Sound - Influences

Introduction of sound

Sound refers to everything we hear in a movie — words, sound effects, and music. 

Sound is used in lm to heighten a mood, provide us with information about the 

location of a scene, advance the plot, and tell us about the characters in the story.

There are two categories of sound in lm: Diegetic and Non-Diegetic. Diegetic Sound 

refers to all those audio elements that come from sources inside the world we see 

on the screen, including dialogue, doors slamming, footsteps, etc. Non-Diegetic Sound 

refers to all those audio elements that come from outside of the ctional world we 

see on screen, including the musical score and sound effects like the screeches in the 

shower scene in Psycho. 

Sound effects can be used to add mood or atmosphere to a lm by creating a 

soundscape that accents or adds another layer of meaning to the images on the screen. 

Pitch, tempo, and volume may be altered to indicate how the lmmaker expects the 

audience to respond to a given noise. For instance, high-pitched sounds, including 

screams or squealing tires, help to create a sense of anxiety, while low-pitched sounds, 

including the sounds of waves or the swinging of a door, can be used to create a sense 

of calm or mystery.

The most interesting use of sound in a movie is the very absence of it: silence. 

At key points in a lm, directors may use silence in much the same way that they 

would use a freeze frame. Both tend to arrest the audience’s attention to highlight some 

action or change in story direction. Silence can be used to build up a scene’s intensity 

or to foreshadow impending doom. 

In recent years, special sound effects have been added to movies in order to heighten 

the lm experience.

Background music is used to add emotion and rhythm to a film. Usually not meant to be noticeable, it often provides a tone or an emotional attitude toward the story and/or the characters  epicted. In addition, background music often foreshadows a change in mood. For example, dissonant music may be used in film to indicate an approaching (but not yet visible) menace or disaster.

Background music may aid viewer understanding by linking scenes. For example, a particular musical theme  associated with an individual character or situation may be repeated at various points in a film in order to remind the audience of salient motifs or ideas. 

Film sound is comprised of conventions and innovations. We have come to expect an acceleration of music during car chases and creaky doors in horror films. Yet, it is important to note as well that sound is often brilliantly conceived. The effects of sound are often largely subtle and often are noted by only our subconscious minds. Yet, it behooves us to foster an awareness of film sound as well as film space so as to truly appreciate a twentieth century art form, the modern film. 

Here are a variety of influences of soundtracks that can be potentials for our own film trailer. We have analysed each soundtracks critically, explaining why it would be suitable for our film trailer and in which parts of the film trailer.

We thought that the 'Royals' instrumental was a major influence for our film trailer as it has an ongoing beat which would create intensity thoroughly between our different shots. Also, as the beat of this instrumental was at a fast pace and rhythm, we also believed this would be relevant towards the timing of our changing camera shots as most of our camera shots were quick snappy shots due to the minimal scripts of our characters.

We decided if this soundtrack would be most appropriately used whilst all the action scenes are showing in our trailer to emphasise the coolness of our characters and to some extent adds a feeling of seriousness.

We really enjoyed the sound of 'Do I Wanna know' mainly due to the fact that it would synchronise with the beat of the Royals instrumental above. As we didn't follow the typical trends of our key influences of just using one soundtrack and decided to mix a few we realised that these both produce an immense combination whilst played together at the right time. We also decided to use some format of indie rock music as we believed that this would introduce calmness in our film trailer.

We thought that the beat of the Mission Impossible soundtrack was also influential as it would typically make the audience realise that this film is an action film. However, this soundtrack would be inappropriate to be used for our film trailer to the fact that this beat would best used for shots which involve various action scenes such as stunts and fighting which are even quicker shots in which we lacked. Also, this soundtrack follows the trend of being used in many spy/detective films in which we don't want to mislead our audience in terms of the concept of our film. This would effectively remove the concept of maintaining a sense of coolness amongst our characters.

'Girl You'll Be A Woman' was another influence in which we thought if it was used, it would be used for a very short time at the ending of our film trailer. Precisely the start of the soundtrack which starts off with a very slow pace and sets a emotional response from the audience. This would be ideally used in the last shots between the variation of the two main characters at the very ending. However, this soundtrack wasn't substantially influential as many can argue it is too emotional and more appropriate for films which consist scenes of romance and love. 

We believed that the soundtrack used in the game 'Grand Theft Auto' would be ideal for the start of our film trailer as there is no violence revealed and this would build a feeling of intensity. This would perfectly suit the voiceover script as the aim of the this part of the film trailer is to express the lavish lifestyles and dominance of two main crime syndicates and not the 'dirty' scenes of violence and action. 

After finding a fairly impressive influence from the media products of games, we decided to follow this research and found another exceptional soundtrack from the game 'Driver OST'. We decided that specifically at 3 minutes 33 seconds of this soundtrack would be a could contribution towards our trailer production. This supports the idea of our film trailer structure of where we wanted to start of with a cool and calm setting where we express the lavish lifestyles of the two most powerful crime syndicates. This would work fantastically alongside the Grand Theft Auto soundtrack above and would also be perfect dropping to begin the sense of seriousness and violence as we believed we would stop using this soundtrack where it hits 4 minutes 11 seconds, where we could introduce a more upbeat and faster pace instrumental to match the structure of film trailer (eventually expressing violence and action).