Recent Developments in Sound Engineering Academy

Project on Audio For Films by SEA
Students who are currently undergoing training in sound Engineering Academy is embarking on a new project which will be a prestigious one for both in students careers and also for the academy. In the previous batches of sound engineering academy, students have created various projects on different aspects and use of sound in the real world. This is the first time students are creating a project based on film sound production. As part of this endeavour, students will be shooting a film where in utmost importance will be given to sound and sound production. This film project is named as Broken Strings

Find more information about this project in http://soundsacademy.blogspot.com/2012/01/project-on-audio-for-film-by-sound.html

Young Business  Entrepreneur  Award for CEO of SEA
Sound Engineering Academy is been delivering training in the field of Sound Engineering since 2004. Mr. AR Vishnu who is the CEO and Director of SEA, Trivandrum kerala has dedicated his life and efforts in creating bright careers / future for students in the field of Sound Engineering Academy. In the previous sound engineering batches more than 90% of students has been placed in various TV Channels, FM Stations, Event Management companies and in various other sound related companies.

Mr. AR Vishnu has been awarded several times by various media channels and organisations in india for the contributions he has made to the media. Recently the Rotaty Club of Trivandrum Royal has awarded Mr. Vishnu with Young Business Entrepreneur Award of 2011. The certificate is given by Sri CN Balakrishnan, Honorable minister for Co-operation in the state of Kerala.

Visit the link http://soundsacademy.blogspot.com/2012/01/young-business-entrepreneur-award.html for more details and related images.

Other recent stories

Story of Sound Archive Collection by SEA - 194 National Anthems of various countries
http://soundsacademy.blogspot.com/2012/01/story-of-sound-archive-collection-by.html

First launch of Live- X ELX118P in Kerala and SEA
http://soundsacademy.blogspot.com/2011/12/first-launch-of-live-x-elx118p-in.html

A Video HK Elements by Sound Engineering Academy
http://soundsacademy.blogspot.com/2011/12/video-hk-elements-by-sound-engineering.html

Legendary Violinist Chidambaranath Visited Sound Engineering Academy
http://soundsacademy.blogspot.com/2011/12/legendary-violinist-chidambaranath.html

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TIMELINE -- DEVELOPMENT OF FILM AND SOUND ON FILM

1870s -- Eadweard Muybridge -- Movement of a horse stop action photography on glass plates. Done with multiple cameras designed so that a horse's foot would trip each shutter.

1882 -- Frenchman Etienne-Jules Marey designed a camera to record 12 separate images on a single strip of film. In 1888 he designed the first flexible film.

1889 -- Eastman Kodak introduces celluoid flexible film base

1888 -- Thomas Alva Edison meets with Edweard Muybidge and purchases 90 of his plates to begin experimenting with moving pictures. His intention was to couple live action with the sound produced by his phonograph.

Late 1880s -- Edison commissions William Kennedy Laurie Dickson to build a film camera. Dickson develops the Kinetograph which coupled recorded images with phonographic sound. The final result in 1892, the peep show penny arcades which were first installed in 1894.
William Kennedy Laurie Dickson conducted many experiments with the Kinetograph. One of the earliest surviving experiments is his film of co-worker Fred Ott's "Sneeze":
         
1895 -- Louis and Auguste Lumiere present the first film projector -- the Cinematographe.

1896 -- Edison produces a film projector developed by Thomas Armat and C. Francis Jenkins and exploited by vaudeville peep show promoters Norman C. Raff and Frank R. Gammon. This projector was called the Vitascope.

April 1896 -- First public movie theatre -- the Theatre Robert Houdin -- operated by magician and photographer Georges Melies in Paris using a modified British projector developed initially by Robert William Paul. Meleis became known for developing the world's first "trick" photography with cut edits and disolves. 1902 he produced Jules Verne's A Trip To The Moon 14 minutes long and three times the length of any previous film. This also demonstrated Melies genius for editing with 30 separate scenes.

1902 -- 1926 : The era of the silent film while inventors including Edison sought to link sound mechanically with moving film images.
1904 -- Frenchman Eugene Lauste records sound onto a piece of photographic film

1907 -- 1913 various fim and sound inventions included the Vivaphone, Synchroscope, the Chronophone, the Cameraphone and the Cinephone. Edison produced the Kinetophone in 1913 -- a "Rube Goldberg" device of belts and pulleys and received boos for his efforts at Keith's Union Square theatre in New York City.

