1. AUDIO
1. Basic physics of Sound
2. Types of Sound
3. Reception: Modes of Listening
4. Sound Art
5. Recorded sound
6. Audio Examples

2. What is sound?
• It is basically a pattern formed in
the vibration or movement of
molecules of air.

3. What is sound?
• It is basically a pattern formed in
the vibration or movement of
molecules of air.
• When a sound is made, air
molecules move out from the
source in waves

4. • When a sound is made, air molecules
move in waves

5. • The waves radiate out 360 degrees and
in 3 dimensions from the source until it
dissipates

6. • When a sound is made, air molecules
move in waves
• The waves radiate out 360 degrees
from the source until it dissipates
• Analogous to a drop of water in a pool

7. • Sound is intentional vs. noise which is
unwanted or unintentional

8. In very general terms, a sound wave has
two important characteristics:
»Intensity
»Pitch

9. INTENSITY
• Intensity = wave amplitude = volume
= loudness
• This is a measurement of the height of
the sound wave

10. • Measured in decibels = dB
• The human ear responds to a great range of
sound intensities from 0dB (threshold of
hearing) to 135dB (the threshold of pain)
• VU meter in sound production is a volume
unit measure

11. Typical Sound Levels
•
•
•
•
•
•
Jet aircraft taking off………..…..125 dB
Rock concert……………………120 dB
Heavy traffic……………………. 90 dB
Interior of a car @ 40mph………. 80 dB
Normal conversation……………. 60 dB
Broadcast studio………………… 20 dB

12. PITCH
• = Frequency
• Refers to the characteristic of the
sound

13. PITCH
• = Frequency
• Refers to the characteristic of the
sound
• For example we talk about women’s
voices being a higher pitch than a
man’s voice or a violin is higher
pitched than a cello

14. PITCH
It is NOT a difference in loudness
(amplitude) but of tonal quality

15. PITCH
• It is NOT a difference in loudness
(amplitude) but of tonal quality
• Pitch refers to how often the wave
repeats itself in one second.
• Each complete pattern of the wave is
called a cycle

16. PITCH
• Measured in the number of cycles per
second = Hz
• The lower the number the deeper or more
bass the sound
• a frequency of 20 Hz would sound like a
very low note on a pipe organ - almost a
rumble
• 20 - 20000 Hz covers most audible
frequencies

17. Temporal Terms
• a sound or sound event has a structure
and a temporality

18. Temporal Terms
• a sound or sound event has a structure
and a temporality
• the initiation of the sound is called the
attack

19. Temporal Terms
• a sound or sound event has a structure
and a temporality
• the initiation of the sound is called the
attack
• this is followed by a sustain: How long
is it held? How long is it at full
volume?

20. Temporal Terms
• a sound or sound event has a structure
and a temporality
• the initiation of the sound is called the
attack
• this is followed by a sustain: how long
is it held? How long is it at full
volume?
• finally the sound fades away = decay

21. Temporal Terms
• These 3 stages are parts of the
sound envelope and apply to any and all
sounds

22. Canadian composer, artist
R. Murray Schafer
In his book Voices of Tyranny: Temples of
Silence, 1993 is an essay called “I’ve never
seen a sound” with some wonderful
thoughts:

23. No sound can be repeated exactly Not
even your own name. Every time it is
pronounced it will be different. And a
sound heard once is not the same as a
sound heard twice, nor is a sound
heard before the same as a sound
heard after.

24. Every sound commits suicide and never
returns. Musicians know this. No
musical phrase can be repeated exactly
the same way twice.

25. Sounds cannot be known the way sights
can be known. Seeing is analytical and
reflective. It places things side by side
and compares them (scenes, slides,
diagrams…). This is why Aristotle
preferred sight as “the principle
source of knowledge”.

26. There is no silence for the living.
We have no earlids.
We are condemned to listen.

27. Everything in this world has its sound even silent objects. We get to know
silent objects by striking them. The ice
is thin, the box is empty, the wall is
hollow.

28. Here is a paradox: two things touch
but only one sound is produced. A ball
hits a wall, a drumstick strikes a drum,
a bow scrapes a string. Two objects:
one sound.

