This is my main submissions for he sound creation unit. the video is an illustration of . The poem is the Dry Salvages by T.S. Eliot. By illustrating a poem in this many ways similar to that of music video production. Music video production is a basic form of poetry registration in the form of a moving image. The lizard my reason for creating a project based around poetry. It gets to the very core of the in support of music video production.
I chose this plan because it is significant in the sense of the connection between life and the flow of water. It has a ambiguous meanings throughout relating to how water represents life and the struggle that we go through throughout life.
This connects with my research from unit one into how everything is connected. The rain falls into the rivers. This flows into the sea and then evaporates back into the sky. Much like a humans life process. The Life is born by falling from the heavens on to earth. Its path through life is like a river flowing and twisting. Building up with speed and taking different routes and directions. It then ends up in a sea of turmoil and then recreation takes place where the water evaporates back into the sky and floats as a spirit, like a cloud. This then drips back down to earth and the process continues.
I recorded the sounds at different locations throughout Norfolk. I wanted to use real sound recordings or noises that are related to the poem. This has resulted in the poem becoming quite a literal transcription. I used a professional actor to record the sounds. I contacted the East Anglian Film Archive and got permission to use some of the Archive footage for the creation of the video.
THE DRY SALVAGES
(No. 3 of ‘Four Quartets’)
T.S. Eliot
I
The river is within us, the sea is all about us;
The sea is the land’s edge also, the granite
Into which it reaches, the beaches where it tosses
Its hints of earlier and other creation:
The starfish, the horseshoe crab, the whale’s backbone;
The pools where it offers to our curiosity
The more delicate algae and the sea anemone.
It tosses up our losses, the torn seine,
The shattered lobsterpot, the broken oar
And the gear of foreign dead men. The sea has many voices,
Many gods and many voices.
The salt is on the briar rose,
The fog is in the fir trees.
The sea howl
And the sea yelp, are different voices
Often together heard: the whine in the rigging,
The menace and caress of wave that breaks on water,
The distant rote in the granite teeth,
And the wailing warning from the approaching headland
Are all sea voices, and the heaving groaner
Rounded homewards, and the seagull:
And under the oppression of the silent fog
The tolling bell
Measures time not our time, rung by the unhurried
Ground swell, a time
Older than the time of chronometers, older
Than time counted by anxious worried women
Lying awake, calculating the future,
Trying to unweave, unwind, unravel
And piece together the past and the future,
Between midnight and dawn, when the past is all deception,
The future futureless, before the morning watch
When time stops and time is never ending;
And the ground swell, that is and was from the beginning,
Clangs the bell.
This video is part of my submission for the sound creation unit. The video is an illustration of a poem. I decided that I would illustrate the poetry because it is very similar to the principles used in order to create music video productions. Music video is essentially a poem that has been illustrated. I used to poems throughout these this video. The first is the anonymous but infamous reading which is as follows:
Every morning in Africa, a gazelle wakes up.
It knows it must outrun the fastest lion or it will be killed.
Every morning in Africa, a lion wakes up.
It knows that it must run faster than the slowest gazelle, or it will starve.
It doesn’t matter whether you’re a lion or a gazelle
when the sun comes up you’d better be running.
(But, unless you’re a runner, you won’t understand.)
-Anon
The second time that I use for this video is Never Stop Running - Allen Steble:
Never Stop Running
never stop running
never stop moving forward
even if your friends leave you
helpless and alone
even if you have no place
you can call home
never stop running
your race to success
or wherever you are going
because your race
makes you shine
and keeps you glowing
never stop running
never stop moving forward
even when you suffer a loss
leaving you crying sad
even when you make a mistake
leaving you insanely mad
never stop running
your race to satisfaction
or wherever you may venture
because your race
is a triumphant adventure
that keeps you glowing
never stop running
never stop moving forward
even when you lose your energy
leaving you so very tired
even when you lose your will
to keep running the course
NEVER stop running!
your race to the finish
your race to completion
because your race
is what keeps you going
your race keeps you glowing
Allen Stebley
To sum up this video it is clear to me that it’s not exactly one of my favourite pieces of work. I think the video and that’s the quite ugly and slightly egocentric. Although there is a point to my creation for this kind of work. Which is that it allowed me to test out the sound creation technical problems that I would come across when making the final video for this sound creation unit. Some of the things that allowed me to understand were using sound recording equipment such as the directional microphones. It also allowed me to ‘and test out many of the different buttons and workflows in order to create using the software. I went through the whole process of making sound project in logic. I discovered that it would probably be better for me to lay out the video in Final Cut first and then exported it as an XML file into the logic. Logic doesn’t allow you to edit video. in order to use lo in your workflow you need to use three different pieces of software. Final Cut, logic and at the end you need to also use the program QuickTime in order to stitch the sound to the video.
Train sound
Here is a sound I recorded a couple of hours ago. I never thought I would find train spotting interesting but it looks like I a new fan http://bit.ly/fJ5FdR
Today I went up to North Norfolk and made more sound recordings. This time equipped with the shotgun microphone and boom. I was also going onto the zoom H4N. The sound recordings today were great because it was pretty windy and this made for ideal conditions. The wind created amazing noises of whistling through the moored sailing boats. I also got some good sound recordings of birds, boats, people, and a fish and chip shop. Here are the pictures from around Morston. Below on the map you can see the area of Nofolk where I did the recording. Most of it was between Wells, Holcolm, and Sheringham. one of the most beautiful parts of Norfolk. The map below shows the area I visited.
