WEBVTT

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I want to skip the introduction.

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I want to start by doing an experiment.

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I'm going to play three videos
of a rainy day.

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But I've replaced the audio
of one of the videos,

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and instead of the sound of rain,

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I've added the sound of bacon frying.

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So I want you think carefully
which one the clip with the bacon is.

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(Rain falls)

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(Rain falls)

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(Rain falls)

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All right.

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Actually, I lied.

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They're all bacon.

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(Bacon sizzles)

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(Applause)

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My point here isn't really
to make you hungry

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every time you see a rainy scene,

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but it's to show that our brains
are conditioned to embrace the lies.

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We're not looking for accuracy.

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So on the subject of deception,

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I wanted to quote one
of my favorite authors.

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In "The Decay of Lying,"
Oscar Wilde establishes the idea

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that all bad art comes from copying
nature and being realistic;

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and all great art comes
from lying and deceiving,

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and telling beautiful, untrue things.

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So, I want to make this clear -

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when you're watching a movie

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and a phone rings,

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it's not actually ringing.

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It's been added later
in postproduction in a studio.

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All of the sounds you hear are fake.

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Everything, apart from the dialogue,

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is fake.

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Not the only thing that's fake
in Hollywood, by the way.

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Laughter)

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When you watch a movie and you see
a bird flapping its wings --

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(Wings flap)

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They haven't really recorded the bird.

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It sounds a lot more realistic
if you record a sheet

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or shaking kitchen gloves.

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(Flaps)

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The burning of a cigarette up close --

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(Cigarette burns)

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It actually sounds a lot more authentic

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if you take a small Saran Wrap ball

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and release it.

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(A Saran Warp ball being released)

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Punches?

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(Punch)

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Let me play that again.

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(Punch)

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That's often done by sticking
a knife in vegetables,

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usually cabbage.

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(Cabbage stabbed with a knife)

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The next one -
I'm not going to play the video

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but it's breaking bones.

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(Bones break)

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Well, no one was really harmed.

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It's actually ...

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breaking celery or frozen lettuce.

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(Breaking frozen lettuce or celery)

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(Laughter)

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Yeah. Thanks to my three friends
who are laughing.

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Making the right sounds
is not always as easy

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as a trip to the supermarket

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and going to the vegetable section.

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But it's often a lot more
complicated than that.

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So let's reverse-engineer together

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the creation of a sound effect.

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One of my favorite stories
comes from Frank Serafine.

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He's a contributor to our library,

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and a great sound designer for "Tron"
and "Star Trek" and others.

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He was part of the Paramount team
that won the Oscar for best sound

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for "The Hunt for Red October."

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In this Cold War classic, in the '90s,

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they were asked to produce the sound
of the propeller of the submarine.

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So they had a small problem:

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they couldn't really find
a submarine in West Hollywood.

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So basically, what they did is,

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they went to a friend's swimming pool,

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and Frank performed a cannonball.

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They placed an underwater mic

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and an overhead mic
outside the swimming pool.

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We recreated the sound.

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So here's what the underwater
mic sounds like.

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(Underwater plunge)

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Adding the overhead mic,

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it sounded a bit like this:

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(Water splashes)

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So now they took the sound
and pitched it one octave down,

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sort of like slowing down a record.

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(Water splashes at lower octave)

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And then they removed
a lot of the high frequencies.

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(Water splashes)

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And pitched it down another octave.

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(Water splashes at lower octave)

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And then they added
a little bit of the splash

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from the overhead microphone.

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(Water splashes)

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And by looping and repeating that sound,

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they got this:

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(Propeller churns)

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So, creativity and technology put together
in order to create the illusion

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that we're inside the submarine.

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But once you've created your sounds

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and you've synced them to the image,

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you want those sounds to live
in the world of the story.

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And one the best ways to do that
is to add reverb.

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So this is the first audio tool
I want to talk about.

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Reverberation, or reverb,
is the persistence of the sound

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after the original sound has ended.

