Voice Over Tips

The Voice

An Overview

Without some form of commentary (be it in form of narration of captions) it's hard for viewers to connect with the film. With documentaries it is better to use a voice over as it does not detract from the image on the screen, if people are trying to read captions they will miss what is being said/shown on the rest of the screen.

However, there needs to be space for sound from the film and time for people to absorb what may have been said interviews etc so don't put too much into the voice over. Keep it simple and fresh obeying these 3 rules: simple words, simple sentences, simple grammar.

A voice over should compliment the picture and fit with the images on screen.

When should I write/think about the V/O?

You should be thinking about the voice over the whole way through and if you can go to filming with a draft of the voice over to get all images needed.

It should have a lot of consideration during the edit, so here communication between with the editor is essential. This is essential for shaping sequences and allowing the correct amount of time so voice over doesn't to be rushed.

It is of course important to bear in mind the whole way through about how the voice will fit in the general soundscape and as mentioned before the pictures and original sounds 'need to breathe'

The most important think to consider when choosing a voice is to remember if the voice doesn't fit it will kill the film. The person doesn't necessarily have to have a rich, glossy sounding voice, it's all about the delivery and making the script come to life. It is important that the words on the paper get across the ideas on the screen.

A good voice will be one that sounds interested and like they know the subject matter of the film. The best voice overs are from people who act normally and don't feel self conscious.

The Script

Analyse what you have written to avoid repetitiveness, there is also not much need for lots of adjectives. Make sure you aren't stating the obvious of what is on screen, the audience will feel patronised! For the opening of a film/section make sure you open with a fact or something that will grab and hook your audience into watching the rest of the film.

The layout of the script is also something to bear in mind, of course each reader will have their own preferences but generally speaking make sure your sentences aren't too long and everything is spaced well. Big font is also useful to most. Some people can read better off coloured backgrounds but this is of course different for everyone.

The Recording

There are many techniques to recording a good voice over, they are these:

• Pop shield: not always essential but will prevent explosive and popping sounds coming through in the recording.
• Project the voice!
• Sit up, relax and imagine you are talking to one viewer (your "personal listener")
• Make it more like talking than reading
• Smile!

Risk Assessment

Just found this great video on the Channel 4 website about risk assessments!

Documentary Research

Whilst looking on what I find a very useful website slideshare, I came across this powerpoint on the "Codes and Conventions" of documentaries and thought I would share it here!

Codes And Conventions Of Documentary

View more presentations from Catford High School.

Distribution: The Facts

For our Friday morning sessions we have been looking at all aspects of television/film making and so it is essential that we look at what happens after a programme has been made, not just all the stages before this. This is the process known as distribution.

One definition of the word distribution is "the process of moving a product from its manufacturing source to its customers", so in the context of the media it is getting the finished film/television piece out there to its audience. To do this there are several different routes you can take.

An independent film maker has the choice of going down the profit or non-profit routes.
Non-profit can include:

• The Internet (Own website with showreel, YouTube, Vimeo etc)
• Film festivals (Sheffield, Brief Encounters etc)
• Put up for Award/Specialist Award 

To make a profit you can look at doing the following:

• Sell to a channel via editing commissioner
• Sell to a distribution company

There are dozens and dozens of distribution companies in the UK (though of course their work can cover worldwide), however, the top players in the UK are:

• BBC Worldwide: Top Gear, Life, Planet Earth (£240 million profit 2009-2010)
• Fremantle Media: Merlin, American Idol, Hole in The Wall (£152 million profit 09-10)
• ITV Studios GE: Hells Kitchen, The Prisoner (£131 million 09-10)
• Outright (run by Shed): Supernanny, Waterloo Road, Who do you think you are? (£11 million 09-10)

It is important to remember there the sale of programmes worldwide covers both English speaking and non-English speaking countries. The arrangement of subtitles to sell to non-English speaking countries is known as packaging and is one of the other things distribution companies do. On top of this they also develop ideas and have their favourite producers e.g. Simon Cowell, and also try and establish successful 1st series of programmes.

As we can tell from the massive turnover of just the top 4 companies in the UK it is not surprising that through direct sales only, the revenue in distribution is around £525 million. There is plenty more to be made though in selling formats worldwide.
A format  is the structure of a programme, the most successful worldwide formats include:

• Strictly/Dancing with Stars (sold to 27 countries)
• Britains Got Talent/Americas Got Talent
•  Millionaire
• Big Brother
• The Office
• Footballers Wives

It is important to remember is is not just non-fiction formats that are marketable worldwide, it is also dramas!

Mondays Sessions

Continuing our previous Monday night session we Shaun, we have been split into 2 production teams with the aim of making a 10-20min short film. It is our job to source a script, actors and have it al ready to film by late February over in the studio at Paintworks.

We were pretty much left to decide our roles though both Shaun and Phil gave some guidance on what they thought we would all be best at. So this is the current line up of our team and their jobs:

- Carlina - Production Manager

- Me - Director

- Ant - AD, Editor

- Mike - DOP/Production design

- Keiran - 1st Sound man/Post sound/pre prodution help/Music

- Edem - Sound 2/editorial desicions/AD2

- James - Camera Operator/Music/locations

- Simon - Equipment co-ordinator/Something else!

 

The set up we have here was partially put into practice in the evening session where we took a basic shot of a woman being angry at a man and ended up building on all aspects including dialogue, camera angle/shot.

