Movie magic: How Foley artists create the sounds behind your favourite films

euronews (in English)

Unsung heroes of the movie industry, Foley artists create much of the sound heard in films and TV shows. A Dutch artist shows us how it’s done.

Transcript

00:00 With this profession, you really get focused on sound.

00:02 (metal clanging)

00:05 And I could be maybe cutting vegetables in the kitchen

00:07 and be like, "Hey, this is an interesting sound."

00:09 Using vegetables is always a fun part of the job.

00:12 Yeah, it gets really messy very fast.

00:14 And when you hear the end results,

00:16 suddenly the scene gets way more gross and fun to watch.

00:20 My name is Ronny van de Veer.

00:28 I'm a Foley artist and I create sound effects

00:31 for movies and TV shows.

00:33 Sound works very unconsciously in a movie.

00:40 That's what I really like about it.

00:42 So you have the objective image

00:44 and then sound is creating this extra layer.

00:47 Sound creates the details

00:49 and Foley is all about those details.

00:52 (upbeat music)

00:54 What we do is we create all kinds of little details

01:03 that make you feel closer to the characters,

01:05 make you feel more in the scene.

01:07 Footsteps are a very big part of my job.

01:12 They're also a very hard part

01:13 because there's a lot of performance included.

01:16 Like every character might walk in a bit of a different way

01:19 and then you have the surface.

01:20 So it could be like concrete, leaves, glass,

01:23 metal, a wooden floor.

01:25 (footsteps thudding)

01:28 We record here with different microphones in the room

01:32 that also record the acoustics.

01:34 So the Foley mixer with whom I'm working

01:37 will make a perspective change in the sound.

01:40 Someone is walking from further away, closer to the camera.

01:43 He can make a mix, like change the mix of the microphones

01:47 to create that effect actually,

01:49 which sounds very natural.

01:50 So it's like a very, yeah, a human thing.

01:53 Sometimes they call us also actors of sound

01:55 because like an actor, we play also with emotion.

01:58 (footsteps thudding)

02:02 We use a lot of layering in the recording process.

02:09 For instance, in a scene where like birds in a cage,

02:12 then I would first do the feathers.

02:16 And then I would maybe do the flapping of the wings

02:19 against the cage.

02:20 They have little claws that they grab onto the wood

02:26 or to the metal.

02:27 And all those layers, it's nice to do that separate.

02:33 The tricky part is that it's so much happening

02:36 at the same time and I'll try to cover everything.

02:38 Foley is a lot about details actually.

02:41 All those small details that make you believe

02:43 this is the real thing you're seeing.

02:45 (footsteps thudding)

02:48 As you can see in my studio, I have like a lot of props

02:54 because everything could be possible in a movie.

02:56 There are all kinds of different objects

02:59 that the actors are using or that need to be used.

03:02 It might look like a mess to someone

03:05 who's not a Foley artist,

03:06 but actually there's like an organized chaos actually.

03:09 Everything is like organized in categories

03:12 so I can very quickly grab it.

03:14 Nature stuff, musical stuff,

03:16 this is like one with bells for instance.

03:19 (bells jingling)

03:22 And all kinds of plastic stuff,

03:27 medical stuff, wind chimes.

03:29 And this is the recording studio.

03:34 This is where we record all the Foley.

03:36 Also again, a lot of props organized in containers

03:42 and a lot of different floors as well.

03:44 We have concrete floors,

03:45 dirt with gravel as well.

03:49 And on this side, it's more grass footsteps.

03:54 A lot of shoes as well.

03:57 To have an idea, this is the amount of shoes we used

03:59 in the previous movie, which is finished actually.

04:02 So a lot of shoes for a lot of different characters.

04:05 (orchestral music)

04:08 In my brain, I have like this whole database of sounds

04:16 from hearing stuff in real life,

04:17 but also from hearing sounds in films as well.

04:19 What I do a lot is go to secondhand stores

04:22 to hunt for props, to find objects

04:24 that I like the sound of.

04:25 This is like the secondhand shop

04:30 where I go a lot for prop hunting.

04:32 So I'm looking out for props that have a nice sound to it.

04:36 For instance, this one.

04:37 And it could be anything actually.

04:43 It could be like squeaky leather belts or shoes

04:48 or nice glasses.

04:50 This thing, I don't even know what it is,

04:51 but it has a nice sound to it.

04:54 Could be used for, I don't know, anything.

05:05 I do think I see or I hear the world differently actually.

05:08 I think I'm quite sensitive to sound,

05:10 but also in a nice way,

05:11 because I also notice the nice sounds.

05:13 Like I could be sitting in the garden

05:14 and could really enjoy a bird flying over

05:17 or an insect chirping or flying next to me.

05:20 That's a nice thing about the job, I think,

05:22 that you get more aware of the world around you,

05:24 like the sound world around you actually.

05:27 (dramatic music)

05:30 (dramatic music)

05:33 [BLANK_AUDIO]

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