Sound Theory

Sound Theory

There are several types of sound that are in films which make up sound theory.

Dialogue: The speech of a character when they are talking aloud, usually the voice is recorded on set and not a pre-production track.

Narration: A commentary over the film, usually to describe what is happening in the scene, seperately recorded to the scene and put over as non-diegetic sound.

Diegetic Sound: Sound that can be heard by both the audience and the characters in the film, these tracks are recorded on set.

Non-Diegetic Sound: The sound that can't be heard by characters in the scene however the audience can, this is usually music or a voiceover/narration.

Atmosphereic Sound: Ambient sound from the location, usually captured by a shotgun mic as it picks up loads of sound clearly.

Foley Sound: This type of sound is the reproduction of everyday sound effects where by the audio is enhanced during pre-production for more impact.

Pleonastic Sound: Sound effects put in real time to go with the scene for example a punching sound, or gun shot, and explosion.

Soundtrack: The music put on over the scene to go with the pace and keep the rhythm of the scene.

Microphones

Shotgun Mic

The shotgun mic is used for a specific area of sound and capturing the audio that's on frame, a muffler is used to minimize certain unwanted sounds like wind for example.

Lapel Mic

  This mic is used for recording sound on a specific character, it is usually hooked on their clothes to get good quality sound while still keeping the microphone hands-free.

Omni-Directional Mic

An omnidirectional microphone is used to record atmospheric sound, and record in all different directions.