Editing videos is a part of my professional life. Hours are spent importing video into an editing program, rendering, titling, and making edits. As a result, tracking screen time is a waste of time. Tracking my activity levels is the more worthwhile activity. The processes involved in doing my job take time. So, while a certain process is running, it’s important that I not sit waiting but get up and do some other activity.
I get to do mundane things around the house, such as cooking, dusting, or washing dishes. I periodically check the computer to monitor what’s happening.
The job’s most time-consuming and challenging part is adjusting and fixing audio. We don’t always get to pick and choose a quiet spot to record material. Problems like background noise are common. Videographers do everything they can to eliminate issues before they record. But even otherwise quiet locations, like a peaceful cottage, can provide challenges. I walk into rooms and habitually listen for problematic background noise. Naturally, you learn to filter it out in person. But it becomes annoying when recorded and played back to an audience. Another issue is people’s poor or non-existent microphone technique at meetings and events. A favorite of mine is the guy who holds the microphone at waist level and expects it to be recorded clearly. Technology can only do so much.
So, much of my screen time on the job is spent on sound rather than video. The next time you watch an annoying news clip with some nasty background noise, think about some poor editor who pulled their hair out trying to reduce the nuisance while preserving what was being said.
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Remember the Ruth Buzzi/Arte Johnson skit on that TV show ‘Laugh In?” One year we decided to recreate that for an office Christmas Party. Someone found a cricket sound and had that softly in the background of the skit. The videographer played the tape and was confounded by ‘that noise in the background.’ The cricket sound! That background sound had to go–way too distracting.
That’ exactly what I’m talking about!
I experience this in a small way every time I try to use my phone to take a video of cranes calling to each other. I end up recording my breathing which isn’t inordinately loud in real life.
the problem gets to be that isolation routines wwork to remove sounds like that, but can remove frequencies that you’d like to retain.
Lou, you just reminded me of the scene in Singing in the Rain, when they were trying to get Lena Lamont to speak into her microphone, but it either recorded her fabric and beads rustling around, or she kept moving her head around, so her voice only came through in waves. I was dying! Thank you for directing our attention to how to appreciate a tough job. I listen to a lot of podcasts, and sound is a big deal. It’s quite noticeable, and the podcasters are often commenting (usually apologizing) about it.