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Techniques and Tchnologies for Soundtrack Making

«Techniques and Tchnologies for Soundtrack Making»

by Florin Gioroc

Source:

Cinematographic Art & Documentation (Cinematographic Art & Documentation), issue: 4 / 2009,

pages: 2025, on www.ceeol.com .

Cinematographic Art & Documentation, nr. 4/2009

Florin GIOROC, Ph.D

University of Theatre and Film, „I.L. Caragiale“, Bucharest

TECHNIQUES AND TECHNOLOGIES

FOR SOUNDTRACK MAKING.

TECHNICAL INTERVENTIONS WITH AESTHETIC

PURPOSE REGARDING SOUND HEIGHT (FREQUENCY)

Abstract

For the beginning, through the speech of high sound approach height – own to human hearing – the pres-

ent article aims to treat only the technical repairs with aesthetic purposefulness in the extreme frequencies

zone of the sound spectrum which are present in the sound of film: the „lows” zone and the “acutes” zone.

Not accidentally, these “lows” and “acutes” that are present in the sound of film, both play an important role

creating to the spectator-listener of a special psychiatric state and highlighting specific features of sound.

Here, in these zones, are focused, the warm, the roundness, respectively the brightness and the transparency

of the sound message with remarkable positive consequences to the spectator level perception. If for the

beginning,

in “low” frequencies domain as well as in “high” frequencies domain, are passed in review the treatment

modalities used in time, treatments and technical imperfections which drastically decreased own expressive-

ness of these acoustic registers, the modern current technical solutions, restoration of the „rights“ of the

expressive capacity of areas of heights above-mentioned noise are subsequently raised. And these only in aes-

thetic idea of the purpose of optimizing the performance of the suggestive sound column.

The human hearing covers, regarding percep-

tion, from a sound height perspective, the

entire acoustic domain of the surrounding

sound universe that has relevance, interest or

meaning for our material and mental world.

What isn’t relevant or what harms us in any

way must not be heard. Consequently, we do

not hear infrasound and ultrasounds, meaning

under 16 Hz and over 20,000 Hz. And we also

do not hear very well near these limits. The

equal-loudness curves of sound (Fletcher-

Munson) state the same thing. The extreme

areas of the audio range are targeted (high and

low frequencies), specifying that at low fre-

quencies the phenomenon is much more pro-

nounced, especially at low hearing levels. This

lack of sensibility at the mentioned frequencies

has its origin in the characteristics of the foetus

in its prenatal period, and its explanation in the

self-protective position induced by nature to

the human hearing organ. This thing, classified

as a “physiological defect of the ear” is not

actually a defect, but a means of protection of

the hearing organ against “the aggression of

lows” (sounds of low frequency and high ener-

gy from the surrounding environment. The

hearing channel of the internal ear itself, acts as

“low cut filter”.

Is this characteristic of the ear useful in achiev-

ing the significance of soundtrack elements in

the mentioned frequency area? Of course not,

as long as we recreate, in the soundtrack of

movies, an acoustic reality and wish to empha-

size the sounds elements situated in this fre-

quency area, in the idea of bestowing it higher

meanings and expression. As a matter of fact, I

think that on a certain evolutionary step of our

ability to aesthetically judge sound, a conflict

irrupts between the self-protective characteris-

tic of the ear, given by nature, and our “thirst”

for meanings and expressions specific for the

low-pitched register of frequencies.

Nature was right, probably, a long time ago

when it defined the self-protective characteris-

tics of the ear, that are still present today. The

existence of lightning, eructation, cataclysms

etc. accompanied by the specific sound mani-

festations were likely to have endangered the

physical integrity of the hearing organ and the

psychic of the human living then. Nature

Cinematographic Art & Documentation, nr. 4/2009

wouldn’t have known that, over time, this

frightened and humiliated by its own ghosts

creature would invent music, and later on, the

movie.

To underline few of the relevant ideas for the

chosen subject I chose in the following part

music, component of the movie soundtrack,

because of its balanced acoustic aspect and of

its very large area of sound heights used.

During the history of the art of sound, music

stabilized own means of expression and, with

the human voice, instruments capable of emit-

ting timbres with very diverse particularities

which cover, regarding the sound stretch,

almost the entire range of hearable frequen-

cies, of mental significance for us, humans. The

hearing area of music is expressive in the area

of frequency, but also in the dynamics one

(loudness). This excursus of frequency charac-

teristic to music is structured in the low, medi-

um and high-pitched register.

