Minor Project- Continued Research

Though audio seems to be the outright favourite, I want to find more and understand more about why video is the dominant output when viewers are concerned. Eric Lamontagne works in the sound department for many big productions in TV and Film, and was interviewed on this topic and I looked into his responses.

"Saying sound is more important is quite a statement! Many storytellers would argue that moving picture started silent and that audiences were entertained. That said, I believe I do understand the need for sound that supports the image but sound must only carry the story naturally."

Lamontagne believes sound is necessary to support the story, if and when its used. He goes on to talk about how many blockbusters now are overshadowing that with their visuals and it can take away from the storytelling. Of course there is ADR and replacement processes but Lamontagne likes to capture the best audio he can, on the day.

"It has been my goal to capture as much live performance on the day of production as possible, a personal and professional goal that I share with many fellow sound crews. At the end of the day though, my role is to do my best to capture the performances to support the story."

This got me thinking about silent films again, and how is the music and score that accompanies the film, necessary to support the story? In many cases the audio can add comedic and dramatic effect with its timing in certain instances. I believe this certainly supports the entertainment of the film, it helps keep audiences engaged, but does it support the story? This gives me three ideas. A silent film that is completely silent with no music, a silent film that is accompanied with random musical score, and a silent film that is accompanied with an original synced score.

The outcome of this will help me understand how audiences will rank the viewings of silent films, and if audio really does matter and support the story of a silent film.

"But for the most part a silent film was silent unless accompanied by live music. But was the music always there? When films were first exhibited commercially, in 1894, via the Edison Kinetoscope peepshow, they were silent. You peered down into the machine, paid your cent or penny, and thirty seconds of so of silent miniaturised action played before your eyes. Edison wasn’t happy with this, and in 1895 introduced the Kinetophone, an adaptation of the Kinetoscope with accompanying (though not synchronised) phonograph recordings. Yet for the most part people started seeing silent films silently."

From the early days of silent film, most of the audiences were seeing them silent and still enjoying them. For a time, unless accompanied by a live orchestra or such, the film you'd be watching was in complete silence. I want to find out why this changed. 

Sources: http://www.reelmarketer.com/interview-how-sound-is-everything/
https://thebioscope.net/2011/08/29/when-silents-were-silent/

When researching audio vs video, there is an absolute handful of books, websites and articles that are pushing the point of audio been better. This one is no different. But this one gave me new ideas.

Why Audio Matters Most for Audiences by DaCast.com goes with the argument that "our sense of sound is the most integral when it comes to communication, making audio an essential aspect of any broadcast." I can't debate that at all, it's a hugely valid point. Our main sense of communication is talking to each other, which for lack of a better term, is sound orientated. It only make sense that the easiest way for us to follow a story would also be through sound. 

The page goes on to offer a test to any readers that doubt their opinion. 

"Don’t think sound is all that important? Try this exercise: pick your favorite scary movie and watch it on mute. Meanwhile, play a nice, relaxing song in the background, or a comedy track from your favorite standup comic. Stripped away of its intended audio cues and music, which are designed to build suspense, tension, and terror, it’s doubtful that scary movie will have the same impact."

This exercise is a great insight into the modern horror film, that features too many jump scares and not enough actual scary footage. Although there are plenty of horror films known for their hauntingly visuals and films such as 2015's The Visit which actually as no score or soundtrack at all. I'm really interested in doing something like this for my experiments. Using some horror footage and seeing how much of the audio actually elevates it from just the visuals. Showing the clip with high quality video and low quality audio, and then low quality video and high quality audio, will show which of the two is more important to the production and the audience of a horror film. Then if in the future if any of us are making a horror film, we'll know to maybe focus or lean towards one because the audience get a bigger kick out of that one. 

Sources: http://www.dacast.com/blog/audio-matters-audiences/

Minor Project- Research into Audio Vs. Video

I've started research looking into debates and discussions of Audio Vs. Video to help me understand both sides of the argument, and where I should start and go next in my experiments and work. Many of the articles and videos I've found heavily lean towards audio been the dominant answer to this debate. Video Entrepreneur Magazine have an article that backs up the argument of audio been a higher priority than video. In their article "Audio is More Important Than Video Picture Quality" by L. Scott Harrell, he talks about how video picture quality is some what mistaken for been more important and gives tips on how to improve you audio quality.

