Directions: Editing & Sound Design Task

For this lecture we looked at editing and sound design, two things a director has to think about carefully when creating a film.

Editing

We began the lecture by looking at directing the edit. We focused on:

• Continuity editing-
• Predominant form of editing style in narrative film and TV.
• Taking discontinuous shots and creating a continuous flow.
• Montage Theory-
• Used in early Russian cinema.
• Four distinct forms:
• Metric- Cutting to a set amount of frames.
• Rhythmic- Cutting based on time and visual composition.
• Tonal- Using the emotional meaning of the shots.
• Intellectual- Creating a higher meaning.
• Continuity editing: Story-
• First layer creates a continuous story.
• You create the story of the scene through temporal and spatial editing.
• If it's not needed, cut it.
• Continuity editing: Drama-
• Creating drama through pacing, rhythm and emotion.
• Quickness/slowness of cuts.
• Think about: what are you showing? How long are you showing it? Why are you showing it?
• Think about use of POV. Going from CU to POV puts audience in position. Whose POV?
• Tension can be created by holding shots and cutting quickly.
• Match on action-
• Allows for dramatic and artful shifts in time and spatial narrative.
• Matching action in one shot, with a similar one in another shot.
• Cross-cutting-
• Helps create suspenseful action sequences.
• Cutting between two or more scenes that are occurring at the same time in the story.
• Montage-
• Collection of shots showing a series of similar shots over a period of time.
• Can be used to show time passing or character development.
• Fade/Dissolve-
• Can show time passing or end of a scene.
• Dissolve is the merging of two shots (slightly different to fade).

We then looked at the stages of editing:

• Log: Log and arrange footage. Work out wheres and whats.
• Assembly Cut: All the scenes assembled in the right order.
• Rough Cut: Cut into assembly, adding shots in, cutting and removing.
• Fine Cut: Cutting into scenes, and creating drama.
• Final Cut: It's all done, though you may still tweak a few things.

Sound Design

For the second half of the lecture we focused on sound design:

• Sound design makes up 50% of the film.
• It is the capturing, layering and mixing of individual sound elements.
• Sound Layers-
• Dialogue: All recorded dialogue from the shoot (V.O. has different track)
• Sync: Sound from shoot that is not dialogue.
• ADR: Dialogue re-recorded or dubbed, after shoot.
• FX: Sound effects recorded for production or taken from library.
• Foley: Cover personal action elements. Specific sounds.
• Atmos: Sound elements that make up the atmosphere of the location.
• Music: Diegetic and non-diegetic music in the film.
• Good sound design adds depth, feeling and emotion to a picture.
• You can add details the audience can't see.

The Task

We were then given a sound design task. The task involved taking a silent clip from a film and then adding all the sound back in using sound effects. We were given a clip that had already had the sound removed, so we had to use the visuals to work out how it might sound.

I started by taking the clip into Premiere and then adding cuts on the track that lined up with the cuts in the actual clip. This would help me lengthen and shorten sound effects so they cut with the shots. I then focused on atmos first. I used the YouTube Audio Library to find atmosphere sound effects that I thought worked with the scene. Once I had insert all my atmos, I moved onto foley. I started by using sfx to create footsteps. There was a lot of walking in the scene and that's why I focused on this first. I then went through and added in FX. For example, I added in the sound of a phone ringing just before the man in the scene answers his phone.

I then went through all the sound layers and messed with the balance and volume of each sound so it fitted into the scene. I wanted to add depth, and messing with these settings helped achieve that.

Here is the final product:

If I were to continue working on this, I would work on improving the footsteps. I would also think about adding in dialogue and maybe so music, to give the scene a meaning and add some more tension.

I found the project very enjoyable and it made me realised how important sound design is. For this project I will think very carefully about how I can use sound design to add some depth, feeling and emotion to my scenes.

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Editing Workshop: Final Workshop

For our final editing workshop we put all the skills we had learnt to the test and began editing together some of the footage we had shot during the camera workshops. I decided to edit together the footage I shot during my final camera workshop called "Crossing The Line".

