I id this assignment and based it off of the movie Super 8. The movie is set in the early 80’s and is about a group of kids who uncover some secrets. The kids witness a chaotic train crash. I wanted to create a 911 call that might have taken place if cell phones had existed. I’m not thrilled with my performance in this, but its the idea that counts!

This was the last assignment I completed for the 10 stars required in Audio Assignments for the week. This one required me to tell a story, basically pretend I was making a phone call, and add background noise to make it more realistic.

I decided to incorporate my secret agent, Margo, into this assignment. I scripted it so that Margo was leaving Moscow to fly back to London with top-secret information she acquired in Russia. She makes an off-handed comment about how the weather was bad and that she would make an arrangement with a man named Thomas to pass along the information. I ended the call with Margo having to board her plane. To signal this, I inserted the background noise of a stewardess announcing it was time to board the plane.

To complete the assignment, I recorded myself as Margo through the Voice Memo app on my phone and then uploaded it to my computer and transferred it to Audacity. I got the background noise of the airport from freesounds.org and uploaded the recording to Audacity. The assignment was relatively is to complete, it just required some creativty.

For this assignment I kept my team project in mind and thinking of how I could add this possibly to our radio show. I struggled with adding my recording thanks to different file types but my goal was for my agent to send an SOS call. My agent’s story ended with her being in Cuba on a secret mission, when she notices her husband in the same hotel….when he is suppose to be in Hong Kong. Fearing the worse, my agent, Mila Tate, immediately escapes the hotel to her safe house. Her safe house is compromised and she is sending out a signal for immediate help!

• Update I had a failed upload on my audio file so my audios are two separate files. One is the background sound and two being my Agent’s call.

For this assignment, I thought it would be cool to incorporate my character, Helga Schwarz. The task is to make a message, like a voicemail message, or a phone call, like a 9-1-1 call. I chose to make a voicemail message, in which I am impersonating Helga, leaving a message for her grandson. In the message, Helga tries to get her grandson to come over for Apfel Strudel, and explains to him that she missed his call because she was going out for groceries.

I wouldn’t say this assignment was particularly hard, but I did try to find an old-person sounding voice for it. After not being able to find one that was compatible with Audacity, I set out to change the pitch a couple times to get it kind-of grandma sounding. I guess? I don’t know, but the message came across. I also used a voicemail-recorder voice at the beginning to give it that real-feel voicemail sound.

Overall it didn’t take long, but I think its particularly funny (probably only because It’s my voice, and no one likes their voice recorded). I think it’s also funny because I was impersonating a grandma, LOL. I think I gave it a signature Helga vibe, because the retired ex-spy mentioned that last week was hectic for her, but this week is all free, and last week she had to pull out the glock. Mysterious, right? XD

Hope y’all enjoy!

-Caty

Today I made up a voicemail left for Kai’s little brother, Gavin. This was done for Audio assignment #2194. In the voicemail you can hear that Kai is clearly on the run, from the gang called the Blue, my story’s villain. You can hear also in the background that he is running away, and up stairs. After running up the stairs you can hear that an explosion occurs in the background at which point Kai hurries to end the phone call.

I made this voicemail using Audacity (duh what else would I use). I began by recording the voicemail using the record feature. Once I was happy with that part, I went on freesounds.org and found audio of fast footsteps on stone, and then also of running up stairs. I imported these in and dragged them to the proper place, and then found more gunshots and explosions on freesounds to add in to make it more dramatic. I got the idea for this because I wanted to make it more dramatic and cool, in Kai’s semi-relaxed response to the explosion in the background. This further adds to the “swagger” that I want my character to have. Also I made the comment at the end because one of my pet-peeves is when people don’t pick up the phone when I most need it. I make this joke with my wife all of the time. I’ll tell her I could be calling her about something frivolous and she would pick up first ring. But if I need her brain for something (she’s much smarter then me) immediately there’s NO shot she picks up at all! Haha! I think if I had to do this assignment again I would do more to make it more real. Like maybe add some voices in the background, or ambient voices or screams after the explosions. Hope you enjoyed!

Just Zaying…

In this audio assignment worth a whopping 5 stars, I created a phone call from the perspective of a character in Philip K. Dick’s short story, The Defenders. This assignment was the perfect one for doing what we were assigned to this week: weave in something that has to do with a story we’ve experienced so far in the class. While I’ve read some short stories and listened to others, this one seemed like the best choice to me. The situation where some humans were stuck above ground and others were stuck below ground makes for a great opportunity for a phone call or message left to communicate between them. I took on the personality of Taylor, a worker separated from his wife and his company, and delivered a joyous message to the underground. To represent his character, I made the message have more formal language and have a hopeful tone. This is meant to be an uplifting, groundbreaking message because it’s letting the people underground know that the world is vibrant and ready to be lived in again!

To add to the phone call vibe, I downloaded some royalty free sound effects of a dial tone and busy tone to bookend around my speech. I also lowered the pitch of my speech in Audacity to make me a little more manly. Sadly there were no females for me to impersonate in my phone call. All in all, I’m happy with my phone call and hope it gives you a glimpse into Philip K. Dick’s future world post-post-apocalypse.

For this assignment, I decided to play the role of Vic leaving a voice message for his mom after the tragic events of killing Quilla June and feeder her to blood.

Here is the audio clip