READING & WRITING

The sound and audio design can make or break a story or film. I’ve always considered the musical scoring the audio design in a film, but there is so much more to sound design than music. In Animated Storytelling by Liz Blazer, she says the purpose of music as a theme establishes an emotion or mood in different scenes(Blazer, 133). Music and underscoring are so important in a film, but I never realized how much additional audio is relevant such silence and sound effects.

I recently saw the Oscar nominated movie Zone of Interest and the sound design provided the entire theme and message of the movie. This movie was about a Nazi family living next to Auschwitz during World War II. The movie truly had very little action or plot line but the sounds of the concentration camp in the background provided the message of the entire movie. It represented the lack of humility demonstrated by the Nazi family being unfazed by the horrifying sounds from their neighboring camp. This is a great example of the importance of sound design in a film.

The chapter on creating a world was also extremely interesting and creatively stimulating as well. I’ve watched many movies where different worlds were created but I never thought of exploring those worlds by challenging the rules of our own world. I think this graphic below is very helpful in asking yourself specific questions to establish the details in your film. From determining literal details such as the time and place to how a community is built and if the air is safe to breathe, Blazer identifies integral questions to create the most believable world in a story.

Blazer, L. (2020). Animated storytelling. Peachpit Press.

RESEARCH TO INFORM

This film, Zone of Interest mentioned above is an example of how the audio sets the tone and messaging of the entire movie. This movie takes place next to a concentration camp during World War II and the eerie music sets the mood of the entire movie. This is only a trailer which provides a small sample of the music. However, in the actual movie, there are many more horrifying sound effect that juxtapose the action. The movie even begins with a blank screen and only an intense and dissonant soundtrack to prepare the audience to use their ears instead of eyes in this film.

The beginning of this clip from the movie, In the Heights is another example how sound effects and music immediately create the setting of Washington Heights in New York City. The use of sound effects on top of the music also synchronizes perfectly and adds to the initial exposition in setting up the world of the film.

This example is a lyric video from The Notebook The Musical. I love how the text bleeds in and out and synchronizes with the graphics bleeding in and out. This theme is also used throughout their advertising campaign and I would love to experiment and try to make the text and graphics bleed in and out.

The Inception title sequence is a great example using text as a literal part of the graphic. I think the transformations from the text into graphics such as a chair is so innovative. The transitions from each title is very smooth and almost addicting to watch. They are also very appropriate to the theme of the movie which represents the sequence of dreams.

CREATE 

The Hidden Life of a S’more

This entire video was challenging to create in production and also post production. The most challenging part was the actual filming and getting the framing right. I had to do as much fixing as I could in post production to make sure the framing was smooth and consistent.

I ended up getting some new ideas while filming and adjusted my storyboards to create more of a dance story instead of love story. I also had many continuity challenges with using live food. For instance, I had the graham crackers break and it was challenging to work with actively melting chocolate in matching shots. However, I had the most fun in post production in finding the right music and syncing it to the action.