19teens -- Western Electric develops along with Lee DeForest (1906 Audion) a method or recording and reproducing sound electronically on disc. Western Electric Buought the rights to the use of the Audio for amplifying the phonographic sound.

1921 -- DeForest improves the method of recording sound on film and patents a new invention he calls the phonofilm.

September 1925 -- Warner Bros. contracts with the AT&T method of sound with film and releases its first sound with film pictures in 1926 using a system dubbed theVitaphone. Don Juan, released in 1926 was the first film to inlcude music on an amplified sound- track.

October 1927 -- The Jazz Singer featuring Al Jolson is released by Warner Bros. Not an immediate hit in New York, but it gained long-lasting fame when it moved into America's heartland. It was rebooked in 1928 in New York and grossed $100,000 a week.

May 1927 -- Fox Film Corporation works with a new AT&T development -- sound on film. Fox uses this system to produce newsreels which would play prior to feature films at theatres.The first big publicity coups was the flight of Charles Lindbergh across the Atlantic. Also memorable was the capturing of the explosion of the Hindenburg. These newsreel shorts became known as the Movietone News.

May 1928 -- the major film companies (Paramount, Loews/MGM, First National and United Artists) sign with AT&T to produce pictures with sound on film despite the introduction of a competing format developed by RCA.

End of 1920s -- only a few theatres in America's largest cities continued to maintain a house orchestra and organist.

September 1928 -- Warner Bros. releases The Singing Fool -- again starring Al Jolson. Tickets for the first night were $11.00. "Sonny Boy" and "There's a Rainbow 'Round My Shoulder" from the film became the first million selling record of the "talkie" era. The Singing Fool cost $200,000 to produce but drew an unprecedented $5,000,000.

7 simple steps for connecting a single microphone and a pair of speakers

My dear students & friends -  here is the 7 simple steps for connecting a single  microphone and a pair of speakers.

STEP 1.   Install the two speakers, one on each side of the front of your audience. Aim the speakers so that the left speaker covers the left side of the audience and the right side speaker covers the right side of the audience. This is for mono use. If you choose stereo, you'll need two sound sources such as a left and right channel of music/sound. One microphone should always be hooked up mono.





STEP 2.  Place your single cardioid microphone on its stand where you plan to place the person speaking but never in front of the speakers. When you place the microphone in front of the speakers, your chances of producing feedback (that squealing sound) are greatly enhanced. A microphone placed behind the sound system has a much better chance of rejecting feedback. The cardioid microphon’s pick up pattern is directed away from the back of the mic and helps to reduce feedback as well.

STEP 3. Connect the microphone cable to your mixer/preamp at input one. You may have a "line" or "mic" switch above the volume knob or slider. Use the "mic" position. The "line" position is normally used for music sources such as a CD or Cassette player. If you have a gain control knob, (sometimes called trim) above the slider/ fader, fix it To get the proper input level.

STEP 4. Connect the preamplifier/mixer mono output to the mono input of your amplifier. If there is no mono input on your amplifier, you may use the left chanel of the amp to drive both speakers (assuming you have enough power in the amp) or "Y" the Left and Right inputs to the amplifier. This means that the mono out of the preamp is "Y" connected to both left and right amplifier inputs. Set the amplifier volume controls to minimum until we get a good level coming out of your preamp.



STEP 5.  Connect the output channels of your amplifier to the left and right speakers. Keep cables neat and taped down. They are easy to trip on and cause injury to someone.

STEP 6. Now that you're all connected, you can set levels. Take the mic and talk normally into it. Watch the meter on the preamplifier as you raise the slider (or fader) up slowly. Have your master control set at 3/4 or "7" as a good place to begin. Raise the input one control until you reach the maximum allowable setting on your meter. this would be "0" on a needle meter (VU Meter) or to the yellow light on an LED meter. If you get into the red, lower your gain setting on the "input gain" knob. Your ideal setting should be with your input one slider or knob at 3/4 or "7" for correct mixing board operation. Never run your input way down low and your master way up high. This will only overload your console and give you distorted sound.

STEP 7. When you've got your proper settings on the preamplifier, slowly turn your amplifier volume controls up until a good listening volume is achieved. If your mic goes into feedback, lower the volume or move the mic further away from the speakers.

AR Vishnu