sound Making digital audio sound analogue: Will my idea work?

Yodaman

Yodaman

Hey guys!

I'm currently in the process of writing a film designed to look like it's from the 1980s, and I'm currently thinking up ways to work on the audio design for the film.

In order to make my film sound like it's from the 80s, I've spent a lot of time working with audio distortion filters on my computer (which I no longer have) and trying to simulate an analogue sound, as though the audio was recorded on tape, just like the old days. Unfortunately, the filters I had didn't work as expected, and I learned it was very difficult to process audio to make it sound "fuzzy" but also still very clear. Then I came up with the following idea, and I'm curious to learn what you guys think.

Basically, my plan is to obtain several 60-minute cassette tapes from Wal-Mart, and a tape recorder. Using an external shotgun mic attached to a boom pole, I'll record my dialog directly to cassette tape, and then using a tape-to-PC deck I'll transfer the audio to digital mp3s. But before I transfer them, I'm going to spend a few days (possibly weeks) wearing down the tapes by playing them constantly until they've been slightly degraded. I'm also going to do this for the music. It's my hope that this will give me a more analogue "feel" to the audio, and hopefully it will help give the impression that the film is, unquestionably, from the 80s.

With my camera I'm still going to record audio digitally, and while I'm spending a few weeks wearing down the audio tapes I'm going to use the digital audio as a reference so that I can still edit the film together. Then when the tapes are ready, I'll simply dub over the purely digital audio with the analogue transfers. And wah-la, a soundtrack that sounds "old but clear" will be born!

Do you guys think this is worth it? I personally think it is, and I'm really curious to know if anyone has ever done anything like this before.
 
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Yeah, most definitely. Soundtracks are incredibly important and I do not underestimate them (mostly because I learned not to with a few experimental videos I did a few years back :P ).

I just REALLY want to give this movie of mine a "nostalgic" feel, and this is my plan on how to do it...

  1. Run the footage through some video/film degradation filters in Sony Vegas to make it look like it's on a VHS tape
  2. Produce sound effects for static during the first few seconds of the film and add the old "dial" sound that sometimes played on old VHS tapes for whatever reason (does anyone know what I'm talking about?)
  3. Run all of the songs to be used in the movie and the dialog through audio filters to degrade them slightly, again adding static in certain areas to give it that feeling of being on a VHS tape

I know that a lot of movie producers/directors want the film to be as CLEAN as possible, but in this case I don't feel like I can evoke the same feeling if I kept everything "clean". I purposely want to degrade the film to make it feel/look like it's on a VHS tape from the late 80s-early 90s. :P
 
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There is nothing immoral about using the current technology, and there is nothing sacred about "old school" methods. What I and other old farts like me do bemoan is a lack of appreciation for the history of our art.
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This is gold for so many reasons. :yes: :yes: :yes: I second, third and fourth your sentiments, Alcove.
 
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Yeah, that's what I'm going to do now. Do you have any recommendations for audio editing software, Alcove? I'm thinking about Sound Forge from Sony; has anyone had any experience with that?
 
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Pro Tools is the industry standard and is fairly pricey - $600 - but you are no longer married to Avid/Digidesign hardware.

Any DAW will work, but video compatibility and staying in sync is the major issue, as is importing OMF/AAF files and frame rate pull-ups/pull-downs. What NLE are you using?
 
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I don't have it yet, but I used the trial of Sony Vegas Movie Studio Platinum to create this video and distort the audio in that video and really liked it. The software Sony makes is some of the best software I've ever used; I like it much better than any Adobe program I've tried (both the pro and consumer versions of Premiere).

It's another reason I think using Sound Forge would be wise; I could integrate it with Movie Studio. :)
 
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In the future I will always "worldize". I wanted to do it on the last movie and let the sound nerds talk me into letting them do it with filters, EQ, layered on hiss tracks, etc... never again. I was not happy with the end result. I'm sure better engineers could have done better, but just making it part of my aesthetic from here on out to always worldize.
 
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@Gonzo I worldized the TV anchor dialogue in the music video I recently did.

It's the ONLY way to go totally authentic and get a great result.

Lots of things can be worldized, as well.

My colleagues are constantly one-upping each other on this. The way I did the music video was place the mics in the same general area you would be listening to it in each shot. The sound designers and mixers I have showed it to are one for one amazed at the realism.

It's the only way to go. If you have the time and care, that is.
 
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Gonzo_Entertainment said:
In the future I will always "worldize". I wanted to do it on the last movie and let the sound nerds talk me into letting them do it with filters, EQ, layered on hiss tracks, etc... never again. I was not happy with the end result. I'm sure better engineers could have done better, but just making it part of my aesthetic from here on out to always worldize.
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It all depends upon your "toys". I've used Altiverb and Speakerphone combined with other plugins to great effect - pun partially intended. But it requires almost as much time and care as worldizing, and you have to think your way through the process as if you were going to actually do the worldizing.
 
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Yeah, like I said, if you have the time and care for it, certainly do the worldizing. But, there can be some good digital in-the-box alternatives if you need to go that route, too.

But worldizing just sounds so good!!!
 
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