What is the art of Foley?
Foley is the reproduction of everyday sound effects which are added in post production to enhance the quality of audio for films, television, video, video games and radio. These reproduced sounds can be anything from the swishing of clothing and footsteps to squeaky doors and breaking glass. The best foley art is so well integrated into a film that it goes unnoticed by the audience. It helps to create a sense of reality within a scene. Without these crucial background noises, movies feel unnaturally quiet and uncomfortable.
Foley artists look to recreate the realistic ambient sounds that the film portrays. The props and sets of a film do not react the same way acoustically as their real life counterparts. Foley sounds are used to enhance the auditory experience of the movie. Foley can also be used to cover up unwanted sounds captured on the set of a movie during filming, such as overflying airplanes or passing traffic.
Foley is one of the most critical, yet underappreciated links of the film sound chain is Foley recording. You probably know the basics. It was named after the great Universal Studios sound man Jack Foley and covers an incredibly wide range of sounds that are added in post-production: everything from car door slams to footsteps, to garment rustles, to jingling keys, sloshing water, furniture moving, sword hits; you name it. Basically, Foley is everything that isn't covered by sound effects or through the production track. Occasionally, the Foley department will also supply the base sound materials for effects editors.
And though the work may seem simple as compared to, say, recording the sounds of Sherman tank treads on location (an effects task), it's actually a very demanding and precise job that, when done well, adds immeasurably to the success of a film's soundtrack. Recently, Mix spoke with three of the best Foley artists in the business to get a sense of the demands and peculiarities of this important craft.
The post-production process known as "Foley" refers to the art of recording "live" sync sound effects to picture. It is akin to looping the dialogue, but instead of recording the actors performing their lines while watching themselves on screen skilled craftspeople known as "Foley artists" will walk, run, and act out any sync sound effects to match what the actor is seen (or implied) doing in the picture.
Foley is usually performed by Foley artists. Ideally they stand on a Foley stage in a Foley studio, though any post production sound studio will do with a little modification. The Foley artists can clearly see a screen which displays the footage they are to add sound effects to, and they perform their sound effects while watching this screen for timing. The actions they perform can include walking, running, jostling each other, rubbing their clothing, handling props, and breaking objects, all while closely observing the screen to ensure their sound effects are appropriate to the vision.
Increasingly, much simple Foley sound effects are done without Foley artists - the sound effects are stored electronically and performed by the post production sound engineer on a keyboard while watching the visual. Done poorly this type of "Foley" sounds bland and repetitive, and it is nowhere near as flexible as the real thing, but it is much cheaper than renting a Foley stage and paying Foley artists to create the foley sound effects.
What is the use of foley?
Foley effects are sound effects added to the film during post production (after the shooting stops). They include sounds such as footsteps, clothes rustling, crockery clinking, paper folding, doors opening and slamming, punches hitting, glass breaking, etc. etc. In other words, many of the sounds that the sound recordists on set did their best to avoid recording during the shoot.
The boom operator's job is to clearly record the dialogue, and only the dialogue. At first glance it may seem odd that we add back to the soundtrack the very sounds the sound recordists tried to exclude. But the key word here is control. By excluding these sounds during filming and adding them in post, we have complete control over the timing, quality, and relative volume of the sound effects.
Examples of Foley Sound Effects
Tightly curl a phone book into a cylinder, wrap it in gaffer tape, and use it to smack things. Great for punches, body falls, dinosaur feet, etc.
A well broken-in leather mallet can also make a good substitute fist.
Take a sheet of glass, and wrap it tightly and completely in several layers of duct tape (so that the glass won't go anywhere when broken). Break it, and it'll give you an interesting crackling sparkey sound when bent and flexed. Make sure none of the broken glass breaks though.
A small bag of cornstarch can be used to add "crunch" to snowy footsteps. Just be careful that it doesnt get wet, becuase cornstarch + water = slurry.
Snow can be obtained almost year-round from indoor skating rinks. Find out where the Zambonni dumps the snow shaved from the ice surface.
Large ice blocks can be obtained from ice-carving suppliers.
Stock up on bamboo rods. Have a variety of lengths and thicknesses, and by all means try to find ones with hexagonal cross-sections.
Pipes and tubes will give a more mechanical, hollow sounding whoosh.
Buggy whips and bullwhips should be handled with care: they require a lot of space and can severely injure a person.
Bullroarers (wood frames strung with rubber bands and swung on a rope) will give you an airier sound if swung slowly.
Practice golf balls (hollow plastic sphere's full of holes) can be tied to a string and swung around for an airy whoosh.
For extra huge planetary whooshes, use a large sheet of wood or metal to wave a blast of air into an inexpensive dynamic mic (eg. AKG D112)
Punches / Kicks / Body-blows
Smack a neoprene flutterboard
Hit a head of lettuce or cabbage (especially for head impacts)
Smack a large butternut squash against a cement floor (for a head hitting cement).
Punch a large piece of raw meat.
Punch/slap yourself on various body parts. Remember that hard doesn't always mean loud, and loud doesn't always mean dramatic.
Punch or kick a heavy bag (taking care to silence any chain jangle).
Thump a ripe wattermelon (for a bass add).
Halve a coconut shell, scoop out the meat, dry it out, and "tune it" by packing in some tar or putty
Get some horse hooves from a farm vetrinarean, and have a taxidermist prepare them (nothing beats the real thing)
Bury a geophone in the dirt pit to add weight to the recording (hydrophones, contact mics or lav's can work for this)
Put a kick-drum mic (eg. AKG D112) inside a sock (preferably clean), and lay it gently in the dirt pit just out of harm's way. Mix with the main foley mic to add weight to the recording.
Stab a roasting chicken with a knife, or even a spoon.
Stab a grapefruit with a knife or spoon. Dig around in it for extra "goosh".
Use a particularly musical knife to add a "shing".
Crunch a mouthful of lifesavers.
Wrap uncooked dry rigatonni in a damp chamois and crush it.
Plastic or silk plants will sometimes make a convincing "foliage" sound.
1/4" audio tape sounds a lot like grass (both for footsteps, and for tall grass blowing in the wind).
A small bunch of kale can give you a very realistic, dense foliage sound.
Spray a bit of water onto a clean cement floor and drag a rubber hot water bottle over it.
Bark/growl/snarl/chuff/sneeze/wheeze/howl/hiss into a mic (use one with plenty of high-frequency detail, eg. Neumann TLM170). Record at 192 kHz. "Add" into a 48 kHz ProTools session without re-sampling (ie. it'll play back at 1/4 speed). Pitch-shift it back upwards (without time-correction) to taste.
Make an uneven pile of slate tiles, and smash them with a heavy rock.
Crush a walnut, and pitch it down a bit.
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