Visualizing Audio - The Lost Art
From SPARK
Thinking in Pictures
The imagination is a gift from God – especially when controlled by the Holy Spirit. Many oral people groups will never learn to read the Scriptures in their own language. So we must communicate the gospel message in a form that they can understand and relate to. That’s where audio productions, either by radio or audio cassettes, are so important. Since there are no visuals, we need to be careful to create the proper visuals or visualization in the minds of the listener. This is no easy task, as any translator will tell you.
We must always remember that the radio or audio cassette listener is blind. Their brains will dutifully conjure up whatever images you suggest via dialogue, music, and sound effects. After listening to a radio drama, one child said, “I like radio because the pictures are better.” But the listener’s mind can perform only so many tricks. That’s why it is so important that all sound effects and music be recognized by the audience if you want to produce the proper image or visualization in their minds.
Sound conveys meaning. Audio drama is a magical collaboration between the performer and the audience. Voices, music, and sound effects cast a spell, and the listener’s mind conjures up a world before their very ears. Voices convey the story, music reinforces emotion, and sound effects render the reality, but how much reality is enough? Let’s not forget about silence, it’s a dramatic element and depending on where it is used, it can be very loud!
There are two roles for sound effects in audio drama; convey the action and provide the setting. A door opening or a gunshot is action. A howling wind or the voices of a crowd instantly paints the setting. They should be used sparingly so as not to draw the attention of the listener away from the story. In audio drama, the dialogue and narration contribute roughly 75% to the drama, with music another 15% and sound effects, a mere 10%. Which sounds and how many you use will determine the quality of your drama’s reality.
What is Reality?
One approach is simply to record an actual setting where people are making those sounds, like the chatter of a crowd and background noise, then layer that “atmosphere” under dialogue and music. This literalism produces the reality from the chatter of the crowd to the overheard conversations of the drama along with a little music in the background. This documentary method assures you that it is 100 percent real; the action is really taking place in this situation.
Another method is to merely simulate or imitate real life. For the crowds or other sounds, you can use “canned” or commercial pre-recorded recordings of sound effects that come on CDs. Or you can create them in the studio. But it is always better to collect and catalog your sound effects from the culture and language where they are going to be used. If it suggests “crowds” in the minds of the audience and sounds real, that is enough to do the job. That’s why it is so important for native speakers to be involved in the process of recording.
It is also important that the sound effects don’t steal the audio spotlight from the actors’ dialogue. Remember that unidentified sounds are noise, noise that can impair the clarity of your production, even if they are 100 percent authentic sounds. As much fun as sound effects are, don’t overly-rely on them. At some point they just get in the way and become noise. While the lack of visuals allows audio to do many things, it does impose some limitations too. It appears that while you can do anything in audio, you can’t do everything.
In audio drama, sound effects must share the stage with voices and music. If you fill up the sonic spectrum with excess sound effects, your total reality can detract from, rather than add to the story. Try to limit sound effects to those that are understood easily. Stimulate the audience’s imagination with just enough suggestion to conjure up a clear picture of the drama. Good hocus-pocus is all about focus.
Live Production or Post Production?
Many prefer the style of live production, while the actors are present and hearing the sound effects and music which stimulates their participation. But much more common today is the style of production where the dialogue is recorded separately and then the music and sound effects are added in post-production. This method allows more editorial control, but can take longer since everything must be assembled and layered together – usually through a computer multi-track recorder.
A drawback with the post-production method is that the actors are performing in a vacuum – they can’t hear the music or sound effects that will accompany them and this may result in a less expressive performance. Audio drama is all about sound, but not only about sound. Even our sound effects have a visual aspect or impact and it’s something you can take advantage of. Give it a try and you will be surprised what you can accomplish.
Writing for Audio Drama
Overall, it’s easier to get started writing audio drama by dramatizing an existing story like a folk tale or Bible story, something where the plot is not too long and the characters are established. First take the text, rework it so it sounds natural, and designate each actor’s part. You can take a long speech and break it up among several characters to keep the voices changing. Short retorts like “Oh Yea,” “That means,” “Really,” etc., can keep the listener’s attention going back and forth between the actors.
Then look the script over and see what sound effects are needed to paint the setting (background scene) and the action parts. Add them to the script in order of their occurrence. These can be produced live by people at the precise moment, or produced and recorded earlier and played back on a recorder at the appropriate time.
Decide where each scene begins and ends – this may, and often does, differ from the original. You may use music to set the scene and sound effects to “place” the actors in a location. Another technique is to put the sound montage (music and effects) under the storyteller. A narrator tells of some past action that occurred prior to the story, and while telling it, we hear the music and sound effects that support the story. Some time this can be more effective than a straight, “real-time” dramatization of the events. Bridges between scenes can be built by narration or music, or both.
Limit the number of characters speaking in a scene to four. This is very important. The listening audience usually can’t handle any more voices without confusion setting in as to who is talking. Crowd scenes are different. Only use a narrator at the beginning of a scene. If he speaks in the middle of a scene, it yanks the listener out of the drama and breaks the spell you are trying to weave. Too much narration and you end up with a “book on tape”.
