Why is the sound so bad on this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E9DTgWo9aCY
I've heard plenty of amateur stuff which is loads better.
I've heard plenty of amateur stuff which is loads better.
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Why is the sound so bad?
- Thread starter gorillaonabike
- Start date
Me too! My reaction was exactly the same as yours and was confused initially followed by a feeling of 'I don't like this.' I then turned on 'film maker' mode to figure out what was going on.
Of particular annoyance was the foley they used. Where did they get such mis-matched foley? There is an initial hotel scene which sounds as if there are a ton of people in there when you can only see 2. Why on earth did they pick that? They had enough money they could've made their own foley for nothing!
Personally, I'm just annoyed they had a half-decent name actor (Virginia Hey), money, a good title sequence, a decent camera and then wrecked their own production through bad sound. It's crazy. They'd have done a better job by hiring me and I'm not a sound guy!
If the audience thinks one way, then unless you're making some sort of "auteur," "avant garde" film and you don't care about the audience, then you have to think that way. It's a fools errand on a filmmaking forum to teach yourself to ignore the audience, as a filmmaker.
A good title in a good movie is great. A good title in a bad movie is just an indication of money being spent on the wrong things. Just my opinion.
I bet he delegated. It's such a team sport and everything. So he let the sound person, sound design person and sound whatever person take charge. That's some real good filmmaking. I'm joking of course, but I'm sure most filmmakers find my humor offensive.
Bottom line is, it's the director's fault. Whether it's bad acting or bad lighting, or bad sound, or bad whatever, it's the director's fault. If stuff is good, then it's to the credit of whoever did it of course, but good for the director for having picked the right people. If it's bad whatever, and the director doesn't arrest it, it's his/her fault.
To be honest I don't agree. This was a FUNDAMENTAL filmmaking error and by fundamental I mean: 1. An error which will at least severely impair the "watchability" for an average audience, if not completely destroy it, and therefore 2. A severe, unacceptable error period, regardless of ANY other consideration, including available budget. Had this error been made by a zero budget first-time filmmaker I would of course find it more understandable (though still no more acceptable!) and for this reason, I would have said exactly the same as I have in this thread, although considerably less brutally!
I find it interesting that you feel far fewer people here would pick up on the issue had it been an essentially no budget production. I agree with you by the way but for me that not only raises the obvious problem that the makers of this film "pissed away" $50k but also raises the problem that many members here would not pickup on or would be more accepting of this (unacceptable!) error. I've probably worked with nearly 100 different professional directors in my time and without exception, every single one of them would have said (within the first few seconds) something along the lines of: "That's appallingly bad ADR" and "where the hell is all the Foley?". Furthermore, to varying degrees they would ALL be capable of far more detailed criticism of the sound than I have given. Now I know few members here are professional directors but many of them aspire to be or at least aspire to create near professional appearing films.
I understand what you're trying to say and entirely agree with you that as filmmakers a far deeper understanding and appreciation of all the individual filmmaking elements is obviously essential. However, this statement raises some vitally important issues!
1. A fundamental flaw in one of the main filmmaking elements will likely result in an audience just thinking it's bad film, regardless of how well any of the other elements have been executed. When we concentrate on the filmmaking elements it's often difficult to differentiate a fundamental flaw from just a run of the mill flaw, of which there are always plenty (even with substantial budgets). One of the main reasons for this difficulty is because a run of the mill flaw or even something which isn't a flaw at all, can become a fundamental flaw depending on context, the interaction with the other filmmaking elements. This ultimately is why a film requires a director, someone with executive power over the film itself, rather than over one or more of the filmmaking elements. IE. Someone in charge of the result of the interaction/combination of filmmaking elements, rather than in charge of the filmmaking elements themselves. What makes the director's role such a difficult one is that they not only have to have a substantial knowledge of all the filmmaking elements so they can create a vision of how those elements will interact (and then direct the creators of those elements accordingly) but they also have to be able to completely forget they have any filmmaking knowledge, completely disassociate themselves from their creation and look at the film as a first time audience member would. This is one of the reasons why the producer's role is also critical, because they provide an additional line of defence against the "can't see the wood for the trees" syndrome.
2. As most of you will know, I often criticise amateur films for their lack (often complete lack) of sound design. What then makes this film "so bad" in comparison? Well, many amateur films don't have a specific visual aesthetic style or rather, often have a (deliberately or not) "nondescript" aesthetic. No sound design will also result in a nondescript aesthetic, one probably not dramatically dissimilar to the visuals. While none of this is desirable, at least there's not too much contrast between aesthetic styles (albeit unwittingly!). This film does have a visual aesthetic style (or at least an attempted one) and a bizarre (presumably unwitting) aural aesthetic, one which does dramatically contrast with the visual style. It's this dramatic contrast which makes this film "so bad". Think of an average, serious amateur film with average serious amateur actors. The result will probably be a rather weak but passable acting performance. Now replace the female supporting actress with Meryl Streep. Ignoring her fame/box office pull and assuming a usual world class performance from her and exactly the same performance from the rest of the cast, have we got a better film? We've almost certainly got a worse film because now we've got a contrast, a contrast which will highlight/emphasise the weakness of the rest of the cast and what seemed a passable overall performance before now seems incompetent!
BTW, I'm not inferring from your quote that you're not already aware of all this Nick, I'm just using it to get on my soap box!
That's exactly what I meant by "Audio Perspective".
And this is why it's such a fundamental flaw!
1. As a filmmaker you want your audience to be involved in or at least thinking about the story you are trying to tell. If your audience is instead trying to figure out what's wrong with the film, then you've already failed, regardless of the reason and regardless of the skill/accomplishment of any of the filmmaking crafts.
2. You never want to loose/disassociate your audience from your story at any point in your film but of all the points to disassociate them, at/near the beginning is the absolute worst!
G