Overall Reflection
When I started this line of enquiry I had a pretty clear idea that diegetic underscoring would be a more effective means of scoring than the traditional method, however through research and experimentation I have become more familiar with the intricacies and difficulties of the method.
My first difficulty is that the context within which this method can be used seems to be fairly niche, not every cinematic scene or situation lends itself to diegetic scoring. It’s completely dependant on the emotional narrative of a scene, because a diegetic composer is limited in their approach. If a scene requires an intense composition but is set somewhere with minimal sound, the composer will find their job very difficult. This could result in very creative uses of foley or ambience and doesn’t negate the possibility of great work, I am only acknowledging that this is a difficulty specific to the practice.
The second point id like to make is that using diegetic elements in a musical score seems to be more common than I first thought, there are multiple composers I have researched that engage in this practice as a diegetic anchorage. I think my enquiry was less of an overview of the practice, as it was an exploration of the spectrum of audiovisual correspondence within the practice. Through my experimentation and creative piece I discovered that the approach to diegetic underscoring boils down to abstraction, the degree of abstraction one wants to engage in. The higher the abstraction the higher the emotional intensity (in the majority of cases), however the abstraction detracts from the audiovisual correspondence and therefore the conceivable diegesis of the sound.
The last problem I encountered was the realisation of the piece, the creation of these two audio works was an invaluable process of experimentation and learning, but I wouldn’t say that they reflect the method in the best possible way. I think the first issue was the lack of a film scene to work from, if I were to have a scene I would be able to map out and choreograph the intensity and synchronisation to match the intensity of the scene. Unfortunately I had to conduct the recording as more of an experiment, investigating the transition from one state to another. Chaos and synchronisation. Another problem I had was the lack of participants, the recording would have been more effective had there been more people, and ideally dancers as they would have a better idea of how to use their body. I found the recording difficult to mix into a scene, to me the recording of the eight participants and the atmosphere sound separate. To remedy this I would, as I’ve said, have more participants in a larger space, and perhaps record more footsteps in the same space to mix into the ambience.
I think my piece works well as a middle ground between ambience and foley, and as such is an excellent avenue for subtle manipulation of the audience. The recordings may not be perfect due to the issues listed above but the process worked as proof of my research. If this method were to be used in a production with a decent budget, I as the sound designer would be working from a film scene, be able to increase the level of choreography tailoring it to the narrative, hire more participants who have a dancing background, and record with consideration to the implementation of the sound in the diegetic environment (If I had the time, patience, money and opportunity I would create a convolution reverb at the location of shooting).
Minimal abstraction with dialogue-
Higher abstraction no dialogue-