Exercise: Voiceover

  • Due Sunday by 3:30pm
  • Points 5
  • Submitting a file upload

Assignment 2: Voiceover 

Produce a short (3 minute max) video on one of the two films assigned for this week (either Persepolis or Biidaaban; Frozen is also an option) using your own voiceover. The voiceover should relay an anecdote or dream, tell a joke, recite a piece of writing, or otherwise provide an independent channel of material. The content can be your own original material or a reading of something others have written.   Whatever material you choose to record for the voice-over it MUST be read/spoken/whispered/sung/chanted in your own voice.

In addition, the project must incorporate some sound from the film itself. You may select the sound from anywhere in the film and you may edit the sound  to mix in different ways with your Voiceover.  Video should be one continuous sequence from the film (running at least 2 minutes long; 3 minutes max); duration and/or scale of the video can be manipulated, but it should include no new video edits.

Remember to title your .mp4 or .mov file with your name first, then exercise title.  Hence, JB_Voiceover.mp4

Video Essays About/Employing VoiceOvers

Of the below examples of video essays, please especially study those by Ian Garwood and Barbara Zecchi, which appear first in the list that follows, as well as "Mediated Auscultation" by Emilia Talijan and "With a Camera in Hand (I Was Alive)" by Katie Bird.   The others are available for you to consider as examples and models, as you choose.

  • To think more about VoiceOver approaches watch Ian Garwood, “The Place of Voiceover in Academic Audiovisual Film Criticism Links to an external site.” (20 min).
  • Watch/study (then rewatch, for good measure!), Barbara Zecchi, "Empowering the Accent: An (accented) Video Essay Links to an external site." (8.5 min)
  • One of the video essays that Zecchi uses as an example in the above is Evelyn Kreutzer's "Berlin Moves Links to an external site." (14 min).  I've embedded it here as a wonderful example of whispering and other "accented" throat and voice gestures that work well in relationship to the visual dynamics and concept at stake.  Kreutzer, you may recall, is the author of "Footsteps" (on listening to the films of Alfred Hitchcock) that we watched for day one of class.
  • But one doesn't need to whisper or purposefully "accent" sonic gestures to command attention.  You may recall the "accented" voice of Maud Ceuterick, in her comparative study of "Resilient Aging Women: A Question of Performance Links to an external site.," which we watched for the introductory day of this class.  Listen again to the first few minutes of her VoiceOver and think about the implications of this voice in relation to the "tone" of written, academic studies.  How does her accent heighten (or detract from) the objectives of the essay?
  • To compare what might be termed more conventional voice-over styles, study these two examples: 1)  “Mediated Auscultation” Links to an external site. (Emilija Talijan, 2021; 9 min).  and 2) Spencer Bell, Nobody Knows My Name Links to an external site., (Liz Greene, 2022; 13 min).  Notice that in many ways the two voices—both coded as female—are similar.  Both approach the voice over in a relatively straightforward manner.  Both offer a sort of explanatory, historical, critical take on their object of inquiry and both incorporate an array of academic citations in a fluid, compelling way.  But they “feel” very different.   Why is that?  (I could add that the relationship between the stethoscope and cinema that Talijan teases out in "Mediated Auscultation" fascinates me, and draws attention to a subject that can only be pursued in this way if one can "hear" the connections.   Greens' study also makes a historical argument, in this case about racist representations in studio-era Hollywood cinema, specifically the 1925 version of Wizard of Oz.  She achieves this goal in part by playing the selected sequences in reverse order, another critical structure impossible to replicate in written form.
  • It may seem odd to include Katie Bird's With a Camera in Hand (I Was Alive) Links to an external site. essay in the current context, since she is not recording her own VoiceOver.  But it is fascinating to reflect on how she incorporates her "voice" as continuous, typed text, while simultaneously including a recorded, male-coded, presumably "objective" or "authoritative" style VoiceOver in the audio track.  Watch at least the first few minutes of this 10.5 min project.  What do you think of the "female" versus "male," or "subjective" versus "objective," or "written" versus "heard," tensions in the simultaneous scripts?  Please also note that this essay was published in NECSUS (spring 2023) and the video at the top of the page is Bird's recorded "introduction" to her video essay, an approach to the "creator's statement" that this academic journal was testing.  The video essay per se streams below the introduction.
  • Finally, you can’t help but be inspired by Dayna McLeod’s innovations.  Her Speculative Queer Autoethnography: Desert Hearts Links to an external site. video essay employs a voiceover.  Or does it?  Should we call it a voice over when she also inserts herself in the video track as a sort of floating talking head?  What happens when we  “see” the creator speak?  Also, here is McLeod's VoiceOver exercise on Wild at Heart that we watched for day one of this seminar and that follows the same parameters, more or less, as the exercise you are creating this week. I embed it here in case you want to watch it again, especially if you're thinking about how and why you might play with "duration" of a video clip and use slow motion or fast forward. This one offers a wonderful example of why those editing techniques might be useful in your VoiceOver exercise:  Wild at Heterosexuality Links to an external site. 

