Sound in trailers

Foley sound is the reproduction of sounds which are added into films or other media in post-production to enhance the audio quality. The idea behind Foley sound is that anything in the picture, any actions or noises which you would expect to hear can be recreated to sound more appealing, realistic and enhanced, these noises can range from anything such as waves hitting the side of a boat, a horse clattering its hooves on the floor to breaking glass, anything can be recreated.

A Foley artist is the person behind all of the recreated noises and sounds you hear in the final production which have been added in, they have a very important role in the post production stage of the film as they can bring the scene to life by enhancing sounds. Foley artists have to be very creative when attempting to recreate sound, for example the artist would watch a scene from a film and would need to recreate a specific noise, a great example would be a horse galloping, the artist could recreate this noise by using coconuts and cloth, clattering them onto concrete, another example would be the noise of someone punching another person, they could either hit a piece of meat or a watermelon. They would have to use so many different things and use different methods just to find the one perfect sound to fit the scene.

Here is a great video which explains how to recreate sounds and the different methods used.




Diegetic sound is any sound presented from the films world, this can be either on screen or off screen, another term for Diegetic sound would be actual sound which we can hear in the real world or all of the current sounds which the characters can hear, whereas Non-Diegetic sound is different as this has been added in post production, it is a sound which the actors would not be able to hear a good example would be music added on top of a scene.

Example of Diegetic are, Dialogue, sounds originating from any object on screen, such as footsteps, sounds which are visible or implied. Examples of Non-Diegetic sounds are added music, narration and any extra sounds added for effect.
A perfect example of Non-Diegetic sound is from the Movie Jaws, in this scene when the shark is swimming towards one of the boys, the very famous and recognisable sound cue plays, this is Non-Diegetic as no one else can hear this apart from the audience, the music begins to intensify as it gets closer to people, adding for effect as the audience can then only assume something bad is going to happen.



To be able to tell the difference between the two, take for example this scene from The Amazing Spider-Man 2, the clear Diegetic sounds are Spider-Man jumping on the bed, this is an action and has an expected sound and the sounds from the television, he also plus in some ear phones which play music, this is a Diegetic sound as this is something the character can hear, there are many more in this scene but for Non-Diegetic to start we have the slow piano playing to add emotion, and then the louder, clearer music from his phone which transitions into Non-Diegetic as it becomes clearer for the audience compared to himself as he throws his phone on the floor.