Project 3 reflection

Audio editing

This is a continuation of my reflection but focuses on the problems i had with audio editing.

Audio quality is a very important element in any video production, especially documentaries with interviews because they rely almost entirely on the clarity of speech.

The first problem i had with audio was at the recording location. I recorded the atmos track and noticed there was a small amount of noise despite it being a very quite room. I knew i could fix this in audition so dismissed it. I wasn’t  using a Zoom H2n and i should have borrowed one, but i thought using a friends new Rode shotgun mic would work just fine and cut most of the noise out.

When actually editing the audio I quickly realised the kerfuffle I was in. I captured a ‘noise print’ from the atmos track, then deducted the noise using the ‘noise reduction’ tool in Audition. Unfortunately by doing this it also cut out a lot of the harmonics and made the audio the sound as if it was being listened to though a long tube (like heavy compression on the internet). I applied a few different EQ’s (echoes as well) to beef up the low and high frequencies but it had minimal effect.

As you can see in the above picture, the top right red audio wave was the before noise reduction, underneath is the is after reduction. The purple speckles have been totally removed giving ‘clean’ audio.

So i decided to hide the lost harmonics using music. I had always had the intention of using music to build the sequence but now it was even more important for ‘fixing’ the mediocre interview recordings.

Firstly i placed two music tracks (one ambient) underneath the entirety of the film. The music was integral to the pacing of the video as well as the delivery of the interviewees speech. As a result it would be hard to understand everything that was said on the first and second viewing of the film. I picked up on the illegibility while editing but couldn’t see the extent of it because I had been working with the same audio of many hours.

I did test the audio with headphones on and off  but i didn’t find the right balance between them. I could have added subtitles to the bottom of the video but it would have taken the audience out of the film instead of immersing them.
Reflecting on this project i wish i had of borrowed the Zoom h2N. In future projects i will record on two audio devices just so i have a backup recording

http://www.mediafactory.org.au/alexander-wilson/2016/04/19/head-trauma-project-3-documentary

In my last reflection I said I wanted to pull away from lo-fi aesthetics ad themes. I always had this intention. Now with Project 3 completed I feel like I have succeeded in making something a bit more beautiful.

So how did the portrait turn out? Pretty good.
I was happy overall and with the general flow of the film. It does have a certain momentum throughout. It has distinct peaks. It has a resolution. A climax as well. But one thing I will take away from this is a new profound respect for people who create documentaries. It’s bloody hard, tedious and tiresome. I spent so long going though the footage, cutting and positioning them to make sense of what I actually had.

Cuttings the easy bit. The hardest part is finding the best clip, out of the many. What makes it harder is that I have a particular OCD (self diagnosed but not that serious) with this kind of stuff I HAD to make sure I had the right piece of footage. I would often lose things throughout the premiere timeline and have to skim though every sound bite until I found the one that’s in my head.

Another thing I found hard, which I assume everyone else was experiencing, was trying to fit the story in 3minutes. I believe this is impossible to achieve (in most cases) if the story is to maintain its integrity. There were really important aspects in Ed’s journey that I couldn’t fit in. While the portrait still holds together, if I just had another minute of runtime the whole vibe of the video would be very different. But because there was such a hard constraint it forces your to decide what’s actually important, and what isn’t.

Seperate reflection on the audio composition

One thing I think I did well on the video was the incorporation of multiple storylines. There’s the story of the fish in the dirty tank then to the clean tank at the end, symbolising Eds positive outlook and reflection on the traumatic event. There’s the storyline of the invincible man which complements Eds story;

Zapped with electricity -> Eds seizure and coma

Waking up -> Ed Waking up

Confusion when waking up -> Eds confusion of the Clay woman

Indestructible man being helped to the bed -> Ed realizing the severity

I feel like harmony and closure of the plot was complimented thought this process.
I’m actually really interested in dream sequences so deciding to interview Ed was a no brainer (Disclaimer Eds also a good friend). For my VCE media video I tackled similar concepts of consciousness but because this is a real story I had to stick to it. I filmed all the B-roll in 60fps so in post-production I could slow it down to give it the ‘dream’ aesthetic. Fading the dark shots over each other and applying blend modes created some great transitioning. The RGB split represented Ed slowly falling into the coma. On all the shots I also added a blurriness to further the dream aesthetic

I purposefully didn’t show Ed talking till the pace shift (where the music changes). I wanted the audience to feel as though they were watching a story unfold. Then forced them into current time by showing Ed now, talking to the camera. I only revealed darkened glimpses of Ed in the bathroom to heighten feelings in the pace shift. I do worry that some of the narration is hard to understand and hear properly.

This project went a lot smoother than the last, mainly because I had to organise the interview at least a week before the deadline. I slowly chipped away at it. Although I spent all of yesterday working on this I am very happy with the outcome.