Tuesday, 22 November 2011

Sound Effect Clichés

·         Animals are never silent - dogs whine/bark/yip, cat’s meow or purr, cows moo, even in some cases where most animals wouldn't be making a sound.
·         Dogs always know who the bad guy is, and bark at them.
·         In a horror film when there is a full moon there is either an owl hooting or a wolf howling in the distance.
·         Car tyres and footsteps crunch on gravel.
·         In a chase situation car tyres squeal when car turns, pulls away or stops.
·         Every button you press on a computer makes some kind of beep or click.
·         Storms start instantaneously with a crack of thunder and lightning.
·         Thunder is always in sync with lightning.
·         In horror films, doors always creek when hero/heroine is searching big, empty house.
·         An approaching airplane or helicopter will make no noise until it is directly over the characters, at which point it will suddenly become extremely loud.
·         Even when depicted as foreigners (including aliens from outer space) all actors speak and understand a common language (usually English) unless the film's plot depends on a language barrier.
·         Kids always whisper even if their two inches away from a villain - he won't hear. If they step on a branch however, the villains will immediately know it’s not some animal, and catch them.
·         When villains fall to their deaths, you can hear their screams gradually fade out, even if they only fall ten feet or so.
·         Anytime a person speaks into a microphone, their first words will cause microphone feedback.
·         When listening to music on the radio in the car, the song on the radio never changes during a single scene. The scene rarely outlasts the song...if it does, one of the characters will turn the radio off before the end of the song.
·         There are never any commercials playing on radios or TVs.
·         People never answer the door until the doorbell or knocking has sounded at least twice.
·         Explosions in space make noise.
·         All machine guns sound alike.
·         When people are on the phone, there’s rarely any background noise.

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