So Long Term 2

I am in the middle of burning DVD backups of my Term 2 work. It's actually an incredibly boring and tedious process. But, it means I'm done with all my work! And will now have a few days to feel normal again. Classes start back up on Monday, but that gives me four days off, and I'm thankful for it.

I haven't had much time to tell you about the projects I've worked on because...well, while I'm in them, they sort of make me crazy, and I don't like talking about it. For example, I just realized I left some "fill" off a section of dialogue that is our biggest project for the term, but I've already turned it into our director. ARGH! This is what carelessness is, folks. I checked my work, but just forgot about this dumb detail (don't even worry if you don't know what it is.. just more tedious audio things). I don't have a good excuse, and it's not really like me to forget the details...but this project has been a mess all term. We've been given very little instruction on it (mostly because our director was gone working on a movie in LA and this was his project), and nobody knows what to do. Honestly, it's a lot like the real world. Except, in the real world, if I'd turned it in, I could go back to them right now and say "hey, I'm a moron" and probably fix it with little more than a huge SIGH (since I'm ahead of deadline). But here...it's after 5, the teachers are gone, so I can't re-submit it. Oh well. Grades become less important (though I DO care) because it's about the lessons you learn...this one is...KEEP double checking even if you're fed up with the dumb thing and want to go home!

Of course, I've never figured out how to remember something you've forgotten you ever knew anything about in the first place. Or at least, how to get your brain to remind you faster...as clearly it pops up eventually.

Ok, back to other projects. Well, maybe I'll tell you about this one. It was called "Lost Love" and I think it was some student film. I honestly didn't watch it all the way through because it was painfully stupid. That was probably another flaw on my part...if you watch it all the way through, you'll have a better understanding of the overall sound you need. But I think I got the jist of it, despite cutting that corner.

The work we had to do was for 3 minutes of the film (that was it! but it took forever! gosh, I hate being slow and new at things!) and add all the sound effects, special effects, backgrounds (bg's...annoying things like room tones), foley (footsteps and props), and some ADR (automatic dialogue replacement...extra lines from the actor that you have to match exactly with their on screen lip movement). In the industry, it seems these tasks are usually divided amongst a group of people...it's easy to see why...it's a lot of work for one person. Luckily, this didn't have a lot of ADR (but the few lines there were a royal pain). The scenes included some dream sequence of a girl who clearly had an abusive dad? relative? who is older now and visiting the guy in the hospital...and remembering some awful memories. Nothing is very well spelled out, which just made it more annoying.

Now, I realize I've said "annoying and tedious" quite a lot, but ...nothing is in a bad way. I know what REALLY tedious and meaningless work is like and this isn't it. This is more like a problem to solve, and it's kind of fun, even if we all whine a bit along the way. I have found out that our class is definitely a sarcastic group of people. It's probably the best thing to get you through!

So yeah...this was like a final project putting all the pieces together, and I missed the stupid FILL. grrr. oh well. I did manage my ADR well..it looks like they're saying their lines. Of course, when you get done with that stuff, if you have to hear any particular line one more time, you think you're going to lose your mind (I will forever have "Did Stan do this?" etched in my brain from Selma Hayak in a role in "After the Sunset" thanks to dialogue editing). But the cool thing is...the next day, you often don't mind you've heard the line hundreds of times, and probably would like watching it at normal speed for a change! (slow motion really helps in lining up words...even if everyone sounds like a creepy alien while you do it)

Ok, other than Lost Love (or Loser Love as we've fondly referred to it), we've worked on a programming project or 2, and a game audio project or 3, and LOTS of other Post Production film editing projects. (oh yes, and lots of practical stuff about digital signal processing..which makes my brain hurt) The post production stuff was really my favorite. I enjoyed editing dialogue and backgrounds and whatever. Ok, so backgrounds wasn't as fun because "yay, it's the sound a room makes when just the A/C is on" and because it was some Angelina Jolie film that included a gory dead body that I had to see over and over while editing. Ew. But...it is kind of neat to see how dumb things like A/C and room "hum" or background birds and crickets really make you feel like they are in a room or outside or...just that they're even talking normally and not in a vacuum. We also did sound effects to an animation of our choice (I picked an airplane zooming around) and that was fun. Oh look...that propeller isn't making any noise. Oh! Now it is, and I picked a good one! I REALLY like the sound work for animation. Everything is so pretty and clean, and things can sound a little surreal if you like.

The Special Effects sound project was also cool. Those are sounds which aren't exactly natural..you know, your spaceships, or creepy horror winds...or just having a heartbeat going in a scene when it's not a medical drama! That stuff is naturally more creative, so can be a lot of fun. The video for the sound effects wasn't as fun at first because it was vague (some girl gets killed when her boyfriend? whacks her with a flower pot, but then she must be dreaming as she walks around and men go by. what does that all mean??? no sound, so no clue!). But...as they often say (And I believe it or I wouldn't be here), visuals can be saved with sound. This visual had no clear story, but after I was done with it, it was like the girl had a string of bad boyfriends (mostly abusive) and she was remembering the bad choices as she died... I thought it was a film about domestic violence and the sad choices that people can make. At least, it is now, huh?

And what's with all the blood and icky films we've worked on? Really...a dead gory body, blood from a girl who was abused and dying, and the last film with an abusive parent figure! My personal belief is that the program is taught by men, and they favor the "action"-styled projects. I guess I should get over my squeamish nature, but oh well. Like I said, the animation one was pretty.

The programming stuff this term...I hated. I don't like anything to do with that..and I don't care if it was to make a "random music generator". At least it wasn't hard code, and you could use picture interfaces like dials and buttons. AND those objects could have color added to them. I think I honestly spent more time making my "program" look "pretty" than I did making it run properly. But it does work, so no worries. I understand the stuff, I just don't like it. yes, I'm still VERY visually oriented and often complaining about the drab classrooms or boring projects. I see know reason why my passions of art and sound can't happily live together. ;)

Game Audio...well, I've pretty much learned that I don't want to do game audio. It sounds like a lot of database, data entry work, and consistent file naming (of say 30,000 lines of dialogue for ONE game!), and I don't think I could stand more work like that. We learned a lot about the gaming industry (for example, they've sold 120 million Playstation 2's since they were released. yee-haw).

And of course...our class song. It's actually not finished because we had problems with the session and broken recording stations that day. Our instructor has worked with it for HOURS to make something work (I didn't think it was so messy, but I haven't mixed recording sessions yet) and postponed it until next term (i.e. next week). I've heard the near-final though and it's weird...I never played any of that with my flute! well, I played the notes...but he's lengthened them and added reverb, and whatever. It's pretty sounding though! And I could play it that way...now I want to go re-record it!

But whew! another term down. Only 4 more left!