A composition I did for an excellent "Sound Design for Film & Video" class I took @ Foothill College in 2009.
I'm just getting started with songwriting. Been playing guitar for many years on and off, almostl exclusively covers.
Story behind the song
I completed this assignment using content from sound effects libraries I've accumulated over the years. There were 25+ tracks in the Pro Tools session I used to assemble this. Did some pretty radical processing on certain audio sources to get the sound I was after.
The specific assignment was stated as:
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"This is an audio-only assignment that draws on elements of sound design we've discussed so fara€”noise, musique concrète, field recording, ambience, foley, effects processing and sound/image relations. The project is to compose a Soundscape that creates a sense of place, time and atmosphere. You can think of it as a musical composition, even though it shouldn't contain traditional musical elements.
You should start by thinking of a location, preferably an expansive one, and the kinds of sounds it contains. This could be an urban environmenta€“Fisherman's Wharf, Golden Gate Park, the Financial District in San Francisco come to mind. Or it could be in London, Paris, Tokyo, Mexico City. It might be a farm in Iowa or a village in Morocco.
Then what you need to do is start collectings sounds from which to create the environment. This requires that you imagine yourself in this place, determining what it should, would or could sound like. The soundscape can be highly realistic, impressionistic or even surrealistic, but it has to create a tangible world for the listener and it needs to suggest the movement of timea€“in other words, there's a progression of some kind. So it's like a short film without images. It's okay to use snatches of conversation (think Revolution #9) or even a musical instrument briefly if necessary (you might hear a bit of calliope music at a circus, for example). The audio tracks of THX1138, Eraserhead and Forbidden Planet are great examples of soundscape used in film. You could listen to those tracks without the picture and still have a strong impression of the world of the film."
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This was an awesome class!
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