"Most inexperienced video entrepreneurs make the mistake in the beginning of their careers focusing a lot on capturing the best quality visuals for their videos and, all too often, completely blow the sound." 

This can speak heavily towards students such as myself who are just starting out and developing their filmmaking skills. From an outsiders view, audio isn't talked or thought about much when discussing a film or it's production but its one of the most important elements, and If done correctly, its quality will go unnoticed because it's done its job. For many of us on the course, it wasn't until the editing stages till we realised just how important and skilful audio capturing is to the final edit of a film. Now this is not to say that you can neglect the video quality of your production also, but the misconception of a videos quality needing to be high for it to be successful just isn't gospel. L. Scott Harrell goes on to talk about how that even if the video component turns out to have flaws and be less than perfect, that with the right quality audio, that is clear and free of distractions, that production can still go on to be a success. This talks mainly more to the pre-production and production side of making sure you always capture high quality audio. The article however goes on to discuss the opposite side of this and how studies have shown that even if the audio quality of your production is just medium to marginal quality, then no matter how high quality or good looking the video picture turns out to be, that audiences are likely to react to the production as a whole negatively. But again, just another reason to be precise in your audio recording. The article is accompanied with a short list to help you capture audio better.

Tips for recording superior quality audio:

1. Voice-Overs are Easy and Reliable!

There’s no doubt that while shooting video and sound in an outdoor location, recording high quality audio can be quite difficult. However, with a little preparation, you can prevent a potentially disastrous situation. Perhaps your best option in windy or noisy outdoor environments is to record most of your audio track indoors, or in-studio, and simply apply it is a voice-over. In other words, you will be recording the audio off-camera separately in a different location and later add it to the video during the editing process. I know several very successful video entrepreneurs that don’t even bother shooting video and use only b-roll or stock video clips that they’ve either shot previously or have purchased online instead. They tend to focus more of their time developing a killer script and recording great audio for their projects.

2. Set Up a Sound Booth

It is best to record audio in a small, carpeted room with wall treatments (pictures, curtains, etc) in order to avoid a harsh sound characterized by an echo. If audio is more important than video for you then you should be recording in some sort of studio. When it comes to make-shift recording studios, closets are actually the best choice.

3. Be Prepared and Have the Right Equipment

If your video production requires you to record your audio and video at the same place and time, then be prepared for the wind and ambient noises you may very well pick up from the background. Try to choose a quiet location and shoot the video when there’s no wind if at all possible. Definitely use a dead cat, or wind muff, windshield which are microphone covers designed to minimize wind noise when recording in less than perfect wind conditions. Keep in mind that a little wind noise is enough to ruin your audio track and is almost impossible to edit out. With most camera configurations you can monitor the quality of your sound during or immediately after recording using a pair of headphones. They’re a pretty cheap insurance policy against leaving the shoot only to find out that what you’ve recorded is essentially garbage.

4. Get Close!

Getting the microphone physically closer to your subject ensures better audio quality, less background noise and better fidelity in your sounds. Although, a full length body shot may seem like a better option, the audio quality will be affected, since you will be far away from your mic. Make it a point to plan your outdoor shots at a closer distance to the camera if you must use a smartphone, iPad, tablet or other mobile device or your camera’s onboard microphone.

5. If You Are Going to Be a Video Professional, Use Professional Gear

Most of the microphones built into cameras are omnidirectional and record unwanted sound from every direction, the microphones in mobile devices like iPads can be even worse. When recording audio dialogue a uni-directional mic is really best. If audio is more important than video in your situation, the perfect situation is to use even a decent quality off-camera directional microphone plugged into a separate audio recording device. The second best option would be to use a microphone plugged into your camera. For professional video content creators and entrepreneurs running video businesses, we consider an external microphone a MUST HAVE piece of gear.

