We are going to present our rough cut to Brian and a guest he invited in the tutorial of this week. They will assess our audio work. Our group presents the start and the interviews finished last week. We also speak our assumption of the audio work and what we want to express, as well as enquire about some questions like what kinds of forms should we use, how do we better add the interview into the work, do we need add some transition sound into the each interview and etc. We’re glad to receive their suggestions, which are very helpful. They make us clear how to organise the structure of our work, which part is good, which parts also need to complete and improve, how to make the work more vivid and more interesting and etc.

The suggestion we received are as follow.

Add the sound of writing or computer typing to show the person is studying or working. This idea is really good. The sound of computer typing is very interesting but the sound of writing is not very clear, which make audiences feel its empty or the work starts so slowly. May be we can add some our own words in that part to reveal the person is studying like monologue.

Make it more like a story. Just like we apply the sudden appeared notification tone of mobile phone to express the studying or working is interrupted and thus present the social media distract the attention of people, which fully embody our topic: “how do social media effect your productivity”

Don’t put all interviews together. Too long interview may make audiences feel lengthy. We have interviewed 3-4 persons and we put them together in the rough cut. Hannah says that, “don’t put them all together. You should separate.” “You can cut the contents you do not need. The answers of some people are similar so you can separate them, cut and then integrate them in which the work will be better”, the guest recommends.

It does not have to determine the form is podcast or documentary. May be we can integrate them as long as make the work more interesting.

It does not have to determine the form is podcast or documentary. May be we can integrate them as long as make the work more interesting.

Add some special effects in the music at the beginning, such as change the sound from the left channel slowly into the right channel and then return it back to the left channel in which make the sound feel like run across ears. It will be amazing to use earphone to listen this part.

It is not too much content in the tutorial today, mainly including two parts: recording exercises and the application of audio editing software. Each group has two or three members and use audio recording equipment (Zoom) to take the recording exercises. The audio is about 1-3 minutes and the topic is “can I have your attention please”. Except recording, we also should add the background music when we are editing. We have recorded some audio effects when we are recording the dialogues. These are helpful to finish the last audio work.

After recording, we start to edit. We apply the Adobe Audition, which comes from a same company with the Premiere Pro. When the teacher is talking, I’m not very concentrated so I have to watch some tutorial video after class. I find that the audio editing is totally different from the video editing. It’s more difficult. You have to carefully listen every material and edit the imperfect part like length, quality, volume, remove noise, consider effects and etc. But these will make the person who wants to become the professional editor benefit a lot and build solid foundation. I have no experience about these so I need a lot of exercises to try the functions in the software and familiar the relative operations. Most of people will satisfy own work but if you are in school, the teacher will tutor you and you also can get the assessment from the professional personnel in which you realize which part is good, which part needs to improve, you can gain more experience and make better.

The important of the tutorial in this week still is the fourth project and we put our main concern on the audio effects. I just know there are various different kinds of audio effects, for example, background sound, over-voice and etc. Actually we know these elements before but we have never concerned them. In order to accomplish the project, we realize the importance of them. We list them independently and study them. Then, the teacher shows some audio works as example. Even it’s boring to listen the audio for half an hour continuously, I learn many things from them, such as the contents that the audio work tells as well as the audio effects in the audio works. I also find it’s fresh that only listen the audio effects without any addition or any visual effect. The sound of computer typing, the sound of camera, the sound of door opening or closing and etc, it will present very different feelings to match the reasonable plots or contents to these sound.

In this tutorial, the teacher also asks us to speak out the determined contents of each group and everyone gives advice about the contents. Our group received some suggestions, which are mainly about the question we proposed around the topic of “Attention” that how do social media distract the attention of people. Our primary assumption is that we will make a discussion about the social media and add some interviews that the answers of people about the question in our audio work. However, one said that, “your specific contents are to make a discussion about the social media, which contain positive viewpoints and also negative viewpoints. But your question directly negates the question, how does your discussion discuss?” This query really stumps us but the teacher provides recommendation to us. Change the early question into how do social media affect you in which we will not only receive more different viewpoints but also get great convenience to make the discussion.