Doco sound design and copyright

Always get copyright.
Always test gear before going out.
Always monitor properly: signal to noice ratio and the use of lapelle mic techniques.

Sound design and copyright is one of the crucial pieces in the making of Yanni. What type of sound to use must enhance the character and also follow the laws of copyright. Paul talked about copyright in a political sense: it should use the tiniest amount of time of research, it is there to protect our stuff, property and creativity, to prove that it was written/made at a certain point.

Copyright is used for images and footage to protect their contents and sometimes resources. The actual license is mainly to be used by common sense, and it is good as seen in example of Elvis. The intended use needs to clarify the example and not my or our own intended use; when using music and saturating it, whether or not they used elvis music to aid the documentary, they are taking it into use, as it become a more motive and the portrayed image.

One must always use the common sense within copyright, also beyond music. When using incidental footage, people used in the frame of a shot one must do this by a wide shot but where one cant assert other ones. Except from when asking the people in advance for permission.

Copyright must always be sorted out because if a film is accepted into a festival, one must be assured that no money is made out of it. A rule of ‘8 seconds of music used’, however when asking for permission and emailing these people, should be confirmed by RMIT’s Copyright person - Ann Lennix.

‘Forbidden lies and Survival had bad sound as it either had been badly recorded or had no work done in the post. Lesson: always check the SWITCH on the back and on the front of the camera, signal of noice ration, boom mic techniqies. This will give better sound than a lapelle mice, because this one doesn’t suck in all the sounds around, but it is good on sound with low noices.

Construction and deconstruction:

As the same principles in drama, with editorial and geographical style, we must cover the person and focus poll between when using two persons. We should list all the kinds of cutaways and overlays that are needed in documentary as we have also done in TV journalism. Here, when making news stories, this order often has 8-10 pieces repeatedly being: PTC-overlays-overlay-grab-overlay-ptc-overlay-overlay-grab-ptc end. In TV 2 this is almost the same thing being in most times very formulate.

The Chinese photographer docu was shot with more than one camera and included more than a person talking: it had crash ins and pull outs of the frame and shot with one long tape. This jumped from talking person, mum cutting up fruit, disapoointed dad, frustrated student and also side shots. The same technique goes for ‘Drinking for England’ as the camera crew here used bits of observational shooting when the character goes into the car and also multi cameraes when she has her last drink.