After sound recording at Wells
The weekend proved quite a challenge with the lack of appropriate equipment. The difficulties that this thew up were that I wanted to record the sound of boats from a distance. The sound of birds on mud flats way out of reach of the microphone that I had. Also I was recording the sound of lashing rigging on sail masts. The problem here was that the sound was created by the wind and the sound of the wind is always bad on microphones.
If I was using a shotgun microphone this would have enabled me to of recorded the sounds from a distance and out of the line of wind fire. So for this reason I have booked out the equipment again and I will be returning to the same spot to get some more sound recordings.
It’s all part of the learning experience.
Booking System FAIL!
This weekend is the last weekend but I have before Easter break. I am aiming to get my sound project finished by on Thursdays lesson. So I made a booking for the H4N four yesterday but forgot to turn up to collect the equipment. Today I went in and they have given away the equipment that I had booked. So much for the booking system then. This is slightly frustrating and has set me back no doubt. I am going to have to try to do the sound recording using a trucking microphone. This is of lesser quality and there is also no shotgun microphone for me to capture the sound, distance. So this is going to make it increasingly hard to capture noises of the boats in the water. Maybe I will have to swim over to them.
Todays discussion
Today I discussed my project work we have both my fellow classmates and my tutor. In order to explain my sound projects to them I needed to make things clearer. So I outlined the project myself by dividing my work into three categories. Which consisted of three videos.
The first video is the audio track entitled “running”. in this video I experimented with recording using binaural microphones and also adding a music track.
The second video is entitled “water”. In this video I experimented with sound recordings using the zoom H4N. this video has also given/to experiment using Foley sound recordings and a voice recording done in the studio.
The final soundscape is to accompany the audio analysis. Following the write-up I will conclude with a selection of sound recordings that I have added distortion and thanks to to create final project. These will be listed in the audio analysis section of my blog.
Zoom H4N fun!
Sound recording from Cromer beach
Thea hearing her own voice by jackalcreative
Thea hearing her own voice
Helicopter
Water Project Progress Post
So far I have set out the video that I managed to get hold of from The East Anglian Film Archive and I have taken clips from the main sequence to make a full length edit. The plan is to put together a video. Mix some audio with it. Then export it as an xml file into logic. Then remaster the audio with a load of foley sounds and the voice recording of the poem reading. Export out of logo using quicktime. Load onto youtube. Embed into this blog post. Thats the plan anyway.
Here is the text from the T.S. Eliot poem, The Dry Salvages
I
I do not know much about gods; but I think that the river Is a strong brown god—sullen, untamed and intractable, Patient to some degree, at first recognised as a frontier; Useful, untrustworthy, as a conveyor of commerce; Then only a problem confronting the builder of bridges. The problem once solved, the brown god is almost forgotten By the dwellers in cities—ever, however, implacable. Keeping his seasons and rages, destroyer, reminder Of what men choose to forget. Unhonoured, unpropitiated By worshippers of the machine, but waiting, watching and waiting. His rhythm was present in the nursery bedroom, In the rank ailanthus of the April dooryard, In the smell of grapes on the autumn table, And the evening circle in the winter gaslight.
The river is within us, the sea is all about us; The sea is the land’s edge also, the granite Into which it reaches, the beaches where it tosses Its hints of earlier and other creation: The starfish, the horseshoe crab, the whale’s backbone; The pools where it offers to our curiosity The more delicate algae and the sea anemone. It tosses up our losses, the torn seine, The shattered lobsterpot, the broken oar And the gear of foreign dead men. The sea has many voices, Many gods and many voices. The salt is on the briar rose, The fog is in the fir trees. The sea howl And the sea yelp, are different voices Often together heard: the whine in the rigging, The menace and caress of wave that breaks on water, The distant rote in the granite teeth, And the wailing warning from the approaching headland Are all sea voices, and the heaving groaner Rounded homewards, and the seagull: And under the oppression of the silent fog The tolling bell Measures time not our time, rung by the unhurried Ground swell, a time Older than the time of chronometers, older Than time counted by anxious worried women Lying awake, calculating the future, Trying to unweave, unwind, unravel And piece together the past and the future, Between midnight and dawn, when the past is all deception, The future futureless, before the morning watch When time stops and time is never ending; And the ground swell, that is and was from the beginning, Clangs The bell.
IV Lady, whose shrine stands on the promontory,
Pray for all those who are in ships, those
Whose business has to do with fish, and
Those concerned with every lawful traffic
And those who conduct them. Repeat a prayer also on behalf of
Women who have seen their sons or husbands
Setting forth, and not returning:
Figlia del tuo figlio,
Queen of Heaven. Also pray for those who were in ships, and
Ended their voyage on the sand, in the sea’s lips
Or in the dark throat which will not reject them
Or wherever cannot reach them the sound of the sea bell’s
Perpetual angelus.
Using Final Cut Pro with Logic Pro
Creating an xml file export to transfer the audio sequence into final cut.
The two images here are show how the files copy exactly when using this export setting.