I wrote about the process I used to edit this footage together in this post:

http://joshuajonesucatv.blogspot.co.uk/2015/10/camera-workshop-4-crossing-line.html

Overall I'm pleased with the editing workshops and I think I have picked up a lot of useful information that I can use when editing together my story-telling project.

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Editing Workshop 3: Fairly Legal

For our third edit workshop we began to look at editing clips that had dialogue. We used clips from a piece called Fairly Legal. The tools we had looked at previously were to be used as part of this process.

I began by looking through the shots to listen to the dialogue, look at the angles and shot sizes and to get a general idea of the storyline. Next I put the wide two shot into the timeline to use as a basis for audio. I then watched this take back and put markers on points where I thought I could cut another shot in. I then put together a radio edit by placing in the shots I wanted (using the markers for reference) but only lining up the audio. I did this so I could fix the cuts later and just focus on one thing at a time. Next I began to use the ripple edit and rolling edit tools to fix the cuts and make the flow of the video a lot better. I watched it back a couple of times to see if the cuts were very noticeable and then went back through to fix anything that different feel right.  For one of the shots (near the start when the female character is about to pick up the paperwork) I had to use the rate stretch tool to slow it down a little because the take was too short. I needed the character to pick up the paperwork at a specific moment and to do this I had to slow the clip down. Finally I levelled out all the audio (as some takes were quieter than others) and exported the video. Here is the final version:

I like the final product I got and I think it did feel like something I could imagine seeing on tv, in terms of how it was cut together. I think this session was a success.

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Editing Workshop 2: Delicious Piece

For our second editing workshop we began looking at some of the tools that Premiere Pro has and how they can help ease the editing process. We used footage from a short documentary type piece about fair trade coffee beans called Delicious Piece.

During the workshop we looked at a number of the tools and what they do:

1. Selection Tool: Used for selecting items on the timeline and for moving them around on the timeline
2. Ripple Edit Tool: Change the length of clips. Timeline jumps to fill gap.
3. Rolling Edit Tool: Edit two clips at once. Edit ending of one whilst editing start of another.
4. Rate Stretch Tool: Increase or decrease speed of a clip
5. Razor Tool: Cut a clip.
6. Pen Tool: Create points on audio clips where you can adjust certain values of it like volume.
7. Hand Tool: Move around timeline.
8. Zoom Tool: Zoom in and out on the timeline.


I think these tools make the editing process so much easier and I will use them a lot in the future. I am slowly learning how to use this software properly and I think I'm picking it up well.




Here is the final product from this workshop:

Even though this session wasn't really about what the video looked like I still spend some time thinking about how I'd edit the clips together. For example, the opening credit sequence was much longer than it appears and, so it would fit with the music and voice over, I cut it into three shorter segments and re-edited it together. I also made some decisions about which shots to use whilst the narrator was speaking. For example, using the map graphics whilst he was talking about the locations. Overall I am happy about the final product.

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Editing Workshop 1: I Think

I personally have only had a little bit of experience working with Premiere Pro, so this editing workshop was very uselful. For editing I normally use Sony Vegas Pro and I was relieved to find that the two programs do have some similarities. Also I have used After Effects a lot before and some of the keyboard shortcuts are similar.

For the workshop we had to edit together a collection of footage given to us by Ferg. There was no right or wrong way to edit it together, it was down to us to use the narration provided to decide how it should flow. This was my final product:

I cut the footage together using some basic transitions. I took inspiration from a film called The Taking of Pelham 123, in terms of how I layered the shots of subways trains. I put a few jump cuts in and added the jazz style background music, changing its length to fit certain points in the footage. I looked for certain cues in the footage, e.g. the character looking up at something, to help me decide how certain shots could be cut.

Inspiration: Taking of Pelham 123

Overall I was pleased by the final product and glad I had a chance to develop the little skill I had when it comes to using Premiere Pro. I hope by the end of these workshops I will be able to use Premiere like a professional.

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