Metropolis Remastered
Posted November 2nd
For part of my sound module we were given the task of mixing a track over a clip taken from the Manga version of film “Metropolis”. The clip had no sound with it so everything was created without any reference to the original clip audio.
Before this project I had no proper experience with any sound mixing or editing tools, other than very basic stuff in Premier and Final Cut, which never involved creating original samples and loops. Here is the final edit.
My process for this project was not particularly elegant or unique, however by diving straight in and matching appropriate samples and instruments to different on-screen actions I found that a style emerged, despite not having a plan or outline for the entire clip.
I really enjoyed mixing the first section of my clip, where a robotic throne is assembed and a girl walks up to it and sits down. I found some really mechanical sounding samples, and took every opportunity to add lots of deep bass (I knew the clip woud be presented on a speaker setup that is favourable to low-end frequencies), and continued this throughout the clip!
I felt that sound effects and foley sounds where insufficient in making my clip feel complete or polished and decided to lay down a distorted drum loop, with a melancholy melody over the top. This melody I had mixed in the first section of the clip and used it to represent the girl. Adding it in later over the drum loop added some consistency to the piece, and made it much more “listenable”.
Toward the end of the clip the scene changes again to an overview of a sphere getting struck by lightning, and the whole scene looks very dark and foreboding. I decided to add a big, long bass drop to represent the dark sphere, while simultaeneously adding a ping-pong reverb to the drum loop. This heavy reverb made the drum loop go completely out of sync and appear to bounce from left to right speaker, which I felt matched the lightening on screen perfectly.
I really enjoyed working on this project, and in 13 hours it has given me a great introduction to Ableton Live.
