Unsung heroes of the movie industry, Foley artists create much of the sound heard in films and TV shows. A Dutch artist shows us how it’s done.
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00:00 With this profession, you really get focused on sound.
00:02 (metal clanging)
00:05 And I could be maybe cutting vegetables in the kitchen
00:07 and be like, "Hey, this is an interesting sound."
00:09 Using vegetables is always a fun part of the job.
00:12 Yeah, it gets really messy very fast.
00:14 And when you hear the end results,
00:16 suddenly the scene gets way more gross and fun to watch.
00:20 My name is Ronny van de Veer.
00:28 I'm a Foley artist and I create sound effects
00:31 for movies and TV shows.
00:33 Sound works very unconsciously in a movie.
00:40 That's what I really like about it.
00:42 So you have the objective image
00:44 and then sound is creating this extra layer.
00:47 Sound creates the details
00:49 and Foley is all about those details.
00:52 (upbeat music)
00:54 What we do is we create all kinds of little details
01:03 that make you feel closer to the characters,
01:05 make you feel more in the scene.
01:07 Footsteps are a very big part of my job.
01:12 They're also a very hard part
01:13 because there's a lot of performance included.
01:16 Like every character might walk in a bit of a different way
01:19 and then you have the surface.
01:20 So it could be like concrete, leaves, glass,
01:23 metal, a wooden floor.
01:25 (footsteps thudding)
01:28 We record here with different microphones in the room
01:32 that also record the acoustics.
01:34 So the Foley mixer with whom I'm working
01:37 will make a perspective change in the sound.
01:40 Someone is walking from further away, closer to the camera.
01:43 He can make a mix, like change the mix of the microphones
01:47 to create that effect actually,
01:49 which sounds very natural.
01:50 So it's like a very, yeah, a human thing.
01:53 Sometimes they call us also actors of sound
01:55 because like an actor, we play also with emotion.
01:58 (footsteps thudding)
02:02 We use a lot of layering in the recording process.
02:09 For instance, in a scene where like birds in a cage,
02:12 then I would first do the feathers.
02:16 And then I would maybe do the flapping of the wings
02:19 against the cage.
02:20 They have little claws that they grab onto the wood
02:26 or to the metal.
02:27 And all those layers, it's nice to do that separate.
02:33 The tricky part is that it's so much happening
02:36 at the same time and I'll try to cover everything.
02:38 Foley is a lot about details actually.
02:41 All those small details that make you believe
02:43 this is the real thing you're seeing.
02:45 (footsteps thudding)
02:48 As you can see in my studio, I have like a lot of props
02:54 because everything could be possible in a movie.
02:56 There are all kinds of different objects
02:59 that the actors are using or that need to be used.
03:02 It might look like a mess to someone
03:05 who's not a Foley artist,
03:06 but actually there's like an organized chaos actually.
03:09 Everything is like organized in categories
03:12 so I can very quickly grab it.
03:14 Nature stuff, musical stuff,
03:16 this is like one with bells for instance.
03:19 (bells jingling)
03:22 And all kinds of plastic stuff,
03:27 medical stuff, wind chimes.
03:29 And this is the recording studio.
03:34 This is where we record all the Foley.
03:36 Also again, a lot of props organized in containers
03:42 and a lot of different floors as well.
03:44 We have concrete floors,
03:45 dirt with gravel as well.
03:49 And on this side, it's more grass footsteps.
03:54 A lot of shoes as well.
03:57 To have an idea, this is the amount of shoes we used
03:59 in the previous movie, which is finished actually.
04:02 So a lot of shoes for a lot of different characters.
04:05 (orchestral music)
04:08 In my brain, I have like this whole database of sounds
04:16 from hearing stuff in real life,
04:17 but also from hearing sounds in films as well.
04:19 What I do a lot is go to secondhand stores
04:22 to hunt for props, to find objects
04:24 that I like the sound of.
04:25 This is like the secondhand shop
04:30 where I go a lot for prop hunting.
04:32 So I'm looking out for props that have a nice sound to it.
04:36 For instance, this one.
04:37 And it could be anything actually.
04:43 It could be like squeaky leather belts or shoes
04:48 or nice glasses.
04:50 This thing, I don't even know what it is,
04:51 but it has a nice sound to it.
04:54 Could be used for, I don't know, anything.
05:05 I do think I see or I hear the world differently actually.
05:08 I think I'm quite sensitive to sound,
05:10 but also in a nice way,
05:11 because I also notice the nice sounds.
05:13 Like I could be sitting in the garden
05:14 and could really enjoy a bird flying over
05:17 or an insect chirping or flying next to me.
05:20 That's a nice thing about the job, I think,
05:22 that you get more aware of the world around you,
05:24 like the sound world around you actually.
05:27 (dramatic music)
05:30 (dramatic music)
05:33 [BLANK_AUDIO]