Instructors: Dan Hosken, Elizabeth Sellers

We will be meeting in the Music Technology Lab in Cypress Hall, Room 238

Cypress Hall (the music building) is all the way down on Nordhoff—

it will take about 10 minutes to walk there from the Art and Design Center

Music Unit:

Cues for Listening:

• Goldsmith: Basic Instinct Theme:
• Pad1:
• Pad2:
• Pad3:
• Edwards: Nightmare Sequence:
• Edwards: Nighttime Sketches:
• Edwards: "True Vengeance":
• Edwards: "Jeanelle" Theme:
• Edwards: "Lionheart" Suite:

Download them as AIFFs here

Sound Design Unit:

Here's a very useful site with a ton of reading material, interviews, etc.: http://www.filmsound.org/

Here are some links to free online sample libraries—I haven't used any of these extensively, so your mileage may vary…

• Sound samples from Berklee College of Music Synthesis Department: http://wiki.laptop.org/go/Sound_samples
• The freesound project: http://freesound.iua.upf.edu/
• Sample Swap: http://www.sampleswap.org/
• TweakHeadz Lab: http://www.tweakheadz.com/samples.html

Here are some more interesting Video Clips (these might give you other sound design ideas):

• from Stanley Kubrick's 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968). This clip starts at "Intermission" with two minutes of unusual music. When the scene starts, notice the incredibly simple sound: breathing, air supply, and ambient rumble from interior of ship (comes in only when camera is on guy inside ship). The dramatic death scene is played in total silence.
• from Andrei Tarkovksy's Solaris (1972). This is actually the DVD menu. As stupid as it sounds, this is actually a pretty subtle piece of sound design. All ambient (not sync'ed to visuals) it builds up a partially natural soundscape which is related to important themes and imagery from the film.
• from Francis Ford Coppola's The Conversation. We looked at the dream sequence the first week week. This is the opening sequence—notice the sound modifications that give the sense of surveillance.

Reading for March 12 class (please do the reading before class):

• Sound By Design by Nick Peck (Electronic Musician, March 1, 2001)
• Sound By Design by Nick Peck (this version includes the graphics, but also ads)

Video Clips for the March 12 class (please view these before the class):

• Write down all of the sound elements that you hear in this video clip. If you can identify them as Hard FX, Foley, etc. that's fine, but just try to take note of all the types of sounds that you here and how it relates to the scene narratively and emotionally.
  • Scene from Kill Bill, Vol. I
• Listen to the way that sound is used in this dream sequence. How might it differ from a non-dream realistic scene? What sound elements clue you in that this is a dream?
  • Scene from The Conversation
• Just for fun, find the sound error in this video clip:
  • Scene from Star Wars, Episode V, The Empire Strikes Back

Dr. Hosken's Homepage

Music Technology Area

CSUN Music Department

CSUN