Sound Design: Creating a Soundtrack for a Film Clip

Sound brings a film to life. But how do you actually create sound? This hands-on workshop takes you into the world of foley and sound design. Using everyday objects, a little creativity, and a recording device, you and your group will give a film clip a whole new soundscape.

Over four half-day sessions, you’ll learn to listen, experiment, record, and edit. The result? Your own homemade soundtrack and a whole new way of experiencing film.

What you’ll need:

• a good speaker system for listening to sound clips;
• a TV, screen, or projector for viewing film clips;
• blindfolds;
• paper, drawing materials, glue, and scissors;
• a collection of everyday objects for creating sounds – not instruments, but things you can use to make all kinds of sounds;
• a recording device and headphones for each participant, this could be a smartphone or a laptop with a microphone;
• a computer with a basic audio editing program such as Audacity or Reaper.

With this step-by-step guide, you can get started with a group, and create a soundtrack for a film clip of your choice.

We’ll start with a few listening exercises to warm up our ears. We’ll also use pencil and paper to draw sounds. Using objects from a sound kit, we’ll create all kinds of sounds to bring a silent film clip to life. In the final phase, we’ll edit these sounds together and turn them into a homemade soundtrack for the film.