I spent five months working and traveling in China last year. For this audio project, I decided I would capture some of the sounds off my video from my time in China, and then describe some of the experiences I had.
In the images below you will find Coco and I enjoying a day out, and watching birthday Grandma “Nǎinai” in her kitchen.
Traveling to me is so much more than a visual exploration. To me, travelling is a sensory journey. The smells, textures and sounds are the foundation to the imagery which makes travelling such an incredible experience. This project was perfect for my time in China. China had such unique sounds. Some were uncomfortable and others entertaining and charming. But, the sounds made the journey spectacular.
To begin, I started by selecting the video I would use. Next, I opened the video into Audition and then extracted the sound. After I extracted the various sounds from the videos. I wrote out what I would say in my narration and printed it off. I divided the narration into segments. Resulting in a waveform file for each segment.
Unbelievably, I began with more than thirty minutes of sound plus another ten minutes of narration. As I went through it, I used razor select and began the process of trimming sound clips. I would begin with a clip of my narration, then add the sound that I felt would best represent that moment. As I did this, I had to keep in mind the sounds overlapping and adjusted volume and fade in and out with each process.
When I got the mix to about nine minutes, I realized there was just too much to keep messing with. I learned you don’t always need to start with such a massive amount of media. So, I did a huge chop. Felt like I was cutting six inches off my hair, instead of six minutes. It actually kind of hurt. But, I could spend weeks dealing with this audio. I then cut a portion of the end for a closure and pasted it to the new ending of the audio. There were parts that now kind of just cut off. I decided a cricket chirping would give the effect of silence, without silence. I found a free soundbite on SoundBible.com.
After that, I then started reorganizing the sound bites to the narration. Placing many now behind the narration and adjusting the volume and again the fade in and out. I completed the draft by removing the worst of the rough edges and exported it as a Mp3. I am looking forward to listening to your feedback!
Female Flying Solo 
Emily, I enjoyed reading about your audio story and the process you went through to complete this assignment. I had a similar issue with having over 7 minutes of audio to edit, so I related to the part of you having to get rid of a chunk of your audio. Your audio story sounds fun and cheerful, which I really enjoyed, the sound effects contribute to this a lot. The way you narrate the story is also really good, continues to show the fun and cheerfulness of the story and your experience in China.
I would suggest adding a bit of silence recording before and after the cricket sounds, as it would help have more of a seamless transition to it or a fade in and out of it. Also, for the music playing while you talk about the big birthday celebration, I’d would suggest a nice fade in and out of the music as well. Overall, I think this is a really good first draft!
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Hello All,
I’m sorry that I will not be able to read all your feedback before I post this response. I must have emergency surgery tomorrow and so I will need to get my feedback turned in before I go.
So, I will be going off the feedback that I see presently. However, I will be sure to read everyone’s feedback after I’m back and able to be coherent.
What I have read so far in the feedback is in working in a better transition of the fade in and fade out on my audio piece. I also noticed the comment to include a fade in and out regarding the cricket sounds and possibly add some quiet audio before and after the cricket to establish the silence. There was also mention of a seamless transition of the birthday music. I will work on getting that done. I appreciate the feedback so far and I look forward to seeing what other advice comes from the group!
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Good Luck and Best Blessing for a very successful procedure!
Barbara
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Emily, hope you are recovering from your surgery and doing okay!! I love the concept and inspiration behind your story, and overall I think it is fun, personal, and has very relatable and humanizing qualities such as vulnerability (the fact that you talk about thinking the night sounds were gunfire shows you are willing to put your thoughts and feelings out there and I love that!). I also really enjoyed your ending statements of reflection. I was the same boat and had way too much content initially, so I commend you for being able to cut it all out!
Overall, I agree with the feedback about transitions and space before/after the cricket sounds to really increase the impact of that. I also found that the second cricket clip was considerably louder than the audio before and after it, which sort of detracted from the effect. While the sound bites you have really enhance your story, I think fading the volume in and out on all of the sound clips will help your transitions feel more seamless. Additionally, I could just be hearing things in the background of the room you recorded in, but I felt like I occasionally heard what sounded like a computer mouse clicking (ex. At 1:10, 1:21, etc.)? And finally, as a Disney lover I do have to say that I’d love to hear the full phrase in “It’s a Small World” played out and then faded, which would just entail letting one more note play 🙂 I think you have a really awesome and unique topic, and thank you for sharing your experiences with us!
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