I found directing quite difficult as sometimes I knew what I wanted but not how to achieve this, however as Shaun pointed out to me several times, directors just need to know what they want, it's the crew's job to achieve it! So the problem solver in me will have to take a back seat and let the creative come through!

I am really looking forward to the project and hope we can find a good script soon as most of us tend to do documentarys so it will be good to get a good short film done this year to add to our showreels!

Behind The Scenes: The Filming

Yesterday was our day spent in the office with Media Clash (our behind the scens project), it was a very long day but we certainly got a lot out of it! Present were Brad, Ant and myself, Claire also came along in the afternoon/evening.
The day started arriving at their office near the Circus at around 10am, we were greeted by Greg and due to his schedule of the day we set up our interview with him straight away


Gregs Interview: We had him sit on the sofa chair next to his desk in the office as we did not want it too formal. We had him looking camera left at Brad who was asking the questions. As the office was open plan there was a lot of background noise from the office, I like that we had this going on as background noise and hopefully there is nothing too defined that will affect the edit. The interview took around half an hour as Greg is a good speaker, we asked him the questions we had scripted but he also provided us with a lot more to work with.

Department Interviews: Our next step was to get to know the staff in the office, to do this we spoke to all the department heads. This gave us more of an insight into the different areas (particularly, and most importantly, the magazines). We asked them 3 set questions in in a vox pop style: what is your name and what is your job? What is your daily role? What makes Media Clash different? This last question gave us some really good stuff to work with.

Cut Aways: The whole time we were there, with our second camera, we made sure to capture lots of cut aways from people typing/on the phone to deadline boards, stacks of magazines and lots of logos. We ended up with about 10mins worth of cut aways from the office.

We then took our lunch break and met up with Claire, upon returning the one thing we wanted to get done was to get our interview with Jane (the co-founder of the company). This was where our problems started, she was too busy/camera shy and did not want to be interviewed. We couldn't work out if it was just today she didnt want to do (as they were preparing for a party in the evening) or if she didn't want to be in it at all! Luckily Greg managed to persuade her to give us 5mins so we managed to get some with her but may come back another day to get some more.

The Client Party: We were fortunate enough to be invited to the client party for all the magazines advertisers. After another afternoon break we arrived at The Royal Crescent Hotel around 5.30pm to get half an hour of set up before people started to arrive. To create a time lapse we left the camera rolling for about 15mins while everyone came in in dribs and drabs. Our aim of the evening was to get interviews with the clients (there were aroung 250 people at the party) and find out why they choose Media Clash. We managed to get 6 interviews by the end of the night but it also worked out very well for us making contacts and being offered more projects by people including Farpoint Apple!

All in all a very productive day, but we will have to set up another time to go back and talk to Jane again properly about the process of making a magazine!

A Quick Guide to Multi-Camera Editing!

As mentioned in previous posts, myself and 3 others helped on a music shoot last Monday and edited on Wednesday, and we learnt there are many things to bear in mind when simultaneously shooting with more than one camera.
Here is a few key points to remember when it comes to FILMING multi-cam shoot:

• When filming ensure both camera are in same format and codec
• All rec's must be continuous (e.g. dont break between songs)
• Get a clear sync point when filming (e.g. a clap/shout/flash)

When it comes to editing in Final Cut here's the basics of what to do:

• Find your sync points in footage and mark them as 'in points'
• After selecting clips choose "Modify' then 'Make Multiclip'
• Overwrite the multiclip into the Timeline (shortcut F10)
• Opening the multiclip in the viewer you can simply clip between shots
• You can then go back and adjust any cuts accordingly (e.g. to the beat in music) by 'rolling' or 'extending' the edits
• Once you're finished and wish to edit the clip as a whole such as fade ins/cutting whole chunks out you must again select 'Modify' and then 'Collapse Multiclip'

It is a lot simpler than I first thought, just have to make sure you get a good and clear sync point when filming, will save ages in the edit!
All tips here adapted from worksheet from Mike Johnston.

Proposal/Treatment

Proposal
Train One Save Many (working title) is a short film on the Weston Super Mare division of the RNLI (Lifeboats), it will be filmed as a documentary. There is no specific target audience as I aim to make it so it inform and raise awareness to audiences of all ages, though getting specific it could be argued that those whole live nearer the coast may have more interest in watching it than those who live inner country/city as it could be deemed less relevant.
Train One Save Many will focus on the people that make up the RNLI volunteers and the stories they have to tell, to show that they aren’t just faceless people. It will remind people how much of a vital role they play and how they are just as important as other emergency services. There will be an educational input too in the opening with facts, figures and a brief history to set the scene.

Treatment
The story of my documentary will be told through a voice over and also be structured around the interviews with members of the crew and (hopefully) members of the public. I will also include contact details of how people can get involved at the end as part of the raising awareness aspect.
The staging of the interviews will be simple with uncluttered background (similar to those used on Traffic Cops) to not distract from message and add professional look. It has elements of an expository documentary in that it will combine a variety of footage, still, interviews and some archive footage to enforce the importance of the story. The tone will not be too serious as I want them to look approachable however of course subject matter is at times very serious. There will also be elements of an observational documentary as I can’t predict all that will happen when I am there.
There are 29 members of the crew and ideally I would like to get an interview with at least 4 people holding different positions or of different backgrounds. All footage will be filmed at their base at Birnbeck Pier. 

As part of tomorrows pitching session we have been asked to create a draft/brief proposal and treatment: