The human voice is used as an interview, narration and in dialogue in connection with moving image.
Narration is often used in films and animations, in advertisements, educational videos, documentaries and in video games, usually over a cut-scene. Narration in movies is usually non-diegetic – the characters do not hear the narrator talking. It is used to give the viewer a better understanding of what’s being shown.
Narration is often used over movie trailers and video game cut-scenes. An example of the main character’s narration over a cut-scene from a game called Diablo II – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2ki_0_NK5Qo Marius – the character – is telling about his adventures and experiences as the cut-scene is shown. I think it’s a quite classic way of using voice-over. Producers commonly use it to tell what’s happening as the film is shown.
Here is an example of narration over an intro of a cartoon show, Samurai Jack – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gMAgQf4ZJXY In this intro, the narrator is the main villain of the cartoon. His narration is giving insight into the general story to inform the audience so they know what to expect. They might have chosen to show it from the villain’s perspective because it gives a bigger impact and makes you pick the hero’s side immediately. I chose this example because most of the time the narrator is either random or the main character of the film who is telling their story. It’s different for Samurai Jack because even though they show Jack’s life from his perspective in the episodes, it is his antagonist who is narrating it.
Another example of narration over an animation is this trailer for Lady and the Tramp – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LZmVm6qv1Lk It is a different kind of narrative than that of Samurai Jack because the narrator is reviewing the movie and telling the viewer about it, rather than just narrating the characters’ life as it goes or showing the plot. He is directly telling the viewers about the movie. This was also different from a lot of films because usually the narrator is just telling the story to anyone, but in this trailer it felt like he was more connected to the viewers.
Interviews are used for getting information from the person being interviewed. They are more personal than narrations and give off a more realistic mood because the answers usually are spontaneous and they don’t seem scripted. Interviews are commonly used for documentaries and television shows and other videos. Producers often add presence or background music to the interviews to make them seem less bland.
Here is an example of an interview in a TV show – Ellen: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uwstZ1lnGls The host – Ellen – is interviewing Hugh Laurie without being very formal about it, and this shows a calmer and more realistic atmosphere. They exchange jokes and talk to each other, but they don’t go completely off track from the original interview itself. In my opinion, such interviews help creating a natural real-life atmosphere. You can see them interacting with each other, freely using gestures and reacting to one another.
Dialogue is often used in movies, TV shows, video games and animation and on the Internet. Having dialogues in TV shows just creates a natural atmosphere and it doesn’t seem scripted, even if it is. There are many dialogues and monologues in movies and animations because they just help building the story and giving meaning to what’s going around the characters.
This is a clip from a movie called Mamma Roma: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dml5U-h4mUA In this clip there is a dialogue between Mamma Roma and her son in the church. This dialogue reveals part of the story and builds up to the main plot. Like in the clip, scenes with dialogue usually include shots of the persons talking to show their emotions and face expressions as they speak, which intensifies their statements.
Here is a TV advert for Honda: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7H-POvW3RRo It includes an inner monologue about the aspects of the car sale. It is internal diegetic – the viewer can hear it and we assume the man who is having the monologue can too, but others around him couldn’t. It was recorded in a studio afterwards and then overlapped the video. The monologue gives meaning as to why he is snickering around the car, in this example. In movies, the director would probably use a monologue to introduce one of the main characters.
Music and sound effects are used to enhance the impact of certain scenes in movies, animations, advertisements, educational videos, documentaries and TV shows.
A film score is specifically composed music for the movie. There are also specifically composed soundtracks for video games. Composers are asked to make specific music because the director has his/her own idea of how the video is going to look together with sound, and even though they may find music similar to what they were looking for, they would still prefer to carry out their idea with music which fits perfectly.
This is an example of the opening cutscene in a game called Persona 3: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r7ZLA5FX_v0 For the scene, as well as all other soundtracks in the game, the composer made each of them specifically for the game to fit the atmosphere as well as possible.
Songs are used in TV shows, movies and animations. They can be diegetic: a song being performed in the film or TV show, and it can also be non-digetetic, for example – a song being played at the beginning of the movie or over a scene without dialog, though sometimes they would just lower the volume when the characters are speaking. Songs can help creating tension or making the viewer pay more attention to the scene. There are also theme songs for TV show episodes that are played in the beginning of each episode. Advertisements often include short jingles at the end of each of them, and they’re usually very catchy so people tend to remember them. This increases the number of customers for the product, because they may remember it and buy it. These kinds of short theme songs are also used for hand-held devices – each time you turn your mobile phone on, it plays the short song, which is different for each company.
Here is an example of a song used in a film called Date Movie: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PTYUUZ0UA5U The song used over the scene is non-diegetic. It gives off an illusion that the woman dancing in the scene seems attractive to those men, though it is obvious she isn’t. It looks comical and emphasizes the humour of the scene because what you expect from the song is not what you actually see on the screen.
This is a TV advert for Citroen DS3: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BFKxDLWd6KQ It is an example of non-diegetic music used in an advertisement. It helps setting the mood of being on the road.
This is an example of a short theme song for Nokia: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yq0EmbY3XyI Most people are very familiar with it because it’s become very popular. The tune is played every time you turn on a Nokia phone.
Stock music is music that’s copyright does not belong to the composer but the music production library. Media producers are able to license any kind of music from these libraries for a reasonable price and quickly.
This is an example of a Northern Bank business advertisement: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sMfMA7SoNzg Businessmen often buy and use production music because it saves time and money for them. They don’t need very specific music, and the music libraries provide all kinds of songs for them to use. It is usually quite basic and generic music.
Ambient sound is background noise recorded separately from filming the scenes. Wild tracks are often used in movies for scenes with many people speaking, outside scenes – rain, wind, thunder, rustling leaves or scenes with some specific sounds that would otherwise be too loud and oppress a dialogue. Even though people have a fairly high dynamic range of hearing, the dialogue is clearer and sounds better with fewer background noises. Scenes that require a lot of people shouting may be recorded in a studio to reduce any background noise with a few people, and the recording can be put on an echo with a slight delay to make it seem like a crowd. They may also be recorded live at some prominent football games and edited later to suit the scenes. Comedy TV shows that have an audience who are laughing during the show have recorded the laughter separately emphasize the jokes and make them seem funnier than they may actually be.
This is a scene from the movie Cracking Up: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J5MpO9grPpk The scene is located in a restaurant, and the producers have added some ambient sound to make it seem like there are more people in it. They may have recorded it at an actual restaurant with many people eating on a busy day, and this use of presence makes the scene and dialog feel more realistic.
This is a clip from a movie – Little Miss Sunshine: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7_oHIUCp_TY#! In this example all of the sound is external diegetic – from the dialogue between them, the music playing in the background to a truck driving past and the characters putting their menus down. The truck driving past was a moving sound source, and it got recorded separately, and it moves from one speaker to the other to intensify the effect. The music was recorded separately too and added when the shots had gotten edited.
Sound effects are used in movies to either intensify events and actions. They are often recorded using strange objects made for a completely different purpose, but producers may use them to use them as supernatural sound effects. In animations they use short cartoon sounds each time a character gets hit or turns around, though in real life we wouldn’t actually hear those sounds. In animations, all of the sounds are recorded separately and added after the animations are completed. Mobile phones have the option to turn sound effects on so that each time you press a button, there’s a sound.
This is a montage with clips from the movie called Transformers: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hjQZEnBzW0E It includes many mechanic sound effects that were recorded with car engines, airplane fans, blenders, printer sounds, drills and other mechanical devices, and they were later altered to create original Transformer sounds.
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