Sound

Advertising can often blur together into nothing, you need to make a moment for the audience to actually look up and think and watch. Viewers connote different sounds with different emotions, and what emotions the viewers feel impact if they remember the product or not. Which is at its core why we as advertisers need to be able to use sound to sell the products of the brand.

Coca-colas advert is light, and about togetherness in its lyricalness, with some acoustic guitar in the background and maracas, which underlines the brands core values which is family and coming together, which is also seen in their “share a coke with” campaign that they’ve done in recent years.

Alfred Hitchcock  paved the way for sound in film, a great example is the score to Psycho composed by Bernard Herrmann, it is seen as the epitome of suspense and terror. It is quick paced, and builds up and up to make the audience sit at the edge of their seat because they don’t know when the end will be and when the scare will happen.

“People take sound for granted, theyd miss it if it wasnt there”, the reproduction of sound in movies in post production is called Foley, an example is stepping on a bag of cornstarch creates the sound of footsteps in the snow, doing this makes a big difference in the price of actually filming the movie or video content. When sound is done well, it doesn’t stand out, it feels natural, so it is taken for granted. All sound in film is deliberately constructed for a specific effect, this helps the audience feel that they are in the content themselves.

Below is an example of how taking away the sound we naturally assume creates an uncomfortable feeling in the audience. There is no fan fare, all we hear is the steps and the coughs of the characters in the scene, it doesn’t feel as dramatic and triumphant as it should.