Stuart Hooper's PDP

I'm a third year Digital Media student at UCF. This blog is a Personal Development Profile of my ongoing work over the next year.

The fact is that in the past artists who achieved chart success received vast and undeserved rewards. The market for music nowadays is greater, but the rewards for individual acts are not so over-the-top. No big deal. The rewards for musicians are still there but the extremes once available for chart toppers are not so extreme. Who cares? It was the equivalent of closed shop. If music is your calling then you’ll make music anyway. The good thing is that opportunities for less mainstream artists are greater. That’s a good thing. The internet has levelled the playing field. I don’t care if Harvey Goldsmith can’t make as much money as he used to. He’s a dinosaur. It’s a myth that his kind nurtured talent. They exploited talent. Vive la revolution!

Sound Design: How to make reliable wind sound

This is a pretty useful PDF. Although what they suggested gets a little repetitive. So I put a very slow wah on the white noise to create the sea crashing on the rocks and now I’m about to mix in some audio i recorded at the beach a few weeks ago to liven it up a little bit. Hopefully it will make an effective cliff-top soundscape for the ending section of our short. 

Mind Meister

Showing your working out and logical progression through mind maps is an excellent method if you’re crap at writing like me. It’s also been shown to help students retain 10% more memory of projects when using this method. This site makes it pretty easy to create maps. I use it to make my sketchbook shorthand scribbles more presentable.

It allows you to export files as different size PDFs and other useful file types. Maps can be shared between multiple users making communal project building slightly easier.

It’s also free. So thats good.

Recording wind with a contact mic

 I’m going to pretend i thought of this.

Yiruma - River Flows in You

Runner up to Twighlights ‘Bella’s lullaby’ as much as it pains me to type it. 

For the cliff scene at the end of our short film I’m going to write something like this. playing in Am Fm Dm and Em for the main sections. About 90bpm. I don’t want to make a cheesy uplifting score for this section as love stories aren’t real. It needs to be grounded by something bitter-sweet. Like the end of ‘The Graduate’ when the cameras roll until the smiles stop. A buzz wears off. In our short the cameras end on a visual climax, so i need to create a somber touch with the music.

johnlaw:

Troika 
‘Cloud’, 2008

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Artist Documentation of the Digital Sculpture for British Airways Heathrow Terminal 5. Curated by Artwise Curators.
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Equipment list

For this short film I am using the following programmes and equipment:

  • MCE-86-s-II (I use this to record some of the ambience that isn’t closely accessable i.e the sea crashing on rocks)

Mic Type: Condenser
Polar Pattern(s): Lobe and Hypercardioid
Freq Response: 50 - 18,000
Power Required: 8 - 48 v


  • AKG C1000 S (This is used for all of the close up Foley sounds

Cardioid/hypercardioid condenser microphone. Phantom power or 9v battery. Cardioid pattern switchable by addition or removal of capsule attachment. Use for almost everything.

  • 302 Mixer (for ease of level control and long battery life)

  • Fostex FR2 LE (for recording foley on location)

  • Tascam 122 (For recording sound at home)

  • Audacity (a brilliant free audio editing softwear. I also use this for recording radioshows)

  • Reason (for reverb, EQ’ing, the NN-XT, general effects and OST)
  • Behringer K1800FX (for basic playback. The response is very good as it’s a keyboard amp. I always check on several sets of speakers for leveling but this is a fantastic start. It’s a shame i don’t have two so i can set the panning!)

  • Final Cut and soundtrack pro

  • Mac G5 (outdated and broken. The bane of my production life.)

  • M-Audio OXYGEN 61 Midi Keyboard (a good tool for the job. Thanks for the lend Nich)

  • Washburn XB120 LH (for score)

  • Imitation Fender Stratocaster. Lefty switch with the neck pickup removed and pots removed for lossless output (for soundtracking and ‘work breaks’)
  • Ipod (This is essential if you’re planning on working in the DPS. It helps drown out the binign conversations and focus your thoughts)

    Notes on a test shoot

    Sound Direction
    As no sound needs to be recorded live and it has higher quality if it is added afterwards, all the sound was Foley. For the ambiance i wanted to create the sounds of a cafe. This to me consists of cutlery, a radio, crockery, and a door and bell. The door and bell help produce thoughts of a cafe r    ather than a kitchen in a house. To create an effective radio sound i played some instrumental music as a patch in the NN-XT synthesizer. I added some tape fuzz with the Scream 4 Distortion unit to make it sound like it was played over a small radio. I then created a room sound using the advanced reverb unit that fitted the room shown on camera. Then using a C1000 i recorded crockery, cutlery and a kettle. After Equalization in Audacity i imported these each into another NN-XT and added the same room sound. As i did not have a shop door with a bell i used a free ready made Foley sound. I will record my own very soon when creating the actual ambiance i am planning to use. 

