AUdIoCoUrSeS
Joined: 31 Oct 2002
Posts: 2014
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| Week 7 |
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1. Describe the difference between an audio book and a talking book.
2. What would be the typical duration of a novel, as read out loud?
3. What is the maximum official duration of a CD?
4. Briefly explain the term 'characterization'.
5. Briefly explain the term 'narrative'.
6. Briefly explain the term 'description'.
7. What is 'abridgement'?
8. Briefly describe the differences in using an actor to read a book, versus a 'personality'.
9. What are 'lip smacks'?
10. What are the acoustic requirements of a voiceover studio?
11. What is an 'acoustic table'?
12. Comment on microphone distance in relation to the quality of the recorded voice.
13. When would edits be made to cut out coughs, mistakes etc.?
14. Comment on the significance of marking problems during the session.
15. What is the benefit of compression?
16. Describe the use of reverberation.
17. Comment on the use of creative recording techniques for poetry.
18. Comment on the microphone technique for audio drama.
19. In an audio drama studio, comment on the use of the dead area.
20. Comment on the use of the live area.
21. Comment on the use of effects areas.
22. Comment on the use of the narrator's booth.
23. Explain the use of walking surfaces.
24. Describe how sound effects are produced in the drama studio.
25. Comment on the value of playing sound effects through a loudspeaker in the studio.
26. How is the acoustic environment of a car interior simulated?
27. Comment on the acting area and 'no-go' area when using a coincident crossed pair of figure-of-eight microphones.
28. What is 'fader start'?
29. List the contexts in which sound effects are commonly used.
30. Comment on the value of accuracy in sound effects.
31. Why are sound effects recorded as long ago as the 1930s still in use?
32. Why is it sometimes useful for archive sound effects to sound noisy or crackly?
33. Comment on the dynamic range of real life sounds.
34. Comment on the dynamic range of recording equipment in relation to that of real life sounds.
35. Give examples of spot effects.
36. Give examples of extended effects.
38. What is 'room tone'?
39. Why must sound effects be recorded in isolation from other sounds and excessive reverberation or ambience?
40. In what context would room tone be faked?
41. Give six examples of sounds made by a car that are not mentioned in the text.
42. Comment on the problems introduced by recording sound effects in stereo.
43. Why is the coincident crossed pair (or MS) technique preferable to stereo techniques where the mics are separated?
44. Give two advantages of MS technique over a coincident crossed pair.
45. Describe Foley effects.
46. What kinds of sound would the Foley technique be used for?
47. In what characteristic is a Foley stage superior to any other recording studio?
_________________
It's all in the ears. - Learn the concepts not the software.
Audio Courses is a way into the music business for you
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Wed Apr 19, 2006 1:52 pm |
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electrosushi
Tape Op
Joined: 31 Oct 2006
Posts: 21
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| my answers |
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1. Describe the difference between an audio book and a talking book.
An audio book represents the content of a book recorded on a CD/Tape/MP3 with acting involved and sound effects while a talking book is book read by a person and recorded as such.
2. What would be the typical duration of a novel, as read out loud?
It can vary from 3 hours to 20, divided in as many CDs/Tapes are needed.
3. What is the maximum official duration of a CD?
A CD filled with standard audio content can maximum last 80 minutes.
4. Briefly explain the term 'characterization'.
Characterization is the process of passing the information about a character to an audience, this can be done throughout his actions, speech or a description presented.
It can be direct or indirect, the first is the case of a character who is introduced by a narrator or the author himself while in the second, the character let the audience identify him through the figure or speech.
5. Briefly explain the term 'narrative'.
It is the narration of a story, stressing the details of the plot and actions.
6. Briefly explain the term 'description'.
It can be visualized as list of parameters aimed to describe a thing. It allows to define or distinguish anything.
7. What is 'abridgment'?
Abridgment is a technique used often in audiobooks productions aimed to shorten passages of the book, it consists of cut, abbreviations, use of different words to reduce the audible content of a book.
8. Briefly describe the differences in using an actor to read a book, versus a 'personality'.
An actor would be a physical person who would impersonate one character in an audiobook, on the other hand the personality is the way that the reader impersonate different characters of the book.
9. What are 'lip smacks'?
Lip smacks belong to the group of the unwanted sounds in the process of recording a speech, they are noises of the mount which can be heard by the microphone.
10. What are the acoustic requirements of a voiceover studio?
Typically, a studio equipped for voice recordings has an acoustically isolated room aimed to capture the sound of the voice and not any other. The room must provide as little as possible influence to the recorded sound, any effect will be added later in the post production.
11. What is an 'acoustic table'?
It is a properly built table for use in radio and production studios, it is acoustically absorbent in order to absorb the unwanted pickup of reflected sound which would lead to a coloration of the sound. They also have a hole in the center for wiring purposes.