One of the characteristics of the musical

instruments evolution is that, in the same

group of instruments, the search was focused

on covering almost entirely the three men-

tioned registers, with specific instruments. It

demonstrates us, in the symphonic orchestra

the string instruments (violin, viol, cello , con-

trabass) the wind instruments (piccolo, flute,

bass flute , English horn, clarinet, bass clarinet ,

oboe, bassoon, contrabassoon ) and the brass

instruments (trumpet, horn, trombone, tubas).

The same demonstration can be sustained also

for the clavier instruments and the percussion

ones. All of these classes of instruments, com-

ponents of the symphonic orchestra, thought

to be the most wide and expressive musical

sound organism that can be found today, shows

that the acoustic register is well represented

(the underlined instruments), and this fact is

not casual. It’s an acoustic area of great impor-

tance. Two of the reasons that made this classi-

fication of bass instruments possible:

- the acoustic balance

- the specific expressiveness of this register

musical sound organism, more or less complex,

has in its components bass instruments, this

thing being mandatory and based on the two

reasons mentioned before. Any abdication

from this classification is inconceivable, sonori-

ties, in the lack of low frequencies generated by

bass instruments become low-down, embar-

rassing, unbalanced and thus inexpressive. All

the sound “crumbles” not having the basis,

meaning the register. The same happens in the

film sound.

As I was saying earlier, one of the adopted ele-

ments, and used on a large scale in the sound-

tracks of films because of its possible functions

that derive from its own exceptional expres-

siveness, is the music.

The film music, unlike the concert music, in

general, very often uses, for creating the state,

the atmosphere, the emotion, the extreme

acoustic registers, meaning the low-pitched

ly the low-pitched one. But also the other ele-

ments of the specific movie soundtrack have an

exceptional expressiveness, effect and spectac-

ular when they have low-pitched frequencies.

We think about all sort of sounds, of ambiences

etc. Almost the same elements as millions of

years ago. This time though we are not fright-

ened and humiliated. Now we are called to

participate in the audiovisual spectacle of the

film, to feel and live at full intensity the recre-

ated reality of sound and image. But we

encounter a conflict. A conflict with our own

hearing and its specific behaviour at low fre-

quencies. If we look back in the past we realize

that “truncation” of the low frequencies area in

film has accompanied us from the first day of

the sound film and until a few years ago.

From capturing in set or outdoor the words

and sounds, from capturing music in studios,

from processing sound and mixing the sound-

track, and to the optical translation of the

sound negative and obtaining a standard copy,

there has been a constant attitude for decades,

for the drastic limitation of the register of audi-

ble frequencies. What caused this “fear” of

“lows”?

1. The fact that low frequencies carry great

acoustic energies, compared to high fre-

quencies is a well known fact. The great

amplitude of these acoustic oscillations is

transformed in high amplitude of the

electro-acoustic signal generated by the

This specific expressiveness of the register puts

in affective, emotional resonance our mental,

generating states and creating specific atmos-

pheres. As a matter of fact, the creation of an

atmosphere, in general, is one of the substantial

motivations of the use of music in movies.

Just like the symphonic orchestra, any other

Cinematographic Art & Documentation, nr. 4/2009

microphone used for registering. From

here, trough amplification, the electro-

acoustic signal has to be levelled to the

registration environment used (magnetic

strip or photosensitive film, recording

mediums of election in the not so distant

past of cinema). The fear of not exiting

the technical dynamics standards, restric-

tive in what concerns the recording level

of those mediums, determined the “cut”

of those areas of low frequencies which

have led, trough their great amplitude, at

the exit outside the dynamic range deter-

mining the so called “supercharge distor-

tions” or “supramodulation distortions”.

This attitude is partially maintained

today for the same reasons.

2. The fact that in this low area of the

acoustic range are concentrated the nois-

es, unwanted in a “clean” recording

(bloop, mechanical noises from handling

or tapping the microphone, wind etc.)

which would consequently cause prob-

lems during the sound processing.

3. The fact that a special accent has to be

put on the practice of avoiding the

appearance of supramodulation distor-

tions of the photosensitive film when

translating the sound negative, by elimi-

nating from the film mixing the area of

low frequencies. All those mentioned

above, amplified by our deficit percep-

tion of low frequencies have caused the

“widowing” the film sound of a frequen-

cy area in the lack of which many of the

film soundtrack elements lose their

expressive power and their capacity to

transmit states and emotions.

frequencies. With the sound component, in

general, are obtained in this manor the mean-

ing of the dialog, of the comment or interview,

but also the warmth, the roundness and the

expressiveness specific to low frequencies.

This result, like many others, became possible

while the analogical technology of sound pro-

cessing and the making of the soundtrack

reached high levels of performance. As a mat-

ter of fact, in the last two decades of the past

century, the gradual abandoning of sound ana-

logic treatment and the adopting of digital

modalities began. The abandonment of the

first modality was imposed by many inconven-

iences of the existing analogical sound treat-

ment with all the hard work of the electro-

acoustics specialists that have developed the

respective technologies until levels on which

the cost-performance ratio became unaccept-

able.

