“Inaudible chatter and background Italian music (instrumental) plays in the background.”
*Customer coughs by nearby table*
*Sounds of food being scraped on the dishes by nearby customers*
*Restaurant doorbell rings as more customers step in*
*Champagne cork pops*
*Champagne is poured into glass*
*Glasses clinking together*
*Indistinct laughter by nearby diners*
*Sounds of dishes clinking together continue*
*Bell rings again*
*Waiters footsteps approaching table*
“Waiter walks up to the customer.”
Waiter: “Parmesan?”
Customer: (hesitates) “Uhm yeah, sure”
*Waiter grates cheese*
Customer: (grateful) “Thanks!”
*Sounds of waiter’s footsteps continue*
*Waiter walks to kitchen door*
*Opens door*
Part 2
The Kitchen:
Background noise changes to noisy, chaotic kitchen chatter
*Ambient sound*
*Knives being sharpened in the background*
*Sounds of pots and pans clanging*
*Sound of mixer starting up*
*Sounds of knife chopping up food in the background*
*Restaurant phone rings*
*Dishes continue to clank together as chefs move them around*
*Oven beeps*
*Chef opens the oven door to place the dish on the counter*
*Bell rings*
Chef: “Order’s up!”
*Waiter goes to pick up the food to bring out to customer*
*Waiter exits noisy kitchen, into the main restaurant*
*Light jazz music and inaudible chatter resume*
*Door closing*
Part 3
The Restaurant:
*Footsteps approaching close as waiter comes to the table*
*Indistinct laughter continues*
My Experience
This sound story recreates the feeling of an Italian restaurant from a waiter's perspective. It immerses the listener into the setting, guiding them through the main restaurant area and the rowdy kitchen. To allow the listener to feel as if they could close their eyes and almost imagine the food in front of them, we added various sounds such as customer chatter, incidental music, the waiter's interactions, and the kitchen noise.
My partner (Phi Phoung Le) and I decided to meet at my house around 3:30 but procrastinated till around 5:00 when we actually started filming. We had already come up with the plan of recreating an Italian restaurant in class but hadn't thought of what to add to the video. Phi was in charge of the script and I was in charge of the editing but we both worked together brainstorming ideas and filming. We didn't really know exactly what we were going to include in the video until we started filming. Little ideas struck us during the process such as adding a champagne pop and grating parmesan. I was editing the sound story in between the filming of each clip, which I think gave us the opportunity to get more of a feel of the Italian restaurant and add more small details. We also had our friend, Nahomy Castro, act as the customer. Although it was difficult to hear back our voices on recording, we decided to keep the waiter and customer interaction in, adding to the normal dining out experience. The Foley videos were really fun to film, even though I had to walk around in heels for MANY takes. We had trouble, particularly in the grating scene, because we couldn't find something loud enough that actually resembled cheese. After grating multiple fruits and random items in my kitchen, Phi and I found that avocados worked perfectly. More challenges like this came in our direction, but we always found a quick solution.
Since I've had no previous audio editing experience, getting the hang of it was a bit difficult. I used Capcut and just started adding random Foley or external audio snippets. The more I used the app, the more I learned about each feature and how I could use it to create a more realistic restaurant experience. My favorite feature I learned to use was the "fade" which was used to transition from the dining room to the kitchen and back. I had already been thinking about this quick transition before I even downloaded the app, and seeing that there was actually a way to use it in the video was nice. Phi and I got our external audios from Youtube and Spotify, where I would just screen record it and then use the "extract" feature on Capcut to edit each clip in. Something else that I found essential in the editing was the "volume" tool. I would have to adjust the volume of EVERY single clip so that it would feel natural and not as if I just added them together with no care in the world. For example, I had to get a perfect mix of the chatter+jazz music to make it seem balanced, not one louder than the other.
The Editing
In this experience, I learned just how hard sound and foley artists have to work and the importance of sound layering. This was a real eye-opener, I had seriously underestimated how many small details go into a short audio clip (considering editing this took me hours). I had a lot of fun working on this project, especially with my friends. Although adjusting each clip was tedious, hearing it come together and the final result was very satisfying. I loved seeing how just random audio snips can be put together to create a real, intricate story.
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