Creating Hurricane scene

[trueindie]

What is the cheapest best way to create a scene like one of those newscasters in a hurricane? Any opinions / ideas will be much appreciated.
thanks
aveek

[Lucky Hardwood]

Come down to New Orleans immediately.

[PaulGriffith]

Originally Posted by Lucky Hardwood

Come down to New Orleans immediately.

Hahaha, I shouldn't be laughing this hard at that.

Big fans and lots of water? IndyMogul has a pretty cheap DIY rain machine I think. We've used leaf blowers quite effectively as wind generators when you don't need dialogue. For one rain scene we did, we just poured water from a watering can onto the actors so that there was some "rain" bouncing off them and interacting and what not, the rest is digital rain created with a particle system and it looks pretty good!

[trueindie]

@luckyhardowood... hahaha... i was just watching the forecast... stay safe my friend

@Paul... brilliant paul. you always have the answers. I think I'm going to use a watering can and find myself a powerful fan.
thanks

[Ernest Worthing]

Fans and water, as Paul said. Throw in more movement in the background. Have a dumpster or something moving. Have someone offscreen pull it with a hidden rope, transparent line. Then throw in leaves and blow them around with another fan.

The more details, the more the realistic it will look.

[trueindie]

thanks for the tips Ernest

[AudioPostExpert]

With something like a hurricane scene you need to be thinking not just about the visuals but also the sound. Sound can make turn a scene like this into anything from a comedy to a horror or just make it appear cheap and/or boring. To be effective and create dramatic impact, you therefore need to be designing the scene for sound as much as the other way around. I can't be more specific with suggestions unless you are more specific about what you are trying to achieve emotionally with the scene.

G

[Ewan]

If you don't have enough money to do some of the practical elements, there are some things you can do in post to make the effect more convincing, though I'd go with practical first off.

[mussonman]

Originally Posted by AudioPostExpert

With something like a hurricane scene you need to be thinking not just about the visuals but also the sound. Sound can make turn a scene like this into anything from a comedy to a horror or just make it appear cheap and/or boring. To be effective and create dramatic impact, you therefore need to be designing the scene for sound as much as the other way around. I can't be more specific with suggestions unless you are more specific about what you are trying to achieve emotionally with the scene.

G

He said it's for a news reporter, so I think it'd be acceptable if the sound went crappy when the wind picked up and hit the reporter's mic.

[AudioPostExpert]

Originally Posted by mussonman

He said it's for a news reporter, so I think it'd be acceptable if the sound went crappy when the wind picked up and hit the reporter's mic.

He didn't say it's for a news reporter, he said "like one of those newscasters in a hurricane". That's why I asked for more information about what he was trying to create. For example, are we talking about a newscaster scene playing on a TV in the background or are we talking about being there with the newscaster and if we're supposed to be there, what emotions are trying to be elicited from the audience (awe, fear, amusement, etc.)? Even for a news broadcast the reporter would have to keep doing takes until the dialogue was intelligible. But in my previous post I wasn't talking specifically about the dialogue, I was talking about the sound of the scene overall and getting it to play with the desired dramatic impact, even if it's just a sequence in the background on a TV.

One other important point, in film there is a huge difference between creating the illusion of crappy sound and actually having crappy sound. One draws you in, enhances the story and makes you look like a talented filmmaker, the other pulls you out of the scene and makes you look like an amateur.

G

[trueindie]

Thanks AudioPostExpert. Absolutely sound is important. I'm still thinking about the scene. It's for a funny bit in a commercial. Not sure if I'll actually go with this one or some other ideas buzzing around in my head.

Appreciate your thoughts very much. Got me thinking some more about the sound.

[AudioPostExpert]

Originally Posted by trueindie

I'm still thinking about the scene. It's for a funny bit in a commercial.

Ah, so we're talking comedy. Again though, we still need to narrow it down a bit, to give an example, let's say we're talking black comedy. You could play the scene where you had the sound of a cat's scream coming from one speaker (with distance and perspective), which gets gets the attention of the reporter, then a cat (dummy of course) flies past, behind the reporter, with accompanying panning doppler effect of the scream to the other speaker, then (out of shot) the sound of a crash/breaking glass/debris, etc., as the cat hits a window. Alternatively you could have the same thing but played more straight by having the reporter continuing with his/her report, ignoring the cat, it's scream and impact. In this case you would mix all the cat stuff a bit lower in the mix. The more convincing the wind noise with movement and bits of debris flying, cables rattling, etc., the more shocking and blacker the comedy. The other comedy extreme would be more cartoon like sound FX, which could be made funny but not so black. I'm not suggesting you actually do any of this, just giving you an example to illustrate the need to plan for sound design before you start filming because in at least one of the examples I've given, the reporter needs to react to the sound (even though it won't actually be there until post production) of the cat or maybe pretend to ignore the sound.

I'd like to emphasise the point I'm trying to make because it is one of the most obvious differences between high budget films and indie films. Indie filmmakers tend to see sound design (if they see it at all) as a purely post production process but many high budget films use sound design as a collaborative art, not just as a reactive technical skill. In other words, from pre-production onwards, the film is designed for sound as much as the sound is designed for the film! In the first example I gave, you could have a master shot which establishes the presence of a window (for the cat to hit, out of shot later), cables, chains or other objects which will make an interesting, emotive sound (in post) in high winds. There are many, many other (more subtle) examples of how a film can be designed for sound and how it can be done at either no extra cost or to actually reduce costs of the production process! One of the reasons I came on this forum was to try and get indie filmmakers to start thinking about sound more like high budget films do, to use it collaboratively to make more imaginative films, even with extremely restrictive budgets. Think about the implications of this for a minute! .... In the example I gave, the audience would get the full dramatic effect of an impact with breaking glass and flying debris but without any of the costs associated with actually faking a cat impacting with and breaking a window and trying to capture it on camera!

Food for thought?

G

[trueindie]

@A.P.E. Awesome post. Thanks for taking the time to be so illustrative. Every time I come to this forum, I learn something. Thanks again

[GuerrillaAngel]

Oregon coast between October to April.

[mussonman]

Originally Posted by AudioPostExpert

He didn't say it's for a news reporter, he said "like one of those newscasters in a hurricane".

Ah, I misread it, then.