As a filmmaker, you know there are several ways to manipulate your audience with camera angles, lighting, editing, etc. In the audio world, you have a great arsenal of tricks too. There are basically 2 kinds of audio in any motion picture.
The Greek word "Diegesis" means a recounted story. Oxford's English dictionary states "The narrative presented by a cinematographic film or literary work; the fictional time, place, characters, and events which constitute the universe of the narrative."
In other worlds, the world of your film.
Diegetic is the sound that is meant to be from the actual scene happening on screen like character voices, elements in the picture (cars, traffic, birds, etc) and music from instruments played on screen or from a radio or television (also known as "source music"). This diegetic sound can be on or off screen though it is always meant to be actual sound. Of course, nowadays in post-production, most of this is either created entirely by a sound designer and or sweetened by the mixer.
Non-Diegetic is the sound of artistic license. It's the sounds of commentary, narration, sound effects and the music soundtrack. This is where many purists have claimed that the use of such non-diegetic sound is articifial and contrived. Danish filmmakers Lars Von Trier and Thomas Vinterburg's Dogma 95 states "The sound must never be produced apart from the images or vice versa. (Music must not be used unless it occurs where the scene is being shot). " Of course Von Trier's Dancer in the Dark breaks these rules. Dogma 95 may be more of a publicity stunt like nailing your manifesto to the church doors. There is no question that music can heighten the mood, project emotions and stay ringing in your head as your leave the darkened theater to return to the real world. How effectively you use the music determines the level of "realism" and whether you even remember there was music in the scene.
Evoking Tension in Film
Tension is an emotion that is so effectively carried by the music in a film. Try watching any tense moment on film with the sound turned off and it's completely lost. I tried to watch the beginning of Monsters, Inc. with my young son recently. I had forgotten how scary the opening moments were - and my son has never seen anything scarier than Dora the Explorer or Maisy or Miffy. (Noggin is big in our house.) And as my son started to slink down into the couch, I reached for the volume to erase the scariness.
John Williams' two-note motif for the shark in Jaws still brings back terror to many. Flicking through the channels the other night, I stumbled on a film noir moment and the soundtrack was just chilling.
The Coen brothers' first film Blood Simple, scored by Carter Burwell, utilizes diagetic music as score and works extremely well. I didn't even notice it at first as the story had me so captivated.
In the final moments of the film, Frances McDormand's character is being hunted and is desperately trying to save herself. The music in the moments before this seem to be coming from her neighbor's window echoing through the courtyard. The diagetic then rushes up to the forefront building on the final moments. I found a clip of it in Spanish here on YouTube. The music I'm talking about starts at around 48 seconds in just before she breaks the light bulb.
Blood Simple won the Grand Jury Prize at the 1985 Sundance Film Festival. Not bad for a first film and shows how the use of these rather simple techniques, one can so effectively manipulate an audience. We'll be discussing more about film sound and music in future articles.
Andrew Ingkavet is a film composer and Head Monk of 300 Monks, an audio agency providing custom music services to film studios, ad agencies and more. You can learn more at http://300monks.com Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Andrew_Ingkavet |
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