Sound // Post-Production

 Through our research we soon realised how sound (mainly incidental music) would be vital to creating the right atmosphere in our film opening.

A couple of weeks ago someone suggested to us a website where you can download royalty free music this person has created themselves for free! The website is http://incompetech.com/ We then had a listen and heard how the songs were actually pretty good! Wilhelmina then found the following songs and suggested them to Indya and I.

The House Of Leaves


This incidental music is really quite good to have as a soundtrack for the opening of a movie as the music starts quietly and then gradually builds up to create tension and worry to the audience. The slightly high pitched melody throughout sounds a bit like a children's wind up toy box sound which links well to the doll in our opening. All things considered at first we thought this would be quite a good piece to use until we heard other pieces (some of the ones below) which we thought were more suitable in creating the correcting atmosphere.

The Dread


I really like this piece as incidental music for two main reasons. There is a low, bass sound throughout that is often used in supernatural horror movies as it is if any normal background sound has been intensified and put into a much lower pitch to make the audience feel on edge and as if something bad may happen. The other thing I like is the high pitched sound that is put over the top of the bass. This sound tends to change a bit more making the piece feel uneasy which helps create an ominous atmosphere for a film opening. We decided to use this piece for the start and end of our film as we believed it suited our movie opening best as it wasn't really dramatic and relied more on the idea of 'less is more' as with not many sounds going on the audience may feel less safe and scared of seeing the antagonist.

Anxiety


We thought this piece was a little similar to 'The Dread' because of the high pitched noise that tends to fluctuate about a bit. Therefore it was a condendor to be played at the start of the piece. However, hearing it and comparing it to 'The Dread' we felt it didn't have enough of a texture and lacked the ability to really make the audience feel nervous and on edge so we did not use it.

Fire Prelude


When Wilhelmina found this she instantly liked it as she associated the initially banging/knocking noise with someone actually banging or knocking. On first hearing Indya and I agreed as it put us on edge and made us feel as though someone or something was making a continuous sound to attract attention and lure an innocent stock character into a place of danger. This fitted perfectly with our opening as Indya (Suzanne Moors) is drawn to the room where the antagonist is because of a doll on the floor. Therefore we decided to introduce the music when the doll appears.

Overall in the end we decided to use 'The Dread' for the start of our opening and then later when the doll is introduced we will use 'Fire Prelude'. We have also used 'The Dread' for the end when the title ('Malediction') appears.