DE0968 Sound Design S poken Word Individual Project Sophie Tyler Interactive Media Design Year 2

1. DE0968Sound DesignSpoken Word Individual ProjectSophie TylerInteractive Media Design Year 2

2. Content List • Introduction • Initial Ideas • Final Idea • Research • Using Ableton • Soundtrack Development • Final Soundtrack • Video Development • Final Video • Conclusion

3. Introduction The spoken word is the oldest form of sound and for many years we have been making each other cry and shout with joy with the words we say. For this project I am going to choose a spoken word which I will then create an original soundtrack on Ableton which is three minutes long. this project will challenge me with extensive use of Ableton which is a program I have only started to learn recently Initial Ideas For this project I decided to first initial idea as many speeches and spoken words from movies and histories that inspire and appeal to me. I brainstormed my ideas below. Pride and Prejudice Mr. Darcy's Proposal Gladiator As one Speech Braveheart Speech Spoken Word Winston Churchill Speech Independence Day Speech Martin Luther Kings Speech Gladiator My Name is Maximus

4. Final Idea From the initial ideas I have decided to use Mr. Darcy's proposal speech from Pride and Prejudice. I have decided on this for my project because Pride and Prejudice is one of my favourite books and is an emotional speech which I believe can be personified with sound. For this project then I am going to use classical music style to create the sound. The speech is written below… “In vain I have struggled. It will not do. My feelings will not be repressed. You must allow me to tell you how ardently I admire and love you. In declaring myself thus, I am fully aware that I will be going expressly against the wishes of my family, my friends, and, I hardly need add, my own better judgment. The relative situation of our families is such that any alliance between us must be regarded as a highly reprehensible connection. Indeed, as a rational man, I cannot but regard it as such myself, but it cannot be helped.Almost from the earliest moments of our acquaintance, I have come to feel for you a passionate admiration and regard, which, despite all my struggles, has overcome every rational objection, and I beg you, most fervently, to relieve my suffering and consent to be my wife.”

5. Research Pride and Prejudice is a novel by Jane Austen first published in1813. It tells the story of Elizabeth Bennet as she tries to struggle through life's problems of manners, family, obligation and love. Mainly love as she meets the insufferable Mr. Darcy and falls in love. Over the years Pride and Prejudice has been made into many adaptations the most notable being the 1995 BBC television series starring a memorable performance by Colin Firth as Mr. Darcy. Another is the 2005 adaptation. Using Ableton To create the soundtrack for my project I am using a software called Ableton Live Suite 9. this software I have never used before so before I started creating the soundtrack I had to learn some basics of using Ableton. I have struggled a lot with Ableton with even the most basic instructions being a challenge for me. With my struggle to learn Ableton it took me a while to complete the soundtrack for my project. Ways I used to learn Ableton was online forums, YouTube tutorials, instructions from Trev and spending time on Ableton to find out all the settings.

6. Soundtrack Development I have created the final soundtrack on Ableton Live Suite 9 in total it is 3 minutes long. Using Ableton I was able to use different features to create the sound. The screenshot below shows an overview of Ableton with different layers of sound I created. On the bottom is effects I added to different layers. As well you can see on the screenshot some of the sound waves which I could add effect too and edit. For all layers of the sound they have the main settings box above with this I can change the volume, name and other features of the sound.

7. Soundtrack Development Originally the sound was very different to the final but after technical difficulties this file was lost and I had to start again. This also meant that I had to spend time creating new notes and material to use for the sound. The difficulties I had with Ableton involved downloading the program and save an exporting files being disable which meant I also lost the original file I had started.

8. Final Soundtrack The final soundtrack consists of the speech split into small sections through the track until having the whole speech at the end. The music is then split into a short ‘chorus’ and then a ‘melody’. The chorus is very light representing the joys of love and parts of the speech are overlaid with this. The melody though is a stronger music what this represents is the torment that Darcy is in. The speech in a whole is him a proud man admitting his feelings to to the woman he loves not an easy thing for him to do and troubles him greatly I believe the music reflects this. Speech Parts ChorusMelody

9. Video Development For the final video I created it in Adobe After Effects cs6 this is a program I have used before and I am confident at using it. The concept for the video is first of a video showing the plain pages of a book being turned this would be discolored like old paper and then faded out it will run for the full 3 minutes though. Then scenes from the 2005 adaptation of Pride and Prejudice will go behind the book video and run one after the other. Parts of the speech written in Edwardian script will then fade in and out accordingly along with the soundtrack. The soundtrack will then be inserted into the file last. The screenshot above shows the adobe after effects file before I started creating the video with a blank screen. The image to the right shows the videos I imported into the project file to go in the video later.

10. Video Development The first part of the video I created was the book which turned to edit the video I had to copy and paste it several times to reach the three minutes. I then discolored the video to give an old paper look. the final thing I did was lower the opacity to 65% this I took down to 40% later when putting the other videos in. The final thing I did later was enlarge the video slightly to have a whole page view most of the time.

11. Video Development The next part of the video I created was the scenes I had chosen to put behind the book. These were simple to drag onto and then crop down to the section I wanted. I then dragged them into place along the 3 minutes. The sound was also dragged onto a new layer and the audio turned on. I then created key frames to have the sound fade out at the end.

12. Video Development The final parts of the video was adding the text which I added at intervals and it faded in and out. The text was in Edwardian script to show an old handwriting style. Lastly I rendered the video in QuickTime.

13. Final Video The final video came out well in high quality sound and video. The scenes from the movie adaptation I had chosen blended well with the book turning on the top which was just at the right opacity level. The text as well is placed on the right points on the page and the font style matches in well with the theme. In a way this final video has brought the idea of novels being movies now in a visual sense with the combination of both.

14. Conclusion This project has been one of my most difficult with my struggle to learn the new software Ableton and because of my problems with the software it took me longer then I would have liked to create the final video and soundtrack. If I was to do this project again I would approach it with more confidence now with more knowledge on using Ableton. As well if I was to do this project again I would select a topic or speech completely out of my comfort zone to challenge myself. This project overall has been very good testing many skills and creating new ones and the work I have produced I am proud of.