29. Types of Sound in Film
3 main types of sound
– voice
– sound effects
– music

30. - Voice - dialogue
- interview
- narration
- voice over

31. - Sound Effects • add realism to a scene
- synchronous: sound matches what we see
(ie. someone playing the piano, the sounds
of a piano are heard)

32. - Sound Effects - synchronous: sound matches what we see
(ie. Someone playing the piano, the sounds
of a piano are heard)
- asynchronous: we don’t see the source of
the sound (ie. the sound of an ambulance is
used as background sound while the image
portrays an arguing couple)

33. - Sound Effects Ambience & Presence
• Ambience is usually the background
sounds available in the environment
• can be recorded in the original production
• or it can be recorded separately and
deliberately added to the sound track to
provide acoustic space around the rest of
the dialogue

34. Presence
• a location’s “aural fingerprint” =
nonspecific sounds on the upper end
(around 2,000 - 8,000 Hz)

35. Presence
• a location’s “aural fingerprint” =
nonspecific sounds on the upper end
(around 2,000 - 8,000 Hz)
• each room has a distinct presence of subtle
sounds

36. Presence
• a location’s “aural fingerprint” =
nonspecific sounds on the upper end
(around 2,000 - 8,000 Hz)
• each room has a distinct presence of subtle
sounds

37. Presence
• provides a continuous sounding background
• may smooth pauses in dialogue and give the
feeling of life in a deadened studio
recording
>> otherwise we would perceive there to be a
failure of the sound system

38. - Music • background music adds emotion and
rhythm

39. - Music • background music adds emotion and
rhythm
• not meant to be noticeable

40. - Music • background music adds emotion and
rhythm
• not meant to be noticeable
• provides a tone or emotional attitude toward
the story and/or the characters depicted

41. - Music • background music adds emotion and
rhythm
• not meant to be noticeable
• provides a tone or emotional attitude toward
the story and/or the characters depicted
• could foreshadow an event, an approaching
menace, etc.

42. - Music • background music adds emotion and rhythm
• not meant to be noticeable
• provides a tone or emotional attitude toward the
story and/or the characters depicted
• could foreshadow an event, an approaching
menace, etc.
• can be used to links scenes (ie. a motif for a
particular character)

43. French sound
theorist
Michel Chion has
described
3 Modes of
Listening

44. • CAUSAL
• SEMANTIC
• REDUCED

45. - CAUSAL • the most common form consists of listening
to a sound in order to gather information
about its cause (or source)
• the source can be visible or invisible with
similar effects on us
• think of a phone ringing…it can be in the
scene or “off screen”

46. - CAUSAL • can also be more ambiguous in that what we
recognize is only the general nature of the
sound’s cause
• for instance we may (unconsciously) tell
ourselves “that must be a mechanical
sound” or “that must be some human”, etc.

47. - SEMANTIC LISTENING • refers to a code or a language to interpret a
message: spoken language as well as other
kinds of codes
• it is something we interpret in aid of the
narrative
• a spoken word is not abstract…it has a
linguistic meaning regardless of tone or
accent

48. - REDUCED LISTENING • a mode of listening that focuses on the traits
of the sound itself, independent of its cause
or its meaning

49. - REDUCED LISTENING • a mode of listening that focuses on the traits
of the sound itself, independent of its cause
or its meaning
• it takes the sound -- verbal, musical, sound
effects or whatever -- as itself the object to
be observed instead of as a vehicle for
something else

50. - REDUCED LISTENING • The descriptive inventory of a sound can’t
be understood in one listening
• - often used for ambience or presence or
more unconscious effects
• - very important in relation to “Sound Art”

51. Sound Art
• Made by artists whose
materials include physical
media, sound, and
environments.

52. Sound Art
• Sound artists tend to be poorly
represented by the modes of discourse
that seem satisfactory for "pure"
musical or visual art
• They are poorly represented by the
forms of presentation available

53. • There are an infinite number of concerns,
methods, styles and approaches
• Some sound artists work with their sound
physically, allowing the physical contact
with materials to influence their choices.
Their work is a dialogue between the creation
of physical objects and the sound generated
by those objects.

54. • Because sound art falls between musical
and visual realms, approaches to the
materials can incorporate what the artist
desires from either tradition
• For example Robert Racine’s Sound
Signatures that uses the recording of the
sound of 22 signatures

55. • Johan Goedhart has created installations using
large amounts of computer printers continuously
printing.
• In addition to spitting out reams of paper which
was eventually fed back through the printers, the
sounds generated were processed and made
audible again through various media.
• The choice of documents to be printed in such
an installation then becomes a compromise
between the visual and audible output from the
printers.
• The sound is a direct result of the artist's choice
of physical materials.

56. • While others are interested in responding to
mediated sound events through appropriation,
sampling, re-recording and digital modification
of those events
• For instance the work of V. Michael (aka The
Spacewurm) uses modified police scanners,
intercepts cell and cordless phone calls and
digital messaging systems
• Or Fred Szymanski whose sources for Feeder
#8 are computer-generated cycles of feedback
sounds from computers themselves…spinning
hard-drives, etc.

