Designing a Movie for Sound by Randy Thom the Biggest Myth
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been integrated into the film as a whole. Giving the actors plenty of things to say in every scene isn't necessarily doing them, Designing A Movie For Sound their characters, or the movie a favor. Sound, musical and otherwise, has value when it is part of a continuum, when it by Randy Thom changes over time, has dynamics, and resonates with other sound and with other sensory experiences. The biggest myth about composing and sound designing is that they are about What I propose is that the way for a creating great sounds. Not true, or at least filmmaker to take advantage of sound is not not true enough. simply to make it possible to record good sound on the set, or simply to hire a talented What is Sound Design? sound designer/composer to fabricate sounds, but rather to design the film with You may assume that it's about fabricating sound in mind, to allow sound's neat sound effects. But that doesn't describe contributions to influence creative decisions very accurately what Ben Burtt and Walter in the other crafts. Films as different from Murch, who invented the term, did on "Star "Star Wars" as "Citizen Kane," "Raging Wars" and "Apocalypse Now" respectively. Bull," "Eraserhead," "The Elephant Man," On those films they found themselves "Never Cry Wolf" and "Once Upon A Time working with Directors who were not just In The West" were thoroughly "sound looking for powerful sound effects to attach designed," though no sound designer was to a structure that was already in place. By credited on most of them. experimenting with sound, playing with sound (and not just sound effects, but music Does every film want, or need, to be like and dialog as well) all through production Star Wars or Apocalypse Now? Absolutely and post production what Francis Coppola, not. But lots of films could benefit from Walter Murch, George Lucas, and Ben Burtt those models. Sidney Lumet said recently in found is that sound began to shape the an interview that he had been amazed at picture sometimes as much as the picture what Francis Coppola and Walter Murch had shaped the sound. The result was very been able to accomplish in the mix of different from anything we had heard before. "Apocalypse Now." Well, what was great The films are legends, and their soundtracks about that mix began long before anybody changed forever the way we think about film got near a dubbing stage. In fact, it began sound. with the script, and with Coppola's inclination to give the characters in What passes for "great sound" in films today "Apocalypse" the opportunity to listen to the is too often merely loud sound. High fidelity world around them. recordings of gunshots and explosions, and well fabricated alien creature vocalizations Many directors who like to think they do not constitute great sound design. A appreciate sound still have a pretty narrow well-orchestrated and recorded piece of idea of the potential for sound in storytelling. musical score has minimal value if it hasn't The generally accepted view is that it's useful to have "good" sound in order to On one hand, they tend to ignore any serious enhance the visuals and root the images in a consideration of sound (including music) kind of temporal reality. But that isn't throughout the planning, shooting, and early collaboration, it's slavery. And the product it editing. Then they suddenly get a temporary yields is bound to be less complex and dose of religion when they realize that there interesting than it would be if sound could are holes in the story, weak scenes, and bad somehow be set free to be an active player in edits to disguise. Now they develop the process. Only when each craft influences enormous and short-lived faith in the power every other craft does the movie begin to and value of sound to make their movie take on a life of it's own. watchable. Unfortunately it's usually way too late, and after some vain attempts to stop a A Thing Almost Alive hemorrhage with a bandaid, the Director's head drops, and sound cynicism rules again It is a common myth that the time for film until late in the next project's post makers to think seriously about sound is at production. the end of the film making process, when the structure of the movie is already in place. What follows is a list of some of the bleak After all, how is the composer to know what realities faced by those of us who work in kind of music to write unless he/she can film sound, and some suggestions for examine at least a rough assembly of the improving the situation. final product? For some films this approach is adequate. Rarely, it works amazingly well. Pre-Production But doesn't it seem odd that in this supposedly collaborative medium, music If a script has lots of references in it to and sound effects rarely have the opportunity specific sounds, we might be tempted to to exert any influence on the non-sound jump to the conclusion that it is a crafts? How is the Director supposed to sound-friendly script. But this isn't know how to make the film without having a necessarily the case. The degree to which plan for using music? A dramatic film which sound is eventually able to participate in really works is, in some senses, almost alive, storytelling will be more determined by the a complex web of elements which are use of time, space, and point of view in the interconnected, almost like living tissues, story than by how often the script mentions and which despite their complexity work actual sounds. Most of the great sound together to present a more-or-less coherent sequences in films are "pov" sequences. The set of behaviors. It doesn't make any sense to photography, the blocking of actors, the set up a process in which the role of one production design, art direction, editing, and craft, sound, is simply to react, to follow, to dialogue have been set up such that we, the be pre-empted from giving feedback to the audience, are experiencing the action more system it is a part of. or less through the point of view of one, or more, of the characters in the sequence. The Basic Terrain, As It Is Now Since what we see and hear is being filtered through their consciousness, what they hear Many feature film directors tend to oscillate can give us lots of information about who between two wildly different states of they are and what they are feeling. Figuring consciousness about sound in their movies. out how to use pov, as well as how to use acoustic space and the element of time, maybe one of them should be over in a dark should begin with the writer. Some writers corner. We hear his voice, but we don't see naturally think in these terms, most don't. him. He punctuates the few things he says And it is almost never taught in film writing with the sound of a bottle he rolls back and courses. forth on the table in front of him. Finally he puts a note in the bottle and rolls it across Serious consideration of the way sound will the floor of the dark bar. It comes to a stop at be used in the story is typically left up to the the feet of the characters we see. This director. Unfortunately, most directors have approach could be played for comedy, only the vaguest notions of how to use sound drama, or some of both as it might have because they haven't been taught it either. In been in "Once Upon A Time In The West." virtually all film schools sound is taught as if Either way, sound is making a contribution. it were simply a tedious and mystifying The use of sound will strongly influence the series of technical operations, a necessary way the scene is set up. Starving the eye will evil on the way to doing the fun stuff. inevitably bring the ear, and therefore the imagination, more into play. Production Post Production On the set, virtually every aspect of the sound crew's work is dominated by the Finally, in post, sound cautiously creeps out needs of the camera crew. The locations for of the closet and attempts meekly to assert shooting have been chosen by the Director, itself, usually in the form of a composer and DP, and Production Designer long before a supervising sound editor. The composer is anyone concerned with sound has been given four or five weeks to produce seventy hired. The sets are typically built with little to ninety minutes of great music. The or no concern for, or even awareness of, the supervising sound editor is given ten to implications for sound. The lights buzz, the fifteen weeks to-smooth out the production generator truck is parked way too close. The dialog-spot, record, and edit ADR-and try to floor or ground could easily be padded to wedge a few specific sound effects into dull the sound of footsteps when feet aren't sequences that were never designed to use in the shot, but there isn't enough time. The them, being careful to cover every possible shots are usually composed, blocked, and lit option the Director might want because with very little effort toward helping either there "isn't any time" for the Director to the location sound crew or the post make choices before the mix.