 200 films, usually to represent someone dying. Whether you've noticed it before or not, you have undoubtably heard it if you have seen films like Star Wars, Lord of the Rings, Saving Private Ryan, and even animated films like Toy Story and Hercules.

The sound effect is credited as first being used in the 1953 films The Charge at Feather River, it gets it's name from the character, Wilhelm, who gets shot by an arrow. Since then it has become sort of a running gag among some movie directors. Most notably George Lucas, Quentin Tarantino, and Peter Jackson, who pretty much use it in every film.

The thing that I find so funny about it is that the director's are making a conscious choice to include this sound effect in their film. I originally thought it might just be a coincidence, but the sound effect is used in too many movies for nobody to know. Christ it has it's own Wikipedia post  for it.

However if you still don't believe me, here are two videos dedicated solely to the use of the Wilhelm scream.

... And the other one.

Hope you enjoyed it.

The Guide to DIY Filmmaking

Although most of us love to make movies, we (obviously) don't have big budgets to get awesome gear and large crews. I found this image online of things you can use or make to get more professional-looking shots with minimal money paid. It's pretty cool! It has stuff like using a wheelchair as a dolly, some pipes as a steadicam, Chinese paper lanters for lighting (who woulda thought!), and how to make cool sound effects at home. Some examples of those are slapping a pair of leather gloves for a bird's flapping wings and sliding the top off a toilet for a stone coffin opening. So cool! I wasn't into filmmaking before I came to Ithaca, and now I feel like a whole world is being opened to me. Huzzah!

Here's the website with the picture I found if you're interested in learning more.