Music Video Update

While we don't have any written material yet to provide, my partner Brett and I have discussed what our plan of attack is for our video. We plan to get an acoustic setup for 2 of the band members from Strikeout Kid preforming their song, 5:33, to do an audio recording of the song first, then shoot section 1 of the video in the studio.

The actual music video will consist of shots of the band playing from the studio (Section 1 as I call it) and shots outside the studio that depict the video's story which we still have yet to draw out Section 2).

We plan on beginning this process this tuesday and hope to provide updates regularly.

If we finnish this video in a good amount of time and have some extra left over, we want to shoot an experimental video with whatever song we can legally get our hands on. This would be just for the heck of it, which I figured was a great time to test out different techniques and ideas and just get a better feel for editing and adding effects.  

Audio Tech? I Like the Sound of That!

As the title partially implies, if I were to be part of a television studio, I would love to be part of the sound team in some form. Sound design would be my primary choice with audio operator being my second

 I am very well aware of sound's ability to make a production sink or swim  and I realize that without sound, visuals in almost any form are left lifeless.  A commercial without sound is just a car driving down the road or an ocean that just says "I'm just a body of water. Theres no fun here." A show with poor audio quality is doomed to mediocrity, and a movie with improper music scores can confuse and disconnect with an audience.

Courtesy of Matthew Keefe

While the effects of poor sound design and audio recording can be detrimental to any production, sound work that is well done can bring that same production to the next level. Stories and emotions can be expressed ten times better and good scoring can immerse the viewers into another a world in cinema. 

I have found that bad sound is noticed way more than good sound in todays media saturated world. If a program has a well produced musical track with clean audio levels on mics and cool sound effects, the viewers will probably end up saying, "Wow, that was a good show." They might talk to their friends about how awesome the show "looked" since television is primarily a visual medium and they might not even say anything about the sound, which is a good sign to me since I find it usually registers on a subconscious level for most. It's all to easy though to find an auditory mistake, and those mistakes tend to be the most off putting  for a viewer. 

Sound design and audio engineering is an art form to me, and I hope to work hard in these fields and hopefully master them someday. I am very fortunate to be a Communications major at Shepherd University and with the experience I am getting, I am confident that I will be prepared to put my skills to the test in the future.  

   

Experiencing the Studio

When it comes to education and learning, I am a firm believer that experience and hands-on training supersedes bookwork and lecturing, at least on a personal level. I find that when I get the opportunity to see the equipment for myself and have things explained to me as I actively work, I learn things faster and they actually stick, and this is what I love about working in the studio.

My favorite thing to do so far has either been doing sound or operating the camera.  Working with audio is something that I am extremely interested in so learning more about it in an interactive environment has been great. In addition to sound, I have taken a strong liking to video work, so getting in some time behind the camera, especially one of the studio's caliber, has also been a great experience.  

The only thing I really didn't like doing was being the director/producer. I have a good eye for what looks good in frame and on screen, but I don't multi-task well enough to call out shots, look at setting up shots farther down the line and then trying to tell the switcher and the camera operators what to do next.

If I had to pick something that I wanted to learn to do better, I would say directing and working at the soundboard more often. Both of these positions are critical to making a great program and being proficient at them would be a great asset to me and my Communications career. Overall, being in the studio has been a fulfilling experience and I look foreword to learning as much as possible.