Studio Brief 3: Moving Pictures
Study Task 6: Sound Deconstruction

Chen Winner

Ah! Sunflower from Chen Winner on Vimeo.

In this video by Chen Winner sound has really be used to help enhance the claustrophobic moody atmosphere of film as well as add to the individual moving elements making it seem more much more alive rather than simply a series of simple, relatively static movements.

For example the use of fuzzy ambient background noise and subtle bits of synth work has really created a heavy tension with in the video. The actual sounds of the objects used such as typing, rain falling, train pulling in etc have added to this effect as well as adding to the monotonous movements of the individual elements.

Half way through the video, whilst still remaining ambient, the music changes to being much cleaner and pleasant sounding, reflecting the escape from the city into the wild. This creates a really sudden and immersive change from the initially claustrophobic and negative atmosphere of the first half of the video highlighting just how important sound can be in reinforcing a desired tone within a video.



Cindy Yang

What I really love is the sense of monotony and routine within this video which I feel relates quite strongly to my own work. As with the above video ambient background noises such as wind and traffic are used to add a really heavy sense of banality to the video.

When the accident happens half way through it is really interesting to see how sudden silence can affect a video. It creates what a feel is a really powerful 'deafening silence' which really makes you question what you are looking at, especially when the visual elements start acting confused about what they are mean to be doing.

Although this is an interesting and powerful effect I think my stings will be too short to fully take advantage of it. Therefore I think the main thing to take from both videos is the use of ambient music and back ground noises to build up a sense of tension and mood within my relatively simple stings. In some of them where I have individual moving elements it would be good to try and find sounds that fit the movements so as to further the impression of movement/activity.