One thing that really didn't jibe so well was discussing these two parts:
Discussion is had about how important it is for the cockpit sirens to be "real". Sure, I understand that. But the only people who are ever going to appreciate that are the pilots & other authorised entrants in the cockpit. Those siren sounds could be whatever the heck you wanted, and still sound pretty legit to the general movie-going audience.
Shortly after, talk is about how much effort they put into altering the sounds... the ones that real-life passengers are more likely to actually hear... and changing those to make them much more dramatic.
I really don't get that. Show the audience the realism in the area they will never experience to compare? And fudge the sounds in the areas where they most likely actully are, for dramatic effect?
Ah, it made absolute sense to me, I think you are getting confused between realism and perception. Consider these points:
1. Alarms in the cockpit are a purely aural phenomena.
2. You want an alarm to sound dramatic, to immediately grab the pilot's attention, to be annoying so it won't be ignored and to be different to all the other potential aural alarms so the pilot can identify which alarm is which.
3. You don't need to design all of this for every alarm in post production, it's already been painstakingly sound designed by the equipment manufacturers! Why reinvent the wheel when most of the hard work has already been done, just record reality.
Now, compare those points with the following points regarding the perception of all the sounds in the cabin and the operation of the engines and other mechanical parts:
1. None of the perception of these events is purely aural.
2. None of these sounds have been designed for dramatic impact. If anything the opposite is true, they may have been designed to make as little objectionable noise as possible.
3. Just recording what the passengers would hear in the cabin is only one part of what the passengers would perceive/experience. As well as hear, we physically feel the cabin shaking and the operation of the engine and other mechanical parts. Also, in addition to the physical and aural sensations there is an emotional response which also forms part of the perception/experience.
In film we only have sight and sound, so we use sound design to go beyond the restriction of only what the passengers would hear and instead, try to recreate what the passengers would experience. When done convincingly, this is far more involving and exciting for the audience than only feeding them with realistic sound. To me, this really is the heart of sound design. It's not about the most realistic sound, it's about involving the audience in the story by enhancing the story telling.
G
