[DN1015] Proposed Sound Design

“I like films where the music and the sound design, at times, are almost indistinguishable.” — Christopher Nolan

Following my treatment as uploaded onto the class’s Google Drive, apart from the voice overs, I intend to blur the distinction between diegetic and non-diegetic sounds in my piece. ** work in progress, not sure if it’ll work as intended**

Actual audio from the footages will be clipped out and mixed with royalty free soundtracks source online to create a completely fictitious set-up. This will juxtapose the only piece of truth audiences know of through the VCR footages. The memories of the past are real but everything else is a figment of Yuk-Ping’s imagination and the reason why she is not present as a figure in today’s time but voiced as a young child. 

Raw Unedited Audio Clip:

After sum Experimental Editing:

The piece progresses into a figment-of-imagination sort of situation as Wong Nam’s non-diegetic narration begin to bleed into a fictitious storytelling of nothing more than a piece of fiction. It is here where the audio of Maya and Kermit’s clipped conversation from Girl Meets World comes along as a reflection and a 3rd person insight of the strained relationship between Wong Nam and Yuk-Ping.

Current Pending Soundtracks
Emily A. Sprague – Sea Space (2:16) [YouTube’s Audio Library // Ambient & Calm]
Nate Blaze – Quiet Nights (2:05) [YouTube’s Audio Library // Ambient & Calm]
Dan Bodan – Neither Sweat Nor Tears (3:18) [YouTube’s Audio Library // Ambient & Calm]

 

Diegetic sound is a noise which has a source on-screen. They are noises which have not been edited in, for example dialogue between characters or footsteps.

Nondiegetic sound is a noise which does not have a source on-screen, they have been added in. For example music, voiceover, sound effects.

[DN1015] Revealing Emotion – GUILT

Being given the emotion GUILT to create a 3 shot story, we had a rather rough time at the beginning, trying to work out how we could portray the idea of ‘guilt’ as dynamically and as creatively as we could within 3 shots & 1.5 minutes.

Writing the script, we had multiple drafts throughout the ideation process due to various feedback sessions with Yue Han and in-group discussions. However, we were able to come together and work out 2 main plans for our work-place drama with JOSH and SAM set as our protagonist and antagonist respectively.

First Edition:


Idea: The guilt of getting a job that your friend really needed / needed more than you did.
Sequence of events: Present to Past

Title Sequence overlaid w/ News Audio of the 2009 economic recession

1st scene:
– Josh is drinking with his friend (/ a group of friends), he is in work attire and looks visibly uncomfortable while the rest of his friends are at ease and having a good chat.
– His friend makes a toast to him / congratulates him for being the first one of the lot to get a job. The group’s conversation gradually becomes inaudible and the VO of a phone call takes over. 

Phone call content (not happening at present time) – The company that XX is now working for telling him that he had passed the interview and has gotten the job. 

  • Location: Quiet Location (anywhere as long as they are gathered there)
  • Characters: Protagonist + 3-5 friends (depending)
  • Grp of Friends → Meeting to celebrate our protagonists success. They don’t know that our friend applied for the same position and failed.

2nd scene:
Josh is at work (an office worker?) while he’s working he gets lost in his thoughts and goes into a daze, perhaps he could look in a certain direction as if someone is opposite talking to him off screen. The voice comes from his friend who talks about how he wants to get a job as soon as he can so he can provide for his aging parents and young siblings. (or some sad backstory) A colleague snaps Josh out of his daze and jokes, “Hey, don’t let me catch you slacking on the job so soon.”
– A potential transition could be a shot of Josh talking to Sam who was listening to him in the 2nd scene. 

3rd scene:
– Sam telling the Josh about how he needs a job quickly.
– Sam rushing to the meeting/lunch and explains that he had to send his father to the dialysis centre. Josh asks the Sam what he’s been doing. Sam says he has been sending in resumes.
– Josh got the job for a while now but he’s still affected by the matter and is guilty.

→ VO to bridge the gaps between shots, it could also explain that our protagonist has some self-esteem issues: they don’t feel as competent as their peers + don’t mind taking longer to find a job. Therefore, the guilt sets in when they think they are undeserving of the job they got. An emotional angle that I think can be used to patch up any rough acting.


Second Edition:

Ultimately, we decided to put them in competition with one another, each vying for a promotion to be the company’s assistant director. With tension injected in the right areas of the plot and an easy to follow storyline, we were finally able to work things out!

1015 Guilt: version 1 w/ 2 endings (shot 3.1 and shot 3.2)
1015 Guilt Final

 

Though I am aware that our filming set-up was one that could be considered rather small scaled when compared to a regular production’s, but it being my first time on-set, I was really overwhelmed with all the equipment, what their functions were and how to operate them. I am therefore, really really thankful to my group mates Eliza and Sean who sped taught me how stuff worked and what I could do to help them on-set.

 

[DN1015] Gone Girl – Reflection

The film Gone Girl’s been the one good psychological thriller I needed since months back when I watched Se7en.

Amy is an extremely intelligent woman who is more than borderline manipulative as we discover through multiple deliberate stagings within the case at hand involving her husband, Nick Dunne. As the film progressed, we see Amy trying to take on this hyper masculine role to defend herself. With her new appearance and faked identity, Nancy, Amy takes on a Louisiana / Texas sort-of South American accent that we previously heard Detective Rhonda Boney have a slight hint of. The accent seems to take on an important but subtle role in the film.

Southern women are often noted for how strong and independent they are. Loving vibrancy and lots of colours, these women are opinionated and very independent. Think Ann Richards, former governor of Texas, civil rights activist Rosa Parks, singer and actress Dolly Parton and writer Zora Neale Hurston.

 

Amy is not your archetypical woman right from the beginning of the film. Her upbringing was of the middle-upper or even the upper classes and she had certificates from Harvard hanging on the walls of the kitchen.

From a plan that was in its entirety, delicately controlled by Amy to something that she loses her grasp on, the sudden turn of events also somehow seem mediated and part of her plan a, b, c, d as denoted with her post-its of different colours. It was even to the extent of planning months ahead and figuring out counter-plans if one were to go off schedule or unexpectedly. So as this independent and extremely book smart AND street smart lady who is capable of planning such intricate plans of framing another, she is someone not to be messed with. If I were to commit suicide, I’d be just like Amy, elaborately planning out how to frame someone or send people on a wild goose chase, making people’s lives a living hell of fun haha.

 

Back to the main point, David Fincher’s choice in camera movements really amaze me and the video down below summarises a huge part of it. It is often overlooked because of how minute and how slight each movement is but through either tilting, panning or tracking alongside the characters’ emotions and physical movements, he brings forth so much internal emotional dialogue the characters have to the audience. It’s as though we are able to see through them like a sheet of clear plastic. This in Gone Girl? Simply amazing.