    For the handwriting I recorded a fountain pen with the C1000. The fountain pen sounds scratchy compared to most pens so is desirable to fill the void of vocals as this creates a focal point of the sound. I recorded the sound of an entire alphabet and imported it into an NN-XT of it’s own I EQ’d it using the Graphic equalizer in Reason. I experimented with pitch shifting Sam’s pen higher than Lawrence’s pen to reflect the difference between the pitches of male and female vocals. This worked well. Given more time i would like to perfect any on screen pen movements as i feel some of the sounds do not perfectly match the movements of the pens.
    The sound of the mug on the table was a pitch shifted mug.
    The Scrapbook ‘send’ sound was the sound of a trumpet and trombone mute being nocked together with added flange. I recorded it from two angles and synced it together to make a fuller sound. I would like to experiment with post flap sounds and things associated with analogue mail such as sealing envelopes. Ripping paper didn’t sound very good.
    Further to this, which i will add in future will be a waitresses footsteps in the background. As this is an intimate scene i would like to add more of the close sounds like body movements.
    The sound of Sam drinking through a mask was strange.     I don’t think we should imply the avatars have mouths at all. We have decided to leave this out in future to stop sounds conflicting the narrative.

    Most of my inspiration has been from Tekkonkinkreet and studio ghibli films. They are well produced and have no live sound as they are animated. A keen ear can detect sources of sound as well.  

    The Royal House of Choke Trailer

    THE ROYAL HOUSE OF CHOKEManchester drummers come together for improvised beat congregation 

    An interesting new project has surfaced in Manchester. The House of Choke is the name given to a performance that took place on February 27 of this year, in which 20 drummers (from different bands/backgrounds/levels of skill) came together and performed an improvised jam. The group included friends as well as people who had never met before, and there was no prior rehearsal. What happened was a form of chaos that became channelled into one big ol’ rhythmic thunderclap!

    The Royal House of Choke project is an experiment that is about to turn into a short film, full release across CD and Vinyl, live tour and website. It’s getting support from the always excellent Audacious Art Experiment, so keep checking their site for more news.

    Although it all looks like a pale, skinny, plaid-shirted imitation of Boadrum, it’s ace to see people getting together and ripping out the jams. And check out that video! Looks like helluva ride. More news when we get it. You can look at the Royal House of Choke group here. -

    http://www.tropicalwaste.co.uk/2011/03/16/blog-the-royal-house-of-choke/#more-684 - Source

    I was happy to see my ex-bands drummer Jon in the middle of this video. I would very much like to start some colaberative projects like this in Falmouth. 

    Infact, I’m going to get in contact with the Poly now. 

    Stuart Hooper – Director of sound

     

    As sound director on a film with no dialogue it is my role to create soundscapes that express the atmospheres of each scene. As vocals normally fill the foreground I will have to study other noises that are usually overwhelmed by voices in order to replace them. This is one option anyway. I am also considering simply building soundscapes that mimic certain animated visuals from the science of sleep by recreating all sounds purely using household objects apart from when the lead actor isn’t wearing a mask. If I choose to do this I will use the musical score to speak for the on screen emotion. This short will have to be theatrical as it depends on body movement and sound to evoke emotion in its audience. I will capture sound on location but as there is no dialogue I will simply build an idea of what I need to re-create. I plan on working closely with the other crew members. If someone hears a sound they like, I will make a note of it. I will still take direction and am willing to change my ideas entirely if the group doesn’t think it is in-fitting with the theme of the short. I am treating this project as a democracy.
    My influences who have worked on film are Mogwai, Antonio Pinto, Michael Brook and Glover Gill. One example of exceptional score writing would be the first London street scene from 28 weeks later. It conveys a sense of enormous despair on behalf of the lead actor. Another example is Antonio Pintos theme to Lord of war. This score is bitter sweet as is the mood of the film. An example of what I don’t want to use for the score is the music set to ‘into the wild’. I find the music dull and tedious.
    Examples of good Foley sound include most Studio Ghibli films, Tekkonkinkreet and Waking life. I choose animated films for Foley research because I can be sure the sound isn’t recorded live. Much like ours won’t.

    I will be working closely with the director of photography on set to make audio recording notes of what is on screen sound and what needs to be off screen sound as well as recording on set for extra. I plan to do this with audio recording equipment and a Dictaphone for notation. The advantages of this technique means i can listen to the Dictaphone whilst editing

    I will also be working closely with the editor as most of the sound will be produced in post. I need to write sections of score to express what the actors can’t with voice I will need to locate musicians willing to play score for a minimal fee as budget is personally a problem. Another experimental option for the score as I have suggested to the other members is recording and performing the music ourselves as there are a few musicians in the group. I have suggested stylized playlists to the group and they seem keen on this idea. The score will be to the effect of Antonio Pinto’s Lord of war soundtrack with a melodic, heavily harmonic feel much like ‘thee oh sees- Hounds of foggy notion’.

     

    Stuart Hooper