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| Artwork by Salvator Dali. Edited by me. |
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| Artwork by Sally Mann. Edited by me. |
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| Artwork by Ben Goosens. Edited by me. |
I also took time out to critique several other students' soundscapes. Here were my findings:
Andrew Cooke's "'Optimism" from A02:
Andrew's soundscape on "Optimism," is insightful and inspiring because it best depicts optimism in the midst of difficulties and hardships. Aurally, we hear this with darker and sometimes eerie sound effects. A low instrumentation signaled meloncholy and despairing moods. However, midway through his soundscape, we hear a child's laughter, and the mood changes from slow, depressing and sad to upbeat and cheerful. The imagery also goes from lighter to darker, starting with a woman drowning and ending with balloon-faced men, floating in a bright, blue sky. Like life, we have moments where we're surrounded by difficult situations, but in the end, if we maintain the optimism, we, too can be balloon-faced men, floating in a bright, blue sky. Some of the concepts I noticed were Andrew's manipulation of time, starting with a slow, dragging sad song (making the soundscape seem longer) and ending with an upbeat, cheerful song (making the soundscape move quickly through). Also, Andrew's manipulation of space can be heard with the certain sound effects chosen. With the darker ones in the beginning, it seemed like one was making an ascension from underwater to the sky, as the mood moved from sad to happy. I thought Andrew's soundscape was entertaining, innovative, and overall original. To make two soundscapes within one is completely genius. Good job, bro!
Grace Roulston's "Relief" from A03:
Grace's soundscape on "Relief" was definitely an entertaining one that really haunted and blessed the ears if you closed your eyes and envisioned everything that was going on. Almost like watching a movie, "Relief" began with eerie doors opening, a strong windstorm, and some odd character walking through the woods (judging by the footsteps in some creepy forest). Entertaining already, the soundscape turns into a bigger drama when the character dives/drowns/swims/submerges into the water. For about 30 seconds we are engulfed in heartbeats, a struggle underwater and bubbles. Finally just as we think the character is gone, he or she emerges out of the water calmly, only to find that we (and the character) are relieved of what happened to them. Immediately, the first concept I notice that Grace uses is the manipulation of space. Her soundscape has your ears follow the footsteps from the dark woods, into the water, and out somewhere safe and calm. Furthermore, her manipulation of time is also notable. Grace uses silence for a good couple seconds to confuse or disorient her listeners when the character goes underwater. I feel as if it is very cinematic and very original. I enjoyed Grace's soundscape and encourage others to listen to it.
This soundscape does a great job of creating a space. First the listener hears someone’s heart beat as he or she opens and closes a door, entering a location. The looped music in the background is tense, and when combined with the distant noise of the yelling group of people it gives the impression of being in a crowded, cluttered, dangerous setting. The addition of the series of crashes and breaking objects make me think of a fight or chase scene. I really don’t think the first and last images the creators used match the sounds that are presented. Even the second one is questionable because they are children and the scene is much more dramatic than something kids might be involved in. The soundscape demonstrates the Gestalt principal of a unified whole, where every individual aspect builds to create a more significant figure. Separately, the sounds could serve a variety of purposes. For instances, the yelling in the background could be applied to any scene of a group of people, the crashing could be an accident, and the music could just be something from a radio. When combined, however, they are symbolic of a dangerous, intense, and possibly violent scene. The soundscape is very powerful, and accurately presents a space without being excessive.
ReplyDeleteThis soundscape really does embody the emotion of rage, and I think what most contributes to this is the low guitar riff. It just reminds me of a heavy metal song which are usually filled with rage.
ReplyDeleteAll of the layers within the soundscape really contribute to the Manipulation of Space. First we are introduced to the sounds of a rioting crowd (also contributing greatly to the emotion of rage), and then depth is added as there are sounds of breaking and glass breaking that fade amongst the background of the noise. And then we hear the gun shots that bring us back to the foreground. All of the layers make the scene very aurally deep. Also because of the fact that no guns appear in the images, the gun shots are off-screen creating more space outside of the frame. As if there is more than just what we see in the picture.
As far as the Gestalt Principles are concerned, they were also covered very well. I already mentioned how the layers of sound created depth within the soundscape, especially because some sounds such as the crashing are made more quiet and seem to be in the background and others like the gun shot are loud and in the foreground. Illusion is also present in this soundscape because if I am hearing correctly there aren't much more than 4 tracks in the soundscape, but it appears that there is much more going on.
All of the noises included in this soundscape represented rage very well, from people yelling and shooting guns. What I thought was the best part was the intensity that built up throughout the beginning. With the bass going along with each sound being made. It’s as if the people yelling and breaking things were part of the beat. It added a whole dynamic onto the rage emotion. The manipulation of sound was represented with the rhythm of the baseline. Everything was timed to fit along with the bass, which was moving at a fast tempo. When a bass moves fast it really represents anger or rage like they were showing. The space represented a confined area with glass breaking and people yelling like it was in a bar. The idea to show rage in such a small confined area really makes the listener feel uncomfortable. When a person feels uneasy listening to a song and it’s supposed to represent rage then it did its job. The illusion of a bar fight was great. It seems like they didn’t need a lot of layers to show what they were doing. They were able to show a bar fight with few layers making it a great illusion. It seemed like so much was going on during the song, and they only made it in Garageband.
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