Source: http://vtrep.com/audio-is-more-important-than-video-picture-quality/

It's shocking to discover how much of a disruption bad audio can be to a film production. In the early days of cinema, quality was not to the standard to which we have it today. During the silent film era, the quality of the video was not incredible high, it would be grainy and somewhat shaky but it was very often accompanied by backing music. This might be one of the first experiences of filmmakers using good audio to attract and audiences attention. Silent films completely silent are not the easiest films to watch and keep your attention, but suddenly with the addition of sound and music, they become interesting and easier to view. If this was switched and a silent film had amazing video quality and low audio quality, even though its a silent film, I think the switch would be negative on the film. 

Raindance Canada uploaded a video to their YouTube account in 2014, showing their own example of why they find audio quality to be more important than video quality. He discuss how in some cases the bad audio can be forgiven in such a purpose of stunt videos where a man might be skydiving, the audio here could be forgiven cause its main focus is on the video. Vice versa with found footage films, the video quality is not high but thats to support the style in which it is been filmed. The video discusses how with bad audio, the content is hard to take seriously, insinuating that bad audio may lose you professionalism and give a sign that your work is not legitimate. The video ends talking about how you shouldn't have to choose but if you have to choose, maybe good audio is the way. 

Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-PLMiA18tBc

The majority of my research so far has strongly sided with audio quality been inferior to video quality, and have made very strong arguments to why. I want to continue my research into this argument and search more for reasons that a film might consider having better video than audio for a legit reason. A case where its more important to its purpose for the picture quality to be stronger than the audio. So far my research has given me new ideas to what my experiment is going to entail, and to try and make it dig deeper than just the surface question. Hopefully finding some useful results worth reporting. 

Minor Project- Audio Quality Vs Video Quality

Minor project, along with dissertation, is the first module of our third year studying Creative Film and Moving Image Production. It's main aims as a module is to helps us focus on a single practice within the industry, and enhance and develop technique and skills within this role. It's a research based module primarily and helps establish opportunities in the future. This is also one of the modules that is heavily focused on the technical aspect of the course. My main area that I want to specialise in throughout my third year of university is writing, but this module I'd like to focus on something else, something that can match the aims and goals of the module better and more suited to the objectives, so I've decided to focus on editing for my minor project.

Specifically, audio quality Vs. video quality. On the surface this doesn't appear to be the most ground breaking area I could've chose, but with been a film student I wanted the area to apply to me as a student now and to be able to have instant results and effects on my work while still at university. It will also be going deeper than just audio vs video, and into editing software, and featuring more technical aspects that can develop and provide solid research that'll support my ideas throughout the module. From my basic research, there is already talk online about this debate, especially on the YouTube space, with content creators wanting the best audio and video quality they can get for their audience. There are articles online discussing the argument and we've also had quick talks about it in sessions and lectures, where the primary consensus seems to be that audio quality takes priority over video quality. An audience would rather be able to hear whats going on clearer than see whats going on clearer. If you can't hear or understand the dialogue, then you're struggling to follow the plot and it takes you out of the movie, no one wants to listen to horrible audio. Whereas if the video quality isn't good but you can still hear whats going on, it makes it a little easier on the audience and helps fill in gaps here and there. I want to be able to put this to the test. I want to experiment with audio quality and video quality to see which means the most to the audiences, but I also want to experiment with different types of genre and different styles of filming to see if this changes from what you might expect. Some genres may find it more beneficial to have better video than audio and this will be an aspect I would like to explore.

I'm hoping to look into how this affects styles such as found footage and audition tapes etc. Different methods and styles of filming but may reflect on how one area maybe more important than the other. The results from this module will help me determine how to improve student quality audio and video and boost it up to an acceptable standard, if not already, and also learn on depending what you're editing that maybe you should focus on one area more than the other, cause the audience is going to appreciate that more and altogether will improve better storytelling through the edit. The finished product of the module along with all the research and development will be a final 3-4 minute video featuring clips and genres with bad audio and good video and vice versa to present in front of an audience with a survey to gather findings. It will range a variety of genres and storytelling styles and will also include my efforts of improving low quality audio and video and trying to restore them to a high level, through the industry and my own techniques.