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So it's sort of like the --

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all the reflections from the materials,

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the objects and the walls
around the sound.

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Take, for example, the sound of a gunshot.

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The original sound is less
than half a second long.

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(Gunshot)

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By adding reverb,

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we can make it sound like
it was recorded inside a bathroom.

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(Gunshot reverbs in bathroom)

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Or like it was recorded
inside a chapel or a church.

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(Gunshot reverbs church)

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Or in a canyon.

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(Gunshot reverbs in canyon)

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So reverb gives us a lot of information

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about the space between the listener
and the original sound source.

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If the sound is the taste,

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then reverb is sort of like
the smell of the sound.

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But reverb can do a lot more.

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Listening to a sound
with a lot less reverberation

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than the on-screen action

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is going to immediately signify to us

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that we're listening to a commentator,

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to an objective narrator that's not
participating in the on-screen action.

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Also, emotionally intimate
moments in cinema

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are often heard with zero reverb,

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because that's how it would sound
if someone was speaking inside our ear.

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On the completely other side,

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adding a lot of reverb to a voice

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is going to make us think
that we're listening to a flashback,

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or perhaps that we're inside
the head of a character

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or that we're listening
to the voice of God.

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Or, even more powerful in film,

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Morgan Freeman.

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(Laughter)

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So --

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(Applause)

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But what are some other tools or hacks

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that sound designers use?

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Well, here's a really big one.

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I think some people guessed it.

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It's silence.

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I didn't really forget
this part of the talk

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but I sort of wanted to show

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that a few moments of silence
is going to make us pay attention.

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And in the Western world,

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we're not really used to verbal silences.

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They're considered awkward or rude.

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So silence preceding verbal communication

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can create a lot of tension.

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But imagine a really big Hollywood movie,

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where it's full of explosions
and automatic guns.

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Loud stops being loud
anymore, after a while.

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So in a yin-yang way,

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silence needs loudness
and loudness needs silence

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for either of them to have any effect.

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But what does silence mean?

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Well, it depends how
it's used in each film.

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Silence can place us inside
the head of a character

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or provoke thought.

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We often relate silences with ...

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contemplation,

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meditation,

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being deep in thought.

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But apart from having one meaning,

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silence becomes a blank canvas

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upon which the viewer is invited
to the paint their own thoughts.

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But I want to make it clear:
there is no such thing as silence.

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And I know this sounds like the most
pretentious TED Talk statement ever.

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(Laughter)

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But even if you were to enter
a room with zero reverberation

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and zero external sounds,

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you would still be able to hear
the pumping of your own blood.

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And in cinema, traditionally,
there was never a silent moment

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because of the sound of the projector.

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And even in today's Dolby world,

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there's not really any moment of silence
if you listen around you.

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There's always some sort of noise.

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Now, since there's no such
thing as silence,

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what do filmmakers
and sound designers use?

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Well, as a synonym,
they often use ambiences.

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Ambiences are the unique background sounds

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that are specific to each location.

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Each location has a unique sound,

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and each room has a unique sound,

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which is called room tone.

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So here's a recording
of a market in Morocco.

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(Voices, music)

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And here's a recording
of Times Square in New York.

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(Traffic sounds, car horns, voices)

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Believe me, it's a lot better
to have to listen to Times Square

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than to have to smell Times Square.

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Room tone is the addition of all
the noises inside the room:

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the ventilation, the heating, the fridge.

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Here's a recording
of my apartment in Brooklyn.

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[You can hear the ventilation, the boiler,
the fridge and street traffic]

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[(is that an electric toothbrush or just
my neighbor having some fun?)]

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Ambiences work in a most primal way.

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They can speak directly
to our brain subconsciously.

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So, birds chirping outside your window
may indicate normality,

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perhaps because, as a species,

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we've been used to that sound
every morning for millions of years.

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(Birds chirp)

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On the other hand, industrial sounds
have been introduced to us

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a little more recently.