57. • Others are interested in using language to
break down semantic listening modes or to
build on them
• Such as dub poet Pamela Z’s Geekspeak
• Or highly conceptual works like Brandon
LaBelle’s use of Roland Bathes writing in
Topophony of the Text

58. Sound Art & Space
• Sound artists attempt to create environments as a
sculptor might, but which are animated with
sound. Some of them create sound sources which
highlight architectural features, some deal with
concepts of room acoustics.
• In addition to altering aspects of physical spaces
which we inhabit, some sound artists present
sounds from foreign spaces where we have never
been

59. • these may be imaginary, created spaces or spaces
inside objects and bodies.
• Alvin Lucier's Music for Solo Performer amplifies
brain waves
• John Cage and David Tudor amplified a variety of
internal sounds from plants and machines
• Richard Lerman also has created a large body of
work dealing with internal sounds of unexpected
objects, like bridges, plants
• They are exploring and exploding concepts of the
transmission of sound through different media

60. Remember...
• That sound is a spatial and temporal event
• Techniques of recording, reproduction,
intervention and even the mode of output,
will all impact its spatial and sonic qualities.
• Try to capitalize on this in your project

61. Remember...
• ...that sound often has not just one, pure
source but at least two...three... and even
more.

62. Remember...
• ...that sound often has not just one, pure
source but at least two...three... and even
more.
• for instance as I am typing these notes,
there is the sound of my fingers on the keys,

63. Remember...
• ...that sound often has not just one, pure
source but at least two...three... and even
more
• for instance as I am typing these notes,
there is the sound of my fingers on the keys,
my watch hitting the table

64. Remember...
• ...that sound often has not just one, pure
source but at least two...three... and even
more
• for instance as I am typing these notes,
there is the sound of my fingers on the keys,
my watch hitting the table, my breathing

65. Remember...
• ...that sound often has not just one, pure
source but at least two...three... and even
more
• for instance as I am typing these notes,
there is the sound of my fingers on the keys,
my watch hitting the table, my breathing
and incidental sounds such as the
ventilation, the clock ticking and so on

66. MICROPHONE BASICS
• there are different types of microphones, but they
all do the same thing
• they transform acoustical movements (the
vibrations of air created by the sound waves) into
electrical vibrations. This conversion is relatively
direct and the electrical vibration can then be
amplified, recorded, or transmitted.

69. TYPES
• Deciding on kind of microphone to use
depends on what you want and where you
are recording

70. • Omni will pick up sound 360 degrees around it
therefore doesn’t emphasize any one direction or
location
• Cardiod will not pick up very much sound from
behind it. Used for concerts, speeches, lapel mic
• Shotgun microphone will pick up the voices of
the talent with a comfortable amount of the
surrounding ambient sound. Unlike the sterile,
close mic'd sound that is typical with a lavaliere
microphone, the shotgun mic usually exhibits a
fuller, richer and more pleasing sound quality.

71. REALISM?
• Live sound is very different than recorded
sound
• In real life we are marvelously able to cut
out (from our hearing) any extraneous
sounds and focus on single sounds…

72. REALISM?
• Live sound is very different than recorded
sound
• In real life we are marvelously able to cut
out (from our hearing) any extraneous
sounds and focus on single sounds…
• Imagine a noisy party in which you are
having a conversation with one person…

73. REALISM?
• This process of selective listening is
actually known as the Cocktail Party Effect

74. REALISM?
• This process of selective listening is
actually known as the Cocktail Party Effect
• This becomes very difficult to do as a
listener of recorded material… that’s where
audio editing comes in…

75. REALISM?
• This process of selective listening is
actually known as the Cocktail Party Effect
• This becomes very difficult to do as a
listener of recorded material… that’s where
audio editing comes in…you must mimic
how we hear and that requires re-creating or
reconstructing HOW we hear.

76. Sound & Image
• They have a very complex inter-relationship
• They are BOTH illusions constructed
within a system of production
• We all participate in an audio-visual
contract -- one we learn in order to watch
films, videos, TV…

77. VALUE ADDED
• Is one of the most important relationships in
the audio-visual contract between sound
and moving image

78. VALUE ADDED
• Michel Chion states that Value Added is:
“the expressive and informative value with
which a sound enriches a given image

79. VALUE ADDED
• Michel Chion states that Value Added is:
“the expressive and informative value with
which a sound enriches a given image so as
to create the definite impression, in the
immediate or remembered experience one
has of it,

80. VALUE ADDED
• Michel Chion states that Value Added is:
“the expressive and informative value with
which a sound enriches a given image so as
to create the definite impression, in the
immediate or remembered experience one
has of it, that this information or expression
“naturally” springs from what is seen.

81. VALUE ADDED
• Gives the (eminently incorrect) impression
that sound is:
• 1) unnecessary
• 2) merely duplicating a meaning which in
reality it brings about, either all on its own
or by discrepancies between it and the
image

82. • Ingmar Bergman’s Persona (1966)
• We’ll watch the opening sequence twice.
The first time with sound, the second time
with no sound.
• Make note of the differences in how you
perceive the images with and without
sound.

83. Resources
 www.filmsound.org
 www.ubu.com
Michel Chion “Audio-Vision”