Today we booked out an editing suite and began editing the final piece. Using the archive footage we collected we were able to create a very impressive and convincing battlefield atmosphere to accompany our dialogue. Our actors were very impressive and very little editing of this needed to be carried out. All we needed to do was either shorten or elongate their dramatic pauses. Other than this, our actors were very convincing and we’re glad that we cast them.
Using the archive footage was really helpful. We had collected quite a catalogue of sounds to use and we limited repetition of their use. During editing, we noticed that the dialogue recordings seem to provide the room ambience which almost achieved what we wanted to with the radio studio walls. To give the audience a sense of place, between being outdoors in the trench or indoors in the bunker, we edited the bomb track accordingly. The indoor bomb track was obviously quieter with more bass to simulate sound travelling through the mud walls. When outside, the original track was brought back in.
The hardest scene to edit was probably scene 4 due to its length and the amount of actions that take place. When Thomas teaches Adam to write, the pencil sounds are very different. As Adam has had less practice, his pencil sounds are much slower and dragged out. Thomas as he has been writing for years is obviously much faster. One thing we did find was that one of the actors delivered one of his lines a little strange. To resolve this, we spaced out his lines with audio. This resolved the problem as it sounded like he was interrupted by what was going on around him.
After the final piecing together making sure that each scene flowed smoothly we finally had our finished radio drama. Listening back we as the production team were quite blown away with what we achieved. We’re sure that listeners will be very entertained and that we have represented the First World War with respect and accuracy. Write ups are currently being undertaken ready for uploading.
