Natural sound is all around us but sometimes it so subtle we do not even notice. We do have ever notice when it is not there. And in movies, sound technicians add a special element of reality to every scene by using something called Foley effect.
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Today were going to show you a scene that we have shot if we frantically arrive into work late as usual but we forgot to put on a microphone so we had to actually add the sound in later. We are going to show you the “before” and the “after” with our Foley effect. The term Foley sound comes from a great Hollywood sound artist, Jack Foley. Foley sound is not sound effects as some people think but recreating a natural movements of people and animals. We shot this sequence using different angles for matching, editing, pasting and timing and adding our music and audios things its works okay but it is really missing some key elements, natural sound.
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We tried matching similar sound effects on location, but re-interrupted by land mars, heavy traffic and sirens. When you are shooting for real sound effects you want the audio to be as clean as possible. Any ambient wild sound or room noise should be added to mix later to make the sound as distinct as possible. So, we went inside the controlled environment. Here, our sound effects mix or watches the video on a TV screen while trying to recreate the sound as realistically as possible. Be patient when you do this, you will have to try it several times to get the pacing, timing and mood just right. The shoes I wore in this particular day were soft soled and made very little sound even when we slapped on heavily on a concrete. So we cheated by using a pair of high heels. High heels are great sound effects tools and can be used for many things other than shoes. I have the usual of junk one would keep in a purse. Well, a video producer would keep in a purse, DVD, many DVD tapes and of course keys and coin. When I dropped the purse though, the sound would have been blended all together so he recorded each item separately to layer on our time line.
When editing place each effect on a separate layer to isolate the sounds so you can fine tune them individually. Even the walking or running sounds, place the left foot on one audio track and the right foot on another so you can move the sound closer or further apart to accurately match at each foot step.
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Natural sound can sometimes come from some unnatural places. You have heard of the tricks of using coconuts to simulate horse clubs. A person running on grass is nearly soundless, so try this tip. Place some shredded used papers in a baggy and crunch it together close to the mic. Other tricks from making natural sound unnaturally, bone snapping, twist dry spaghetti. Bones breaking break fresh or frozen celery. Body beaten, fill the gutted cavity of the frozen chicken beat it. A stair creek, use a racking chairs. Walking in the mud, walk your fingers across a socking wet roll of toilet paper. Wind, turn the bike upside down, place a part of a nylon fabric or wind break or jacket on the tire and spin the tire. To learn more about Foley and sound effects look up these articles in videomaker.
Real-time Sound Effects: Te Foley Way
www.videomaker.com/article/7220/
Audio: It’s Foley Time
http://www.videomaker.com/article/13515/
http://www.videomaker.com/article/10447/
Sound Advice: Random Noises
http://www.videomaker.com/article/10447
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