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In the world of film and television, sound effects are often performed by a foley artist.
What is a Foley artist? Let's find out.
If we're going to talk about the art of performing foley, we'll need a foley artist. Susan Fitz-Simon, foley artist. How are you, Susan?
Great Buzz, how are you? I'm doing well, but I don't know what foley art is. Foley art is performing
live sounds, you either replace the sounds that are in the film, or you enhance them.
You get a film, you look at what the props are, and you use them to perform it live.
So you're watching a big screen, and you're in-sync with the person. Money for instance,
someone is counting money, you don't hear that, it doesn't make sound. So, we have to
add that in. The boom mic is so far up, and the lob mic you'll never hear the footsteps.
So we'll watch the person, the actor, we'll find out what kind of shoes they're wearing,
what surface they're on, and then we'll grab different shoes. The art is really in the
footsteps because you really have to learn to walk on a four by four square, and the
mic is pointing at your feet. You can't move, so you have to adjust your feet from the normal
way of walking. If a film had a dog that was wearing shoes, would you do that in two passes,
or would you put shoes on your hands? I would put shoes on my hands, and I would do it in
one pass. Tips from the pros. Susan, I see that you brought some foley props here with
you, and this is part of the kit that you take with you wherever you're performing.
Could you demonstrate some of these sounds for us? Tell us a little about them. So its
just basic things. I like to carry some things with me all the time. If you wanted to do,
like say, a police officers belt, you know, their belts squeak, you know they have handcuffs,
they always have keys on there, and you know they're going to have a gun. A good old can
opener can be used as a gun, if you don't have a gun handy. I can't travel with this
bag, obviously, they won't let me in the airport. There you go, seat-belt, that's an easy one.
And then of course, you know, the good old Zippo lighter, because you know we always
have films where there's one guy whose going to light that. The cool character. Yeah exactly.
Yeah empty that out. See, and that could be, right there, that could be a great sound effect.
So, I collect anything and everything that makes a sound. Me too. Is there one secret
that you could share with us, to help us with our own foley sound effects? In footsteps,
you don't want to watch the feet, watch the shoulders because that is going to be, to
me, the ebb and flow of the persons cadence. If they might have a limp, if you're watching
the shoulders, you're going to go with that movement of watching that person walk. And
to me, that's the best way to really grab sync on the character. Well, Susan Fitz-Simon,
obviously its time for us to go, thank you so much for being here today and sharing some
tips and information on Foley art. Thank you Buzz for having me. We'll see y'all soon.