Evaluation

Introduction

My project theme was the study of Foley and aimed to recreate sound effects for a movie clip by researching and using practical techniques and recording methods. With this in mind, my goal was to recreate sound effects of a professional quality, that would immerse an audience and make them believe what they were hearing correlated with what was going on on screen. By taking part in this project, I aimed to enhance my knowledge and practical skills and grow and learn from any mistakes along the way. 

My initial goal was to redub roughly three 1.5 minute long video clips with my own Foley to demonstrate my capabilities with the subject. I ended up choosing clips from Toy Story 2, Wallace and Gromit: Curse of the Were-Rabbit, and Lord of the Rings: Fellowship of the Ring. I expected to be quite stretched for time with all this and I was initially very nervous. I felt I had a lot to cover in seemingly quite a short amount of time and after filling a spotting sheet for my project I was a little bit overwhelmed by the sheer amount of sound effects I needed to record. Nevertheless, I proceeded forward.

 

Practical Skills

My practical work was very efficient in my opinion because a combination of previous experience with Logic Pro, and new researched techniques allowed me to progress through my practical work quite smoothly. I personally found recording into the DAW quite simple and editing different audio slices into the timeline easy too. I can now proficiently use techniques such as slightly fading in/out a sound or automation to increase the overall quality of a soundscape in a project. On top of that, I’ve become more proficient with effects such as pitch shift and reverb, thanks to my research on them. These effects proved very useful in many cases when implementing my sound effects into my work to make a convincing soundscape. Such examples include using pitch shift to adjust the pitch of my recordings for the rabbits and using reverb for when the carrots fall down the chute in my Wallace and Gromit clip. Additionally, my overall balancing techniques (in terms of volume) have improved too partly thanks to how I managed gain staging, especially in the later half of the project, when I changed microphones after learning about electret microphones. 

I did have a few issues with the DAW. As mentioned in problem solving, I consistently ran into the issue of my video feed freezing up making it more difficult to time my Foley work correctly without referencing my spotting sheet. I ended up having to restart Logic dozens of times during editing to (try to) fix this but the problem kept coming back. No solution was ever found to this which is unfortunate. 

I also faced issues with electrical interference and how grounding your equipment is very important. This skill can be applied elsewhere outside the studio too such as in live sound. 

 

Subject Context 

I often feel as if sound effects are overlooked by people studying audio technology. A lot of people seem very focused on the music side of audio technology but it has other applications to it too, Foley being one of them. In my research, I explored the history of Foley artists and the different techniques they used, leading up to the modern day such as how artists would use a variety of objects for different sound effects (a lot of these objects were vegetables). I discussed common techniques used by sound designers in the film industry, such as spotting sheets and different ways Foley artists will use objects to create certain sounds for a film. I think Foley is extremely relevant to audio technology, as it embodies the process of creating a soundscape out of nothing in order to help entertain. In this way it's similar to music. 

 

Research

I covered quite a lot during my research, reading a lot from the book “The Sound Effects Bible” by Ric Viers but I also consulted other websites such as “Foley First” during my project. The most helpful (a new concept I found out) in my research was spotting sheets. I was grateful I managed to research information on that subject as it helped me organise my workflow later in the project. Later on the project, I also had to research specific techniques for recreating specific sound effects including horse hoof sounds (coconuts) and carriage sounds (desk chair and a pile of wood). Researching effects also helped me enhance my soundscapes in the editing processes which increased the overall quality of my final project, which was in line with the aims of my project. 

 

Foley and Creativity Components and Audio Technology

A lot of my Foley work made use of my creative initiative. I found it quite easy to look at an action on screen, and find a practical solution to creating a sound for it. One example of this is for the pump machine in my Toy Story 2 clip. I was initially unsure on how to recreate this sound but upon further analysis I deduced that I could use a bike pump. But I then lost that bike pump and had to find another option. I found an old toy Nerf gun that worked perfectly for the sound effect. 

My creativity wasn’t limited to the practical recording side of Foley either. I factored in my researched knowledge of audio technology and used it creatively in my work. For example, I was able to make a metal box sound like a wooden box with creative use of EQ by increasing the gain of a low frequency bandwidth. 

Methods such as these were used extensively throughout my project and helped increase the quality of my project. This therein was in line with my project goals of widening my knowledge and using the new knowledge to create professional quality work.

 

Problem Solving

I dealt with problems pretty effectively. How I dealt with practical problems are listed on my Problem Solving page and each helped aim me towards achieving my project's goals. The subject I didn’t really discuss was my mental attitude. I was very, very nervous throughout 90% of this project and lacked confidence. On the practical side, I didn’t have to make any major changes to my workflow but nonetheless I had a lot of built up anxiety over the whole project. I’m unsure, but it's possible that this anxiety, particularly towards the approaching deadline, made me rush a bit on the details. As seen from the external evaluation, there were a few fine details that were missed. If I had calmed my nerves a bit and slowed down for a second I may have been able to include the extra details, and get around to fix what I missed. Either way, my final product is extremely good in my opinion. This project has taught me to have more confidence in myself and I should take that with me into future endeavours to create even better projects. 

 

Planning & Production

My initial timeline in my project proposal was optimistic but I definitely strayed away from it at several points. Yes, I finished my practical work on the exact day I planned to but I still had to cut off my final project’s clip by a few seconds. I think it expected more from me than I was realistically capable of, or what was expected of me. For example, I expected myself to do more feedback surveys which definitely would not have been realistic. The one alone took a long time to analyse. My feedback survey helped my evaluations but the write up analysis took a long, long time. I don’t think I could have done it multiple times with my fluctuating motivation.

Also, I planned to make a Foley pit during the Easter holidays. Pure procrastination got the better of me here and I never got round to it. It affected my capabilities with my third video clip a bit but I managed to get around it using the ambience I recorded during the holidays and creative use of Foley techniques when creating effects for the horse and carriage. 

In terms of additional planning outside the project proposal, I made use of spotting sheets which I found out about in my research. This proved extremely useful and vital when organising and planning my Foley work. It let me plan sessions out ahead of time fluidly and plan what objects I should acquire for certain sessions. 

Nevertheless, the project was cut short due to time restraints. I was advised right from the start that 1 Foley clip would be enough but I managed 2 and a half. That’s an achievement in itself. 

 

Presentation Skills

I feel as if my presentation skills were good. My website looks nice in my opinion, but there’s quite possibly areas where I could have benefitted from using more images to portray my ideas. I stated during one of my early reflective journals that I didn’t want pages that were just “walls of text”. I tried to include as many images as possible, especially in my research. I used some of Wix’s gallery tools which helped display groups of images in a pleasant way that could be easily navigated. Despite this, I think some pages such as the proposal page, and reflective journal would have benefitted from more images. Also, I should have been taking more pictures during my studio time. The last gallery in my Planning and Production page feels a bit lacklustre. 

On the subject of navigation, I think my website does a very good job. I’m particularly proud of the menu and submenu system you can see above. It makes it easy to hop from one page to another no matter where you are on the website, or how far you’ve scrolled. I also like the layout of my reflective journals with their individual boxes separating the months, and the individual tabs on the boxes taking you to each week. 

I think my communication has been clear throughout the project. Upon completing this evaluation, I may send the website link around to friends and family to make sure what I try to say in my work is clear and effective. Throughout the project I’ve tried to go into detail about what I’m explaining and, rather repetitively, been trying to link it all together to achieve the project’s criteria in terms of personal project goals and marking criteria. I’m confident that my written work is satisfactory, legible, and highly detailed. 

 

Evaluation and Reflection

I used thorough analysis of external feedback for my first Foley clip to help evaluate my work. I used it to be able to identify the weak spots in my Foley such as missing sound effects, audio discrepancies, unusual balancing in volume levels, and more. I also was able to determine from this feedback that the final product produced was very high quality with a majority of people saying it was better or on par with the original Foley work. I particularly learned from this feedback to pay attention to the very fine details in such projects. Doing so provides a higher quality and more immersive experience for the audience. 

In terms of written work, I’m proud of the amount of work I’ve got done. All the way from project proposal, to this final evaluation. I’ve written far more than I initially expected I’d be capable of. I feel it’s all relevant to what I’m doing and every word has its worth. 

I think having more confidence throughout the project would’ve helped me a lot. Less anxiety would’ve given me a clearer mind and prevented me rushing certain areas on the practical side.

My reflective journals were useful during this process. It gave me a moment of self analysis every week to help understand my thought processes and improve myself week by week. Just taking a step back for a second and thinking about what’s going on helped develop my workflow leading to a better quality project. I might start doing the same for future projects if they require it. 

 

Conclusion  

Overall, I'm very proud of what I’ve accomplished in the past few months. To determine the overall success of my project, I can start by cross referencing my initial project goals and outline from all the way back in February:

• Has my project taught me recording and editing techniques used in professional sound effects production? Yes, it has. Through my research and new personal experiences I have learned new tricks and techniques in DAWs such as effectively using EQ and effects to my advantage when making Foley. 

• Have I been able to demonstrate my ability to use these techniques in the development of my practical work? Yes, the final product and all the written work is extensive evidence of my demonstration of this. 

• Have I documented my methodology, problem solving, work progress, and processes? Yes again, everything major is documented. I showed a variety of different techniques used for my Foley work in planning and production and showed how I solved different problems in the Problem solving page

• Have I been able to produce a variety of sound effects made by me in one to three short video clips? Absolutely, and I would say a variety is somehow an understatement. I got the majority of my practical work done, only missing out the last few seconds of the final clip. 

• Was my work a professional quality, immersive experience? Yes, I’ve been consistently working towards that goal only missing out on perfection in a few areas and my final product has been received well, which is evident from the external feedback I received.

• Have I been able to grow and learn from my work by using self evaluation and criticism to help develop my skill set? Yes, the external feedback and my evaluation has taught me to have more confidence in my work and pay attention to the fine details in Foley work. My skill set has grown from the experience gained during this project

 

From this I can determine that the project has gone extremely well. I’m confident about this project and the quality of my practical work. My overall goal with this project was to learn, and enhance my skill set and produce a professional, immersive sounding final product and I think I can safely say I’ve achieved that. I feel a lot better about my work than I have done in the past and I want to take that confidence and use it to aid my development into a professional setting in the future. I think the next step would be enhancing my skills with balancing volume levels, EQ, effects, and mastering even further. Audio technology can be a vast and complex subject but it interests me a lot and has many different applications from creating cool sounding synthesisers with oscillators, to creating immersive soundscapes. I’m keen to learn more. 

Do I see myself being a full on Foley artist in the future? I don’t know. But it’s a lot of fun.