Research into Documentary Sounds

In documentary, sound is needed to match the image in order for the audience to understand and make ease of what they are watching. In the article Conventions of Sound, it says, 'Indeed, listening to many of the scenes of observational films without watching the screen can be a dizzying experience. Without recognizable sources in the image to anchor the sounds, we hear a virtual cacophony of clanging, snippets of dialogue and music, and various unidentifiable sounds, almost an experiment in concrete music. Freed of their associations to objects, the sounds resurface in their phenomenological materiality.' From this it was clear that when sound recording in Liverpool, we would need sounds that would match our image. For example, when shooting on the docks, the sounds needed would be waves crashing against rocks, seagulls and boat horns perhaps. So the audience could recognise and match one another.

To support this point I watched a documentary called Taming the River Thames. This link with our project due to it working around water and similar subject. In the documentary we are shown how a certain function works, in which we see images of above and below the water. Above the water we see a man looking down at the water with water reflections on him and the wall behind him. With clear and crisp sound of the waters wave. When under the water the sound becomes more fuzzy and exactly how we would hear the waters movement if we was under the water. Giving us the exact sound that would match the image.

Whilst researching audio techniques in documentary, I have learnt a tip that could be helpful whilst doing this project. This tip being, if there is a lot of unwanted noise that is hard to avoid whilst recording then make sure visuals are provided of such noise. For example, if there is a lot of wind make sure you get footage of trees swaying or in our case a good visual would be a flag waving on the docks.

Ellan Vannin Presentation

Ellan Vannin Documentary

Liverpool Sound Editing

In order to keep clean sounds for our Liverpool project, I used Adobe Audition to clean up some background noise that is unwanted in our recordings. By highlighting the section where the unwanted noise is we can then use the 'noise reduction' tool and then use 'capture noise print' in order to circle out the certain noise. Then, highlight the rest of the track and use the 'noise reduction process' which will then allow you to control the sound and tone it down in order to get a clearer recording of the sounds.

I used this same method, however the below Adobe images are from Nick Gosling.

After this you can go into pro tools and add EQ, which allows us to control the frequencies of the track and again use the sounds you want and don't want.

After using EQ you can use the compression tool in order to keep all the levels the same, so it is not quiet or louder in different places of the track. Such tools are used in radio to control volumes and to attract and audience to their stations.