Research

RESEARCH ESSAY

Firstly you will need to demonstrate that you understand what foley is and how it ts into the production process. You will need to write a 700 word essay outlining the importance of Foley and techniques artist use to create the effects with examples. You should pick scenes from lms and analyse how they made the sounds for it. Highlight tips and tricks, as well as, what you should not do.

Foley, which is named after the sound effects artist named Jack Foley. Foley is everyday sound effects that are added to a film or video and any other media in post-production. It can be anything from the use of clothing, footsteps being squeaky to breaking glass to make the effect more real to the video. Some Foley art is too good that the it goes unnoticed by the audience.

The term foley can also mean a place, such as Foley-stage or Foley-studio, where the process of Foley is taking place. Foley is a range of sound effects that were originally taken for live broadcastings of radio drama in the early 1920s in radio studios across the world. It replaces sound that is recorded when filming on set at the time which can be known as field recording. The audience watching the many videos and movies should not be able to realize the the sound was not actually part of the filming process. It helps alot because in some situations whilst filming you may get sudden background noise that is not needed and there is no way of blocking it out. For instance when its a fighting scene its shot with stunt actors so not all the action noises are real it is often added with also explosions and crashes. Foley art can be broken down into three main categories which are feet, moves and specifics. Foot entails the sound of footsteps to make the sound of walking they use different techniques like the types of shoes they use on different floors to create the footstep sounds. These foley artists can be referred to as “Steppers” or even “Foley walkers” when they are working on the feet subject of foley. The moves make up more of the sounds heard in the film like the swishing of clothes when two people walk past each other. Which is created by using two pieces of material being rubbed together near the microphone. The specifics used for sound in foley can be the sounds of doors closing or doorbells ringing. In these videos you see how the make all the sounds from the footsteps to all the crazy action shot brought to life. I think it's pretty clever how they make all the sounds on point just by using two people knowing what sounds need to be closer to the microphone or not.

As you can see in the video they stop the film because they know they are out of sync with it so they tell the controller to rewind the film to the point where they can work on it again. You would think it would seem like a stressful job but you can tell with them laughing when they messed up that it's not really stressful it can be a fun thing to work on, i mean it really does mean something to see a whole film with all sounds made just by you. You can see how messy the studio gets after Foley artists have been working in it with all the random use of objects.

John Roesch is a Foley artist that has worked on films from E.T to interstellar on his business called Skywalker sounds, his studio was constructed just for foley to be happening in there. Digging up the floor to reach the bottom ground to make solid thuds for footsteps, also a pool of water to make sound effects with the use of water on different scenes for films. “When i go to a movie if the sound job is wonderful i get lost in the film in fact that's what we want, that's what i love about this business”

Although there's a lot of physical movement for foley and some people enjoy it, you can get some injuries from it like many cuts bruises, burns as many foley artists have said.

Many examples of the use of different objects to get all these sound effects were on The firesign Theatre audio play “The Further Adventures of Nick Danger”

Corn starch in a leather pouch makes the sound of snow crunching

A pair of gloves sounds like bird wings flapping

An arrow or thin stick makes a whoosh

An old chair makes a controllable creaking sound

A water-soaked rusty hinge when placed against different surfaces makes a creaking sound. Different surfaces change the sound considerably

A heavy staple gun combined with other small metal sounds make good gun noises

A metal rake makes the rattle/squeak sound of chain-link fence; it can also make a metallic screech when dragged across a piece of metal

A heavy car door and fender can create most of the car sounds needed, but having a whole car in the studio is better.

Burning plastic garbage bags cut into strips makes a realistic sounding candle or soft non-crackling fire when the bag melts and drips to the ground

¼-inch audio tape balled up sounds like grass or brush when walked upon

Gelatin and hand soap make squishing noises

Frozen romaine lettuce makes bone or head injury noises

Cellophane creates crackling fire effects.

A selection of wooden and metal doors is needed to create all sorts of door noises, but also can be used for creaking boat sounds

Acorns, small apples and walnuts on a wooden parquet surface can be used for bones breaking

Canned dog food can be used for alien pod embryo expulsions and monster vocalizations.

It is very clever the ways they make sounds for all these films and I love the way people enjoy the job of making Sounds for these films no matter how big or small the film is. Making my own Foley video was very fun and easy to be able to do for my college course I got to feel like an actual Foley artist and understand the ways they make the different sounds during this research.