Adopting new modalities of digital treatment

of the electro-acoustic signals opened new

roads for technical performance, with major

implications in correcting of these “trunca-

tions” of film sound, specific to analogical

treatment.

The chapter of the sound register, with its spe-

cific characteristic, is reinstated with the

appearance of multi-channel sound formats

certified by the cinema practice in the last 25

years.

The idea of the multi-channel sound is not

new. The space character of sound being an old

principle, technical solutions, more or less sat-

isfying for our biaural requirements, have been

proposed and realized over time. At a low time

though, in 1977, the technicians from Dolby

Labs, solve the problem of low frequencies

according, alongside the “full range frequency”

channels (linear answer channels in all the fre-

quency area, a number of 4, (center, left, right,

surround, which created “the acoustic space”

of the film) and a “dedicated” channel of this

acoustic register. In this channel, called “Baby

Boom”, the low frequencies of sounds were

sent to the other channels alongside other fre-

quency “effects” positioned only here. The

movie “Third Degree Encounter” uses for the

first time a channel dedicated to low frequen-

cies, the Baby Boom system being imposed.

From now on, the path being opened, all the

multi-channel systems established in the sound

world of the contemporary film, Dolby Digital,

The sound resulted in the standard copy, as a

general nature, was metallic, stringy, loud, and

lacked the warmth and intimacy given by the

presence of the low-pitched register. A positive

thing was that, drastically minimizing the

masking effect of the low frequencies, the

intelligibility of the dialog, of the interview or

of the comment had something to win. This

practice of increasing the meaning of words by

eliminating the low frequencies from their

component is still being used, compensating

though the tenorial “color” with other existent

elements in the soundtrack, trough modern

technologies, trough the area of expressing low

Cinematographic Art & Documentation, nr. 4/2009

D.T.S. (Digital Theater System), S.D.D.S.

(Sony Dynamic Digital Sound), will use the

specialized channel of low frequencies, now

called L.F.E. (Low Frequency Enhancement)

actually the sixth (alongside the other five,

which are “full range frequency”), capable to

replay at a higher level, imposed by the “phys-

iologic defect of the ear”, that low-pitched area

of the acoustic range, capable of transmitting

special signification of the sound. The respec-

tive configuration of channels is generically

called 5.1.

This area of the low-pitched acoustic register,

destined for the 0.1 channel (L.F.E.) has a

bandwidth of 110 or 120 Hz and is situated

near the lower end of the acoustic area, high-

lighting the low frequency sounds, trough an

acoustic device with a specialized speaker (dif-

fuser) called “subwoofer”.

At the present time there is in the 5.1 multi-

channel sound system two ways of highlighting

the low frequencies contained by the sound-

track:

the first, called “without low frequency admin-

istration”, in which their source is only the

L.F.E. channel.

the second, called “with low frequency admin-

istration”, in which their source is represented

by the total of low frequency signals of each of

the five “full range frequency” channels,

obtained by “low cut” filtering (with a filter

tuned on the 50 Hz frequency, with a cutting

slope of 24 dB/octave), added to the low fre-

quency signals delivered by the L.F.E. channel.

The result is sent to the subwoofer for play.

This two ways are listed in the block schemes

of the 5.1 multi-channel system (fig. 1, fig. 2)

Fig. 2

I mentioned earlier that the capturing, process-

ing, recording and rendering devices achieved

by the analogical treatment of electro-acoustic

signals, the critical areas are in most cases those

edges of the acoustic area of frequencies,

meaning the “lows” area and the “highs” area.

As a matter a fact, for this type of “trunca-

tions”, in the technical specialized literature

there is the notion of “linear distortions”, lin-

earity in frequency being a major challenge of

the entire electro-acoustic chain. Just as in the

case of low frequencies, high frequencies get

specific tasks in achieving the acoustic balance

and sound expressiveness. It’s the area that

offers more luminosity, transparency and shin-

ing with certain aesthetic connotations at the

level of our mental perception. A dialogue, a

“crowded” music, “tubby” noises are conse-

quences of the lack of high frequencies which

end up by realizing a formless film sound,

without relief timbre, tern and thus inexpres-

sive. If in what concerns the analogical magnet-

ic recording of sound, while impressive per-

formance were reached in the field of high fre-

quencies, optical recording on photosensitive

film of sound, which is the aim of sound pro-

cessing of the film has a restrictive character in

the mentioned area. The optical sound tran-

scription systems on photosensitive film that

resort to traditional ways of sound information

Fig. 1

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