 

Microphone Options and Audio Equipment

Keep in mind you have several options for recording your voiceover

  • You could record the voiceover directly into DaVinci Resolve or Premiere Pro; see tutorials below
  • You could record on your computer, cell phone or other device using the built in mic and import into your editing program as an audio file.  If you choose this option, I encourage you to test the results in different environments such as a bathroom or a stairwell (often the acoustic quality in these enclosed spaces is very rich), and/or (pro tip!) hang a quilt or other cloth-based material around the area in which you are sitting. 
  • You could use the UW Sound Studio in Odegaard Library, which is available by reservation on a first come, first serve basis.  Here is a link to the interfaces and technology in the Studio: Sound Studio Space Documentation.  Here is a tutorial on the equipment: Digital Audio Tutorial.

 

DaVinci Editing Tutorials

For those of you working with DaVinci, I've pasted in below several useful tutorials for the new skills required in this exercise.   After you import the audio track of your Voiceover (or record it directly in DaVinci), remember that KEYFRAMES, which are added directly in the Edit Page, allow for crescendos or fades and can enable precise control of the audio track.  Keyframes are your friend, and in DaVinci keyframes are super simple:  you can add them (on a Mac) with a simple click of the Option key, as long as your cursor is on the white line (usually located in the middle of the wavelengths) of the respective audio track.    This QuickTip tutorial by Jason Yadlovski explains audio Keyframes simply and well:  How to Keyframe Audio in DaVinci 18 Links to an external site.

Of course, DaVinci has a separate page, called Fairlight, for audio editing.  The Fairlight icon at the bottom of your DaVinci work panel is the one that resembles a musical note.  There are extensive possibilities for audio mixing and fine tuning here, and could deserve extended attention.  For our purposes a few hot tips:

  • Hot tip 1: remember to "normalize" the audio track of your voiceover on the Fairlight page once you've imported the file (a good setting is -3)
  • Hot tip 2: there is a "de-esser" function on the Fairlight page, which will eliminate odd lip sounds and random throat noises:-)
  • To learn about normalizing audio, employing the de-esser option, as well as using "soft clipper" for enhancing the "body" of your voice, watch the first 4-5 minutes of this Beginner's Guide by Jamie Fenn, Fairlight Audio Editing and Mixing in DaVinci Links to an external site. .  The remainder of the guide talks about equalizing and balancing multiple components of your voice, and you are most welcome to try those techniques if you like.  Or earmark them as techniques you'd like to study more later (if choosing to incorporate a voiceover in a final project, for instance).

 

Premiere Pro Editing Tutorials

 

TECHNICAL OVERVIEW

  • Introduction to Voiceover Tool in Adobe Premiere (at a glance)
    • Premiere Pro CC -> Preferences -> Audio Hardware
      • Sample Rate – 48000 Hz
      • Built in Mic
    • Timeline Display Settings
      • Expand All Tracks
      • Locate “Voice-Over Record” icon
      • Mute External Speakers – Feedback Loop
      • Position Playhead
      • Click on the “Voice-Over Record icon
      • Levels should be between -12db and -6db.
    • Working with a scratch track
    • Troubleshooting
      • Check System Preferences -> Sound
        • Confirm System Input and Output are set.
  • Premiere Pro – Basic Audio Editing
    • Working with Multiple Audio Tracks
    • Organization
      • A1 – Source Clip Audio
      • A2 – Voiceover Audio
    • Displaying Waveforms
      • On by default and located in “Timeline Display Settings”
      • Expand Track
    • Volume Adjustments
      • Click and drag the connector line in the audio track to adjust the volume up or down.
      • Right Click on the audio track choose “Adjust Gain”
      • Keyframes and the Pen Tool
        • Command Click the connector line in the audio track or
        • Chose the Pen Tool from the Toolbar
          • Click the connector line where you want to add keyframes
        • Should have two or more keyframes to adjust levels
      • Audio Transitions
        • Default Transitions
          • Right Click in the timeline
        • Effects Tab
          • Click and Drag to the timeline
        • Manipulating Transitions
          • Double click the transition to adjust the duration
        • Recommended Audio Levels
          • Voiceover -12db to -6db
  • Premiere Pro – Duration and Scale
    • Manipulating Clip Speed
      • Speed/Duration
        • Right click on a clip and select “Speed/Duration”
        • Linked vs Unlinked
        • Maintain Audio Pitch
      • Rate Stretch Tool
        • Located in the Toolbar – Click and drag the end of a clip to the desired length.
      • Time Remapping
        • Right Click the upper left “fx” box on a clip in the timeline and select “Time Remapping -> Speed”
        • Add Keyframes
        • Pull Down to slow down
        • Pull Up to speed up
        • Optical Flow
      • Manipulating Position and Scale
        • Double click on a clip
        • Browse to the “Effect Controls” Tab
        • Twirl down the “Scale” triangle
        • Toggle Animation On
        • Set a starting keyframe and an ending keyframe
        • Set a scale value at the starting keyframe and a different value at the ending keyframe.
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