Final Movie

Valhalla Rising Final Report

Overview

This project is demonstrating how sound design can add dynamic feel to the movie in the movie production industry. The project was carried out in several stages based on the audio production process such as planning, recording, editing, mixing and mastering.

The equipments used in this entire project were Marantz PMD660 field recorder , AKG microphone CK-91 and 92 , iMac core i7 with OS 10 , music production software such as  Protools 10 and Reason 6 , Reference monitor speakers (Sennheizer and ) and D-Command mixing desk . 

The movie clip was used in this project was the Valhalla Rising directed by Nicolas Winding Refn. The length of the clip was 7:00 minute.

Planning

In the planning stage, we observe the movie several times to identifying the element of sound that is appropriate for particular scenes, identifying the overall mood of the movie in order to design the sound track for the movie. Finally, we produce lists of required sound for sound gathering process.

Recording

We record different sounds from different location in Darwin based on the required sound list using the. Some other sound such as foot steps are recorded in the Charles Darwin University Studio Editing room.

Editing

In this stage, we audit the quality of each sound gathered and edit the sound by normalizing, trimming, and pitching, equalizing and applying soft compression. The edited sound then imported into the Protools and composed into different tracks based on the scenes time line. In addition, we apply equalizing, compression and gating to water drip sound to take off the low frequencies.

Adding special effects such as reverb, delay and stereo expander into three stereo buses mix and assign each track that needed.

Adding fades to impact sound to smooth the sound. Reversing some of the regions to get the pre-hit sound to some of the impacts.

Finally, we create a sound track using reason rewire to add mood and emotion to the movie.

Mixing

In the mixing process, we listen to the overall mix; apply panning and adjusting the levels to get the stereo perspective and equal level across the mix. Apply level automation to each track to add the dynamic flow to the movie.

Most of the tracks were grouped based on its characteristic and its purpose. For the impacts and hits were grouped into one of the sub mix. Similar to other sound such as mud, waters and music. This makes a lot easier to mix the overall mix.

Finally, the fader automations were mostly applied to sound tracks and some of the ambience sound.

Conclusion

This project is to design sound to add characteristic to the movie. In this sound design process, we follow the audio production technique to achieve our goals in this project. This sound design project has helped me in gained the skill in sound editing and mixing process using protools and compose sound track using Reason virtual instrument.

Sound gathering Process

Sound Gathering.
Most of the sound used in the Final Project are from the locations around Darwin.

Equipment :
Recorder: Marantz PMD660
Mic: AKG body with CK-91 and 92 heads
XLR cables and a small Stand Mic

The Sea Ambience , Rocks and the shore are from Darwin Beach in the City.

Mud sound i gatherd from the mud in the rivers and some from my house

MUS399 Final Project

Movie Clip Name: Valhalla Rising 1

Duration: 5 Minute

Mood: sad, horror, violence, cold, lonely, unfriendly, frustration, lost.

Sound texture:

1.   Organic sound (Water, Mud, Rocks, wind)

2.   Metallic Sound (Knife)

3.   Sound Effect: Dark low tone sound

Musical background:

1.   Slow Moving Synth Pad.

2.   Tribal music.

Scene	Required Sound Effect	Music	Sound to gather
Scene 1: 1. Boy Sit down and watch; 2. A man walks around offering water bottle	1.     Walking 2.     Drinking 3.     Forest Environment	1.     Bass Synth pad startup	1.     Footsteps 2.     Drink from water bottle 3.     Natural environment
Scene 2: 1.     A man flashing back the violence moment	1.     Hit impact 2.     Pre hit impact	1.     Building up Synth pad to metallic sound	1.     Hit pillow with baseball bat sound 2.     Reversing the impact sound to get the pre hit sound
Scene 3: 1.     Two man stays in the forest. It was windy and shower 2.     A man walk towards a boy 3.     A man holding two wet knives pointing towards the water.	1.     Wind 2.     Shower 3.     Metallic 4.     Water drips 5.     Walking	Synth PAD	1.     Wind effect 2.     Shower effect 3.     Water drips 4.     Foot steps
Scene 4: 1.     A man walks run in the water 2.     A boy walks on the wet sand 3.     A man Assembling the rocks 4.     A man nose down to water and breath	1.     Water 2.     Foot steps on wet sand 3.     Rocks, touching the rocks, sliding the rocks 4.     Breath on the water surface	Synth PAD	1.     Running in the swimming pool or sea. 2.     Rock, sliding the rocks, touches the rock. 3.     Human breath on water
Scene 5: 1.     A man walks on the grass. 2.     A man lay on the wet mud breathing to death 3.     A man hit the sword on the ground and knee down on the water 4.     A man approaching the wounded man on mud and beat him to death 5.     A man put his hand inside the water 6.     A man scrawl on the ground and digging the mud	1.     Footsteps on the grass 2.     Mud sound, deep breathing. 3.     Ground hit impact 4.     Water hit impact 5.     Hand on water 6.     Digging mud sound 7.     Sliding on the mud sound	Synth Pad Tribal Drums	1.     Walking on grass 2.     Animal breath 3.     Impact hit 4.     Impact in swimming pool 5.     Put hand in the swimming pool 6.     Cracking the Creams to get the mud sound
Scene 6: 1.     A man walking to assemble the rocks, the rock falls apart. 2.     A man beating another man in the mud 3.     A boy with a traumatized face witnessing the scene. 4.     A man stabbing the mud and with anger and fall into the water. 5.     A man assembling the rocks 6.     A man Stabbing the water 7.     A man sit in the water 8.     A man slide another man heads in the mud	1.     Falling, Sliding, and touching rocks 2.     Fighting in the mud 3.     Impact hit on the mud 4.     Impact hit in the water 5.     Calm water 6.     Sliding and in the mud	Minor scale Synth PAD	1.     Creek sound 2.     Cracking the creams 3.     Hit on the swimming pool
Scene 7: 1.     Red water sliding 2.     A man finishing assembling the rocks 3.     A man put out his head from the mud following vomiting the mud out from his mouth 4.     A man walks on the grass 5.     A man sit next to the running river 6.     A man breathing after finishing assembling the rocks. 7.     A man screaming in the river 8.     A man sitting next to the assembled rock with flies running around his head. 9.     Thunder storm cloud 10.  River and forest	1.     Touching and sliding on the rocks. 2.     Mud sliding 3.     Footsteps on the grass 4.     Calm river running 5.     Fast breath 6.     Flies flying 7.     Thunder sound 8.     River sound 9.     Forest	Synth Pad Synth Mechanical sound Tribal Drums	1.     Rocks (Sliding, touching) 2.     Cracking creams 3.     Foot steps on the grass 4.     River sound effect 5.     Human Breathing 6.     Flies Sound effect 7.     Thunder storm effect 8.     Forest sound effect.