Sound & vision : towards a definition of the dialogical interactions between image and sound effect in animated film

• Main Author: Hodges, Peter
• Other Authors: D'Arcy, Geraint
• Published: University of South Wales 2017
• Online Access: https://ethos.bl.uk/OrderDetails.do?uin=uk.bl.ethos.766734

The introduction of synchronised sound to moving pictures brought the birth of a new form of entertainment, the sound film. As a contemporary moving image medium to the live action film, animated film also successfully adopted synchronised sound. The process of animation is, by its nature, inherently silent so any use of sound involves decisions away from the creation of the image. Thus, there are many opportunities for an inventive audiovisual dialogue to affect an animated film's narrative intention. The marriage of sound to image was initially thought to provide two opportunities of interpretation. The first, that the sound could simply match the expectations of everyday life by working in parallel with the visual action, supporting it in a realistic manner. The second suggested enhancing the narrative by providing sound information that acted in counterpoint to the displayed visual, thus providing a new, different interpretation of meaning to this audiovisual event. In film, a dialogue between sound and image can be created through applying a combination of parallel and counterpoint sound throughout a film's duration. However, after ninety years of the sound film, are there any alternative definitions of audiovisual meaning other than in parallel or counterpoint? To investigate this variation in the interpretation of meaning, this study defined a creative methodological framework that considered sound design choices and their relationship to meaning within animated film, and recognised the influences within animated film production on the sound design decisions made. These formed the hermeneutic categories of sound effect choice, and the physical and meta-influences that inform decisions regarding the chosen sound effects. This framework was developed and applied to case studies using an action research approach. The study concludes that a creative methodological framework for sound effect planning in animated film provides a useful understanding and application of the range of influences in animated film sound production. The research also illustrates that the framework's integral hermeneutic categories provide a valid expansion of the parallel- counterpoint position with regard to informing choice and meaning in sound effect planning. Finally, the study recognises that the framework presents a workable methodology to apply to the sound effect planning process in animated film.