Sound Production

Setting the scene for your documentary is as much about music as it is about facts and footage. Music can be used to enhance a film or shape the mood of the moment in a particular part of the film.

Patricio Guzman, a Chilean documentary film director, states that a documentary captures the real rhythm of life: "I believe there is natural music that is very important in documentary it comes out in descriptive scenes. Imagine a scene with the sound of traffic in th background, or someone singing, or a police care driving away."

The role music plays in documentaries is a subtle but important one; it can be a powerful motivator in helping convey the meaning and power of the film; good music can help move a story along and underscore the emotions of a sequence.

Our decision to use instrumental music derived was inspired by some of the skateboarding documentaries we watched. However, we thought it would be very difficult to make this ourselves in the amount of time and lack of experience with creating music. In order to overcome this, we decided to research some instrumental music on YouTube and after endless searching we found the following songs, which we thought were appropriate for a documentary and the skateboarding theme:

Erykah Badu - Didn't Cha Know (Loop Instrumental)
J Dilla - Life (Instrumental)

We tried getting in contact with the following YouTube accounts that uploaded these instrumentals and the artists who own them, since we thought it was worth a shot. In order to do so, we created a twitter account, as this would allow us to get in contact with the artists themselves immediately. We also posted a few of our videos from our YouTube Channel, mentioned on the Distribution and Exhibition Page.

The Use of a Voiceover

Our main voiceover at the beginning of our film is another key part of our sound production process. Initially, Tamuka was going to do the voiceover, but I suggested that it could be better to use a female voice so the short film's skateboarding topic could appeal to the other gender; it's a very male dominated sport.

We then agreed and asked one of our female friends to do it, but after thought we thought it would much more personal if the voiceover came from the filmmakers themselves, hence I became the conventional "voice of God".

The voiceover is used at the beginning of our documentary short to introduce our topic and the journey we went on to discover it. A key part of the voiceover is when I talk about the archive footage we decide to include of what the Southbank skate park community looked like back in the

1970's .

The second voiceover at the end of our documentary short is just as significant as the first because it explains the film's title - 'Its Not Raining'. This one on the other hand, was done by Tamuka since he came up with idea, allowing him

to explain it from personal

experience and

connect with the

audience.

Why we chose to use these particular instrumentals?

Erykah Badu - Didn't Cha Know (Loop Instrumental): we chose this instrumental for the first half of our documentary short because it's very upbeat and is a great way to get our audience instantly interested in our topic, even if they don't skateboard or know anything about the subcultutre in London. Upbeat music affects your mood as it essentially makes you feel uplifted and happy, linking to the positive message that we want to put across. This type of upbeat music may help get our message across to the audience.

‘People were successful at raising their positive mood as long as the music they listened to was happy and upbeat,’ said Dr Yuna Ferguson, the lead author of The Journal of Positive Psychology.

J Dilla - Life (Instrumental): this instrumental was suggested by Tamuka, whereby we listened to it and then edited it in to our short film. It got some positive feedback, as one person said it complements the interview scene with Khi well, so we decided to stick to our decision and use it.

By Ashley Fontaine