SAMPLE PROMPTS/EXERCISES

This is your class, and, as such, the content is somewhat plastic, molded by your creative needs and wants. PLUS I'm pretty damn weird. I do what I can to preserve a note (more than a note) of surprise and unpredictability. That said, here’s a list of likely writing/production projects, which, in addition to blog posts and in-class writing prompts, you’ll likely be expected to complete. The purpose of this is list is ONLY to give you a general idea of the sort of work we'll be doing in this class. When the time comes to respond to one of these prompts or to work on one of these projects, it will be formally assigned.

1. ACTIVE LISTENING: Sit somewhere with your eyes closed for five minutes. Disentangle individual sounds from your sonic environment. How many sounds combine to make the unique audio environment of a specific place? Pay attention to proximity. When you open your eyes, write down at least five sounds (note, too, how close or far).


2.EVERYDAY OBJECT: Using your phone and an everyday object, record an ordinary sound that can stand in for something extraordinary and/or otherworldly.

When Linda Blair’s head turns a full 180 degrees on her possessed neck in The Exorcist it's actually a wallet twisting. Sound designers hit slabs of meat for the punches in Rocky and Fight Club. Packaged liver sliding in a flat container made the sound for E.T's walk (which Speilberg described as "liquidy and friendly.") Turns out, when a bullet hits liquid metal it sounds like an empty glass being dropped into a bucket of yogurt (and when the T-1000 morphs around the jail cell bars, it's wet dog food sucked from the can with a vacuum cleaner hose). A metal endoskeleton stomping on a human skull was a pistachio shell. Spidey's comic book "thwip" was fishing line and shaving cream; Nightcrawler's "Bamf" a vintage camera flashbulb. The legs and arms of Transformers' Jefire was a creaky oven door. A porcelain lid slowly slid from a toilet tank was the opening of the Ark of the Covenant. Freddy Kreuger's glove was a combination of leather and steel, a belt twisted and a knife slid along the blade of another knife. A wafer cone crumbling was the hatching velociraptor in Jurassic Park. So, then, think nut shells, ice cream cones, watermelon, meat, cabbage, keys, toilet tanks, etc. Try to recreate one of these sounds or come up with something new.


3. SFX & 1 WORD: Produce a thirty second to two minute audio scene using only sound effects and one word. How many sound effects do you need to paint the picture properly? Think of loaded language, emotionally charged exclamations, names. Note: You may repeat the one word as many times as you care to.


4.SONIC EVENTS: During class, you’ll have roughly five minutes to link a series of randomly selected sonic events (ranging from dog growls and dragon calls to robot footsteps and whip cracks) into a narrative chain. Your responses will likely be plot heavy, more a "treatment" than a story. At home, pick a line or two and dig in, go deep, add texture and color (that is, turn a line into a paragraph or a page).


5. FILTERED VOICE: Using the free voice filtering site linked on the class site, create a two line conversation between two filtered characters. In other words, write and record a line of dialogue for one character (say, an astronaut or a scuba diver) and then write and record a retort (of sorts) for the other character (say, an alien or a sea monster).


7. SONIC STORY: Write a THREE page story (12 pt., Times New Roman, double-spaced) with a distinct narrative voice (first, third, or, indeed, second); this will be the basis for your "sound" story. Again, this project prioritizes narration (not dialogue). Initially, this will look like a prose story, not a theatrical script. Think audio book as opposed to podcast/radio drama. Naturally, feel free to grow the story from any of the in-class writing prompts. Rather than telling a complete story, consider ending the episode with a cliffhanger that will compel a listener to “tune in” again. Include sound cues announced by the text, but include at least one diegetic sound not announced by the text.


8. AUDIO SCRIPT FORMAT: Once the story is written, put it in the proper production format. The format will, of course, lengthen the piece. Your finished script should be around FIVE pages. Formatted examples, including entire scripts, will be provided in advance of this assignment. There are three things a listener hears in a radio drama: dialogue, music, and sound effects. Each of these audio components is called a "cue"—because they come at a specific time in the script and the director may have to physically point to someone ("cue them") to produce it. An instance of dialogue, no matter how many lines, is considered one cue. All cues are numbered and music/sound effects are additionally underlined. Again, see class site for sample script format.


9. MAKE A MONSTER: King Kong’s bellow was supposedly a mix of tiger growl and lion roar played backwards at half speed, the Rancor in Return of the Jedi was a slowed-down chihuahua, and Chewbacca was a stew of badger, bear, and walrus. Mix together at least THREE sounds (at least one animal and one inanimate object), altering at least one (i.e. slowing it down, speeding it up, playing it backwards) to create the shriek/roar/yawp or indecipherable language of a made-up monster/species. Decide what your monster/creature looks like and try to evoke a specific picture with your final sound. Can the listener tell what your creature looks like by the noise it makes? That's the goal. Post MP3 recordings under the appropriate heading on the home page of the class site. Or e-mail a link/attachment at alexander.dawson@rutgers.edu.

10. SONIC STORY PRODUCTION: 5 – 10 min. Again, for the purposes of this class, a sonic story is a narrated story "dynamized" with sound effects and music (it can have a couple lines of dialogue, but should be mostly, if not entirely, narration). Think audio book. The sound effects illustrate the narrative (versus the "ear movie," in which the sound effects propel the narrative).The story need not be "complete" (many podcasts are serialized); indeed, it can be Part 1 of a larger story (and end with a cliffhanger). Your piece should contain the following: opening/closing music, 1 bridge, 1 sting/stab, 1 bed, 3 isolated sounds, 1 animal sound, 1 filtered voice, 1 weather sound, 1 sound not announced by the text.

11. EAR MOVIE PRODUCTION. 5 - 10 minutes. The story unfolds via dialogue and sound effects (w. very little narration). In the previous podcast the sound effects simply illustrated the narrated story; here, the sound effects are meant to propel the story. You must use opening music, closing music, one sting, one bridge, one sound effect bed, one musical bed, and at least five discrete sound effects (of those five, you have to record three yourself from real life).

12. VIDEO SLIDE SHOW: Turn your ear movie into a video in which the audio is accompanied by a slideshow of still photos or art (original or found online) that illustrate or enrich the work without undermining its integrity as an audio narrative. Consider ways in which to make the still images more active: pans, zooms, and transitions. Post your movie on the home page of the class site under the appropriate heading.

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