About: The Listening Method
We write for people who make films and want them to sound like somewhere.
Feeling first, equipment second
Most sound advice begins with gear. Ours begins with a question: what should the audience feel, and where should they feel they are standing?
SignalStorSceneTonc is an independent editorial site about sound for film scenes and digital media. We publish guides to ambience, dialogue, Foley, layering, transitions and mixing for filmmakers, editors and anyone who has watched their own work back and sensed that something was missing.
How every guide is structured
- Listen without judgementPlay the scene through and note what you feel, before naming any technical problem.
- Diagnose the missing layerIs it the floor (ambience), the voice (dialogue), the body (Foley), the emotion (music) or the movement between scenes (transitions)?
- Make one deliberate choiceRecord, replace, carve or remove — one change at a time, so you can hear its effect.
- Listen once moreOn a different system, ideally the next day.
What you can expect from us
We are not paid by manufacturers, studios or software vendors, and we do not accept sponsored placements. Where we name a microphone or a standard, it is because it is widely used and useful as a reference, not an endorsement.
Technical figures such as loudness targets are drawn from published standards — EBU R 128, ATSC A/85, ITU-R BS.1770 — and distributor specifications. Standards change, so we always recommend confirming current requirements with your distributor. If you spot an error, please tell the sound desk; we correct mistakes promptly and note significant updates.
Our guides draw on the wider literature of film sound, including Walter Murch's In the Blink of an Eye, Michel Chion's Audio-Vision and David Sonnenschein's Sound Design. We recommend all three.