Listen up! – the importance of audio | Perpetual Films
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04 Oct Listen up! – the importance of audio

Posted at 15:57h in Latest by

In an earlier blog I wrote about the unsung king of film-making crafts, the editing process.

Another Cinderella of this business is audio.

The Artist notwithstanding, audio is an absolutely crucial part of successful film making at any level.

So many consumer cameras boast of their ability to shoot fancy high definition pictures, but will still have some dreadful built-in microphone that picks up more traffic noise than dialogue and ruins the end result. Audio – whether it’s speech (dialogue or interview), music or sound effects – should be accorded the same care as pictures.

It’s worth making every effort to ensure that location sound is cleanly recorded and that real care is taken in the editing process to juxtapose audio and video as effectively as possible.

On location, specialist gun-mics or radio-mics must be used rather than any built in device. Even consumer cameras can have an external mic added on.

With music, the danger is over-use. Music should have a specific purpose in a film, not be plastered all over it like butterscotch sauce.

Take a look at this little film about the artist Charles Penny.

Sound effects, music and voice-over are carefully used to build a mood that fits the location and the artist. The pictures are lovely – but watch them without sound and they mean little.