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Even though I really like
them personally --

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they've been used by one
of my heroes, David Lynch,

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and his sound designer, Alan Splet --

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industrial sounds often carry
negative connotations.

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(Machine noises)

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Now, sound effects can tap
into our emotional memory.

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Occasionally, they can be so significant

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that they become a character in a movie.

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They are a lot more low maintenance
than some actors, as well.

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For example -

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The sound of thunder may indicate
divine intervention or anger.

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(Thunder)

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Church bells can remind us
of the passing of time,

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or perhaps our own mortality.

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(Bells ring)

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And breaking of glass can
indicate the end of a relationship

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or a friendship.

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(Glass breaks)

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Scientists believe that dissonant sounds,

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for example, brass or wind
instruments played very loud,

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may remind us of animal howls in nature

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and therefore create a sense
of irritation or fear.

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(Brass and wind instruments play)

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So now we've spoken
about on-screen sounds.

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But occasionally, the source
of a sound cannot be seen.

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That's what we call offscreen sounds,

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or "acousmatic."

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The term "acousmatic" comes
from Pythagoras in ancient Greece,

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who used to teach behind
a veil or curtain for years,

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not revealing himself to his disciples.

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I think the mathematician
and philosopher thought that,

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in that way,

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his students might focus
more on the voice,

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and his words and its meaning,

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rather than the visual of him speaking.

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So sort of like the Wizard of Oz,

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or "1984's" Big Brother,

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separating the voice from its source,

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separating cause and effect

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sort of creates a sense
of ubiquity or panopticism,

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and therefore, authority.

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There's a strong tradition
of acousmatic sound.

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Nuns in monasteries in Rome and Venice
used to sing in rooms

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up in galleries close to the ceiling,

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creating the illusion that we're listening
to angels up in the sky.

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Richard Wagner famously
created the hidden orchestra

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that was placed in a pit
between the stage and the audience.

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And one of my heroes, Aphex Twin,
famously hid in dark corners of clubs.

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I think what all these masters knew
is that by hiding the source,

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you create a sense of mystery.

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This has been seen
in cinema over and over,

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with Hitchcock,
and Ridley Scott in "Alien."

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Hearing a sound without knowing its source

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is going to create some sort of tension.

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Also, it can minimize certain visual
restrictions that directors have

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and can show something
that wasn't there during filming.

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And if all this sounds
a little theoretical,

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I wanted to play a little video.

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(Toy squeaks)

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(Typewriter)

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(Drums)

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(Ping-pong)

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(Knives being sharpened)

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(Record scratches)

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(Saw cuts)

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(Woman screams)

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(Laughter)

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What I'm sort of trying
to demonstrate with these tools

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is that sound is a language.

00:15:55.016 --> 00:15:58.158
It can trick us by transporting
us geographically;

00:15:59.071 --> 00:16:00.587
it can change the mood;

00:16:01.079 --> 00:16:02.500
it can set the pace;

00:16:03.882 --> 00:16:07.336
it can make us laugh
or it can make us scared.

00:16:09.098 --> 00:16:12.448
On a personal level, I fell
in love with that language

00:16:12.472 --> 00:16:13.789
a few years ago,

00:16:13.813 --> 00:16:18.420
and somehow managed to make it
into some sort of profession.

00:16:19.674 --> 00:16:22.900
And I think with our work
through the sound library,

00:16:22.924 --> 00:16:28.720
we're trying to kind of expand
the vocabulary of that language.

00:16:30.197 --> 00:16:33.679
And in that way, we want
to offer the right tools

00:16:33.703 --> 00:16:35.343
to sound designers,

00:16:35.367 --> 00:16:36.715
filmmakers,

00:16:36.739 --> 00:16:38.574
and video game and app designers,

00:16:39.148 --> 00:16:42.283
to keep telling even better stories

00:16:42.782 --> 00:16:45.514
and creating even more beautiful lies.

00:16:45.538 --> 00:16:46.825
So thanks for listening.

00:16:46.849 --> 00:16:50.368
(Applause)