Sound

I recorded, produced, mixed and mastered the soundtrack using Logic, internal and external Synthesisers, effects and compressors. 
I started by watching the trailer through several times to get a feel of where the mood, dynamics and texture of the music should change to reflect whats happening on screen.

Arrange Window for the sound track:

I could watch the trailer at the same as I layered down the different SFX and long drones. I mainly used ES2 and EXS24 to create the bass and different filter sweeps heard in the drones and SFX:

I used effects such as reverb, delay, phaser, chorus, stereo spreading etc. I used 'SpaceDesinger' to create a similar reverb to what may have been made inside the Klinger factory. I used the EQ tools and ADSR envelope to create a cold sounding reverb:

For the drums/rythmic beats, I used an 'Ultrabeat' drum synthesiser which I heavily processed using a Compressor to create a hard, 'thud' like sound:

Finally, to Compress and master the music, I sent the audio through a Focusrite Compressor and Noise Gate. The compressor would prevent the audio from distorting or sound too loud. The noise gate would silence any background noise heard from any audio recordings by reducing the volume of the file when it whent below the Threshold:

Amityville Horror Trailer Sound Deconstruction

Sound Deconstruction

• Firstly voiceover of male protagonist speaking over production companies mentioning the area being out of price range with subliminal music playing as well underneath it.

• A montage plays with the voice over of a a conversation by the couple
• It’s all reasonably happy music till the estate agent mentions “A CRIME” then music changes, a drop then beeping like an alarm this links to the clock we see turning to 3.15am
• A gun shot is heard, mixed with the beeping then a voiceover of a news report, all mixed together creates chaos and isn’t clear. Gun shots continue infrequently as though he is killing them then and there. Voice over changes to male to suggest it was big news, probably national.
• Then you see a flash of the house, dark spooky and rainy. Music comes in to traditional choral music will long drawn out notes, linked with the rain and thunder.
• Children laughing modern horror, spooky
• Voiceover of main protagonist played of archive footage, piano music.

Silent House: Sound Deconstruction

• At the beginning and the end of the trailer, we hear the sound of the shutter of a camera which is used to break up the diegetic sound of the protagonist.
• We hear a number of sound effects including door slams and screams to keep the audience on edge during the trailer.
• A voiceover is used to tell about the story of what happened within the house. This is to inform the audience about the story but not give away too much. This voiceover does give away quite a bit of the plot though as the trailer is a theatrical trailer yet as our trailer is only a teaser trailer, not as much plot is needed to be shown.
• As the motion of the trailer becomes quicker; we hear a number of clock ticks breaking up the equilibrium of the film before suddenly we hear a number of clocks ticking sounding like an alarm clock. The number of clock ticks heard at the same time could resemble a nightmare occurring and suddenly it had stopped because of the "alarm". This is very easy to create & edit on a trailer as you can use the same ticking sounds but just lay each sound on top of each other to create one big alarm ticking sound.
• The trailer is constantly in disequilibrium as at one point you hear silence and then you hear sudden beats and sounds to create a cliffhanger before returning to silence again.
• We then begin to hear piano music playing which sound like a bedtime nursery rhyme which shows there could be a "light at the end of the tunnel" for the protagonist yet we realise this does not happen as once again the tone of the trailer changes.
• During the final scene we hear cries and screams from the protagonist before you hear an echo during the fade of the trailer. This is really effective as it can give a final lasting effective towards the audience. This effect is very easy to edit onto our trailer as there would already be an echo effect within the program we use to edit and then it can be edited to how big an echo we would like.

Chernobyl Diaries: Sound Deconstruction

• A big alarm goes off at the beginning of the trailer with sounds of alarms going off towards the end of the trailer. The first alarm sounds like a big panic & evacuation alarm and in the film we find out that this was a nuclear reactor. This is very relatable to our film as our plot is about an abandoned factory and can show the connotations of danger and possibly a bleak future.
• We then hear a voiceover of the description of the events that had happened during the nuclear explosion. Here, a professional voiceover speaker is speaking and to make our film sound more realistic and relatable to past events, we are using a news reporter as our voiceover to explain the background of the abandoned factory.
• Throughout the trailer, we hear constant diegetic sound from the speaker and the characters within the film.
• Sound effects used within the film includes screams (typical convention of horror films) and also the use of the shutter of the camera. This is useful in the trailer as it shows the transition between different scenes and also a sudden sound to give the audience a little shock.
• Towards the end of the trailer, we hear the beat of the music louder than before and also faster to show the change in motion of the film - this beat could possibly symbolise the tension within the group during the outing/could show how much their heartbeat is now beating from the beginning to the end. 

Paranormal Activity 4 sound deconstruction

• Pixelation is used a lot in the film to jump cut each section within the montage but is also used so it looks more like a home style/documentary video. Towards the end of the trailer, more pixelations are used to cut up some of the scenes and create more tension.
• At the end of the first scene, you hear an echo fading into the background to show it is the end of the scene.
• Quite a bit of the trailer is silent as it tends to put the audience more on edge, it also gives the film more of a cliffhanger with the trailer not being very predictable.
• As some of the trailer is silent, this means you tend to get more sudden sound effects within the trailer such as jumps and screams to shock the audience once in a while.
• During the trailer, you hear quite a lot of conversation to continue with the "documentary style" type film.
• In the last scene, as it gradually progresses, it gradually gets louder with more sounds to create more tension. You first hear whispers from the main character before starting to hear haunted sounds on top of that with that music gradually becoming louder before hearing a genetic voiceover which becomes the dominant sound to scare the audience. We finally hear a sudden bang of the door and a crash sound to end the trailer and leave it on a cliffhanger.

Whitechapel Gallery Visit

Our group had a few main concepts for our trailer but to research moreon these concepts and maybe even find some more new ideas, I decided to visit the Whitechapel Gallery in London. The exhibition on at the moment features a range of up and coming artists using sound effects and narrative to show art in a different perspective. The subject of political and social matters was also one of the main concepts of the exhibition which would help with our "context link".

As soon as I entered the gallery, you immediately hear sounds of TV pixilation and hung up telephones. Both sounds give the effect of confusion and show unanswered questions - this could be a good idea for our trailer because then it means the plot would not be revealed within the one minute trailer and gives the excitement of the trailer ending on a cliffhanger. TV pixilation also gives the effect of a sudden ending and this would make the trailer seem incomplete and make even more confusion towards the audience - yet we do not want the audience to feel too confused and lose the main sense of the film.

The use of narration was an important part of the exhibition. Normally in films, not many trailers use the effect of a voiceover or narrative well but some of the artists used narrative as a sense of power. Rehana Zamen used narrative with a pitch black screen to show effective sound is without the use of visual art. She used one narrator to speak and try and memorise the audience with her story - this maybe effective for a longer, theatrical trailer but for our teaser trailer will not work. Something that could be a good idea is the effect of layered narrative/voiceover. Heath Phillipson had the idea of "construction and deconstruction of narrative through the spoken word". She then layered these spoken word voiceovers to give an effect of someone speaking having more power - this could be effective in our trailer as a few small layered sounds within the trailer could make the audience feel delusional and put in a trance.

Sound Effects

Sound effects are used constantly within film and other parts of media to emphasise the content in that part of media. Though in terms of film, there are different types of sound effects including:

Hard sound effects: sounds that you would hear commonly in real life e.g. door slams, cars driving by.
Background sound effects: these sounds give an indication to the audience about the setting of the film. Background sound effects can also be used to set the atmosphere within the film.
Foley sound effects: sounds that synchronise on screen e.g. footsteps
 

Hung telephones – the sound of a hung up telephone is also another effect which can give a sense of uncertainty within the atmosphere and could be effective at the end of a film trailer as it could leave on a cliffhanger.

Pixelation – pixilation tends to be used to blur a part of a video or image and is usually used for censorship. Yet for film, it can give the effect of something which has suddenly stopped. The audience get the feeling of something broken and maybe a sense of “what’s going on” depending on the atmosphere. Pixelations can also be used in a clever way to mark a victim/villain in a trailer to give the film a sense of uncertainty and persuade the audience to see the film.

 

Screams – these are a very common sound effect used in horror films, with the two most popular and known screams (Wilhelm and howie) being used in numerous amount of films right now. Screams are often heard when an event such as a death or explosion happens or when someone is genuinely shocked at something. As these do tend to be the most common sound effect used, if we were to try and use something a bit more effective and unique sound effect to give the audience a shock, this shouldn’t be the one to use as it could make the trailer sound a little bit unpredictable.