12. Comment on microphone distance in relation to the quality of the recorded voice.
A voice can be recorded in various techniques, depending by the contest, a close distance produces a quantity of unwanted noises even in acoustic booth, in relation this there are measures to achieved a good result, a pop filter is one of these. On the other hand being too far from the microphone causes reflections and sound coloring.
13. When would edits be made to cut out coughs, mistakes etc.?
Once that the all track is recorded, it is possible to edit by using either the automation or cutting the noises from the track.
14. Comment on the significance of marking problems during the session.
When arranging all the audio recorded during a session it is possible to mark regions where there may be mistakes, by doing this the engineer knows quickly which are the good takes that can be selected and used, the aim is to reduce the time spent on analyzing the tracks.
15. What is the benefit of compression?
Compression is useful when a recorded source has a large dynamic range, in the case of a human voice, it would help to achieve a uniform sound in the case the speaker is whispering or using loud voice. However over compression can result in dramatic changes of the voice. A compressor can be used also as a limiter.
16. Describe the use of reverberation.
Reverb gives the perception of space around the recorded voice, it can be useful to simulate a recording in particular room when the actual recording would be done in an acoustical booth.
17. Comment on the use of creative recording techniques for poetry.
The recording of poetry induces the listener to use the imagination to build the scene he or she is listening to; Panoramic techniques are often used giving a position to the characters, reverb effects can emphasize passages or sentences.
18. Comment on the microphone technique for audio drama.
Multi-tracking is probably the main technique used in drama productions, it allows to add sound effects and soundtracks to obtained a higher sense of reality.
19. In an audio drama studio, comment on the use of the dead area.
It is an area of the studio were the sound is actually absorbed, normally in this area the vocals are recorded.
20. Comment on the use of the live area.
The live area on the other hand is the part of the studio where drums or guitar amplifiers are set to be recorded with the use of natural and variable reverb.
21. Comment on the use of effects areas.
Effects areas are part of the studio where sound effects are created, they create noises which follows the play giving to all the elements the noise that the perception would associate with.
22. Comment on the use of the narrator's booth.
The narrator booth is a vocal booth acoustically treated to have a minimum sound reflection in order to deliver a pure voice sound, it is normally a part of a studio as it needs small dimensions.
23. Explain the use of walking surfaces.
Walking surfaces are areas where the aim is to record foot steps to be inserted on the play, they are normally composed of different materials to give the possibility of recording steps on different types of grounds.
24. Describe how sound effects are produced in the drama studio.
A drama studio is normally equipped with various areas aimed to sound productions, nowadays the dimensions are much smaller compared to years ago as the synthesisers and computer systems are getting more advanced the quality of the sound they produce is very close to what the sound effects should sound like.
Years ago the noise effects were produced with actual sounding material which was aimed to have the sound that the brain associate with that contest. i.e. a door opening would involve more than a technician and several tools. Nowadays these technique are still in use wherever the technology cannot reach.
25. Comment on the value of playing sound effects through a loudspeaker in the studio.
It has great importance for the sound engineer to listen to the produced sound on a sound speaker as this is the sum of all the tools used to recreate a specific noise and it needs to be a very reliable sound to induce the brain to think that what is heard is that association of concepts.
26. How is the acoustic environment of a car interior simulated?
The process of simulating a car interior involves the use of a vocal booth to re-create a tight space and a process called auralization, by the use of physical and mathematical modeling it results into the simulation of a car interior. It takes the original sound source and alter the frequency spectrum according to both, how the room affects the wave and, how your head/ears affect the wave.
27. Comment on the acting area and 'no-go' area when using a coincident crossed pair of figure-of-eight microphones.
In such a scenario it can happen that a sound hits a microphone in the front but at the same time hits another microphone on the back so the 2 diaphragms are pushed and pulled in opposite direction. This creates a de-compensation in the phase resulting into a noise which sounds very odd for the human brain and that basically explains the concept of a no go area with a figure of 8 microphones.
28. What is 'fader start'?
Fader starts allow, for example aCD player, to actually start to play when the fader is actually moved or turned on.
29. List the contexts in which sound effects are commonly used.
Sound effects are vital for a successful result, in refer to radio drama, movies, theaters
Their uses is revolves around all those noises which need to be reproduced along the play, commons uses are: foot steps, stairs, doors, external environments, weather, kitchen or bath sinks, curtains and telephones.
30. Comment on the value of accuracy in sound effects.
As said above, sound effects are vital for the success of a play, each sound effect has the purpose of "fooling" the brain thinking that the noise heard can be associated with a particular situation, in the case that a sound effects is done improperly or even if its volume level have not been strictly monitored through loudspeakers, the result generated is not only a bad sound effect, but it reflect is failure on the all situation, making it harder for the brain to familiarize with it, in the case of a radio drama this means failure in delivering a good show.
31. Why are sound effects recorded as long ago as the 1930s still in use?
It all started with the radio... in the 1920s broadcasters like BBC were setting big studio environments for drama productions, they basically started it all and they invented techniques which still today need to be used.
Sounds recorded during the all evolution of the studio applications are kept for their accuracy values, they may be sources recorded on the spot which will be impossible to reproduce.
32. Why is it sometimes useful for archive sound effects to sound noisy or crackly?
To achieve a vintage sound, to give the recording an antique feel. There are computer plug ins aimed to create the vinyl distortion or the tape sound thickness as well.
33. Comment on the dynamic range of real life sounds.
With the demand of sound effects often the sound designer has to decide if it is better to record a sound as from its original source or create the intended sound in studio. Real life sounds are very used when what's matter is recording the sound as accurate as possible from the source but for giving some specific effects which can help them fitting to the content, real life sounds have other sounds added in the multitrack.
34. Comment on the dynamic range of recording equipment in relation to that of real life sounds.
Even to capture simple sounds it is necessary to have a big number of tracks available, the aim of this is being able to shape the sound effect in the best way possible in relation to the content. To record the sound of a shotgun for example, it can be used 1 or 2 microphones from where the the shotgun is used, another near the where the bullet passes by and another where the bullet hits "the victim". All these sounds can then be mixed up to obtain the best result.
35. Give examples of spot effects.
A spot effect example can be the noise of a person walking on a particular surface, spot effects are aimed to care about one "odd" effect within a concept.
36. Give examples of extended effects.
Opposite to the spot effects, individuals and discrete, the extended effects are sound effects with a length of a all scene, such as background noises.
38. What is 'room tone'?
It is the sound of the room without any dialogue, it is usually used as a background for the dialogue.
39. Why must sound effects be recorded in isolation from other sounds and excessive reverberation or ambience?
Each sound effect must be tailored to the scene it is going to fit in; also to obtain the best results each sound must be recorded as the close as possible to the source, any reverberation, ambience can be added in post recording session.
40. In what context would room tone be faked?
In all those contest where the recorded source would not be appropriate to be used as sound effect. In these cases the room tone can be created in studio. Imagine recording the noise of spacecraft room...
41. Give six examples of sounds made by a car that are not mentioned in the text.
Indicators
Seat-belts indicator
Electric windows
horns
door opening/closing
hand-brake
42. Comment on the problems introduced by recording sound effects in stereo.
By recording a sound effects in stereo an engineer must keep in mind that the sound will be panned into a certain direction, this direction must be the same in the play, also some issues were caused in the beginning of stereo recording when radio transmission was still mono, in this contest, some stereo recordings were loosing their panning effect and the results were confusing for the audience.
43. Why is the coincident crossed pair (or MS) technique preferable to stereo techniques where the mics are separated?
The MidSide Technique uses beside of a stereo microphone also a mono microphone directed to the sound source, in this way the result ca be edited to obtain a result superior than a stereo technique, the MS technique offers a stronger image of the sound.
44. Give two advantages of MS technique over a coincident crossed pair.
In a situation where a sound source is much smaller compared to the environment the MS technique offers bigger reliability as the sound is captured from the normal stereo mic (S) plus the front mic (M), also if a recorded sound (let's imagine in the open space) it can happen that the air compression will cause that the sound will be louder on one side rather than the other, the MS technique offers more reliability.
45. Describe Foley effects.
Foley effects own their name from Jack Foley who in the years when the cinema was passing from mute to "talkies", Jack Foley worked for Universal to adapt the old films to the new era. Foleys effects are generally called as the sound effects for environmental sounds.
46. What kinds of sound would the Foley technique be used for?
Generally environmental sounds such as: horses galloping, kisses, punches, footsteps and doors.
47. In what characteristic is a Foley stage superior to any other recording studio?
Despite the typical foley studio would look like a junk yard for for the "noise material" being stored, the advantage is that the foley artists can work in an acoustically sound proofed studio to add any noise to a scene. They rely on a screen which shows the current footage and from this the that artists can work in a good environment. |
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Sun Apr 22, 2007 12:27 pm |
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AUdIoCoUrSeS
Joined: 31 Oct 2002
Posts: 2014
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Great work!
You are doing a great job and certainly understand this topic very well now.
Kepe it up.
_________________
It's all in the ears. - Learn the concepts not the software.
Audio Courses is a way into the music business for you
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Sun Apr 22, 